Drive over Ambition. Always.
Although it seems that drive and ambition are the same thing at face value, I would actually suggest that they are two very different concepts, and that one is much greater and more important than the other.
Ambition literally defined is ‘a strong desire or urge to do something’, and while ambition is honourable and important, I think that it’s what we do with ambition that counts the most.
Without drive to push forward, those things that we’ve hoped for, prayed about and journalled around - we are stuck. We may be excited about what might and what could be as we ponder the plethora of possibilities we’re presented with. But drive, I believe, is what takes us from dreamer to doer.
This same sort of message could be written around the concept of motivation over discipline too. Motivation exists when we have an initial idea, or when we have a sudden wave of inspiration and we are ready to get moving. I’m sure you know what I mean - after you’ve watched a really inspiring Netflix documentary for example, and you’re in a place of inspiration which means you can’t help but keep moving and get excited about everything that could be in store for you. Although there’s nothing wrong with this of course, the issue comes when that motivation no longer exists. All it might take is a bad day or somebody suggesting that the concept that you’ve been dreaming about for all of these months is a bad idea, and suddenly, the motivation of the day before is crumpled into a heap on the floor.
Discipline on the other hand is a little different to that. Discipline is the idea that regardless of how you feel, you will do the thing that you know that you need to do, or are called to do, or indeed want to do, no matter what. Now before you think that this has completely changed the tone of what we typically talk about here at Time & Pace, I want to make something very clear…
Drive and discipline don’t need a deadline.
This is where what I say here at Time & Pace, and what others might say becomes a little different. Discipline which suggests that you need to be at your desk at the exact same time every single day, otherwise the goals that you set for yourself aren’t serious enough don’t work for everyone - they certainly don’t work for me. As I’ve mentioned before, we as human beings operate in seasons and stages as opposed to robots with the exact temperaments and tasks day in and day out.
Consider an aspiring marathon runner for example. They might wake up most days at a similar sort of time and train for the marathon that they want to run in the future. However they may also, during the period of time at their training, encounter injury or personal circumstances which couldn’t have been predicted, or I don’t know... a global pandemic. The fact that suddenly they are not running every day at the same time anymore doesn’t mean they are not disciplined - it means that they are human. However, what discipline and drive do look like in this instance is not giving up. Because giving up will happen if ambition and motivation are the only things that you have got to go on. The truth is, you won’t always feel ambitious, nor will you always feel motivated. I believe that drive is what gets you up in the morning - even if it’s not quite every morning.
Thinking about this same marathon runner - if they are running in memory of a lost loved one, for example, they are going to be driven to ensure that the marathon happens - whether that’s in 2021 or 2022 or beyond because of how committed they are to the cause. This means that when they wake up on a day that they feel generally okay and as though they could definitely go out and run they will, even if the idea of doing it is not the most fun thing in their minds at that particular moment.
Without the thing that drives and compels you to do the work that you’re here to do, you’ll inevitably come to a day, a week, or a month where you simply don’t feel like it anymore, and that will be that. This is why I believe that whether our goals are long or short term, they need to drive us enough to take action without needing 10,000 pep talks and the stars aligning first. Of course, having drive doesn’t mean there won’t be ‘off’ days - read anything I’ve previously written to understand that… but know that without something compelling you to action, action will 100% be harder and less consistent.
And so as we close, as ever, here’s your journal prompt - What is your why? What’s the drive that fuels all of the ambition and motivation you have into disciplined action?
When you know that, you’ll be pretty much unstoppable.
Keep going. Keep growing. 💜
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