There is a place where you and I must reside. It is called the uncommon place. It is at times a lonely place, and is where few choose to reside.

However, there is a call being heralded throughout the world. There is a cry going out to the ends of the earth for those who will take up the challenge to rise up as leaders in their families, their schools, their universities, their workplaces, their churches, and throughout the entire fabric that makes up today’s society.

Who will take up the challenge? Who will count the cost? Who will pay the price? Who will stand against the tide of common opinion? Who will speak out? Who will be light? Who will be salt? Who will be a city set on a hill?

This is where those who stand up in response to this call will be and are transformed from the ordinary into the extraordinary. It may take decades to manifest, but if you persist it will surely appear.

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Peter J. Daniels, (born in 1932 in Adelaide, Australia) is an Australian life coach, writer, and professional speaker. On January 14 through 16 in 1984 I entered a motel room with one of his first published books, a Gideon Bible and a notebook with one intention – to unveil my destiny. Those three days of prayer and fasting changed my life forever.

So when I had the privilege of hearing Peter speak at a seminar in my hometown this past week, after so many years, I felt compelled to  honor this great and godly man by including his brief biography(that now covers 78 years) here in my Motivational Memo Blog.

Peter Daniels was illiterate and worked as a brick-layer’s assistant. He came from a disadvantaged background and was challenged with illiteracy in his early years. His family was third generation welfare recipients, he has two alcoholic brothers, 4 fathers and 2 mothers. Many of his relatives have been in jail. He failed at every grade in school, became a bricklayer, and at 26 years of age was hopelessly in debt.

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‘The mind is like a muscle and it can be developed.’ Peter J. Daniels

I heard Peter speak again this weekend at my local church, and it’s twenty four years since I first came in contact with the author of that quote. For three days I shut myself away in a motel room with three books – one book written by Peter J. Daniels, the Gideon Bible, and a blank notebook.

During those three days I filled that notebook and mapped out my future, including the businesses that I believed I would develop in the years to come. At the time I was not yet a businessman, and I was unaware of any businessmen being in my recent known ancestry. So it was virgin ground that I was entering, and experience has been my greatest teacher. This was the beginning of my mind muscle development that has continued to this very day.

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‘If you love learning, you love the discipline that goes with it – how shortsighted to refuse correction.’ Proverbs 12:1 The Message

Laziness will never produce anything of value. Tardiness will leave behind disappointment and unfulfilled promises. But discipline will instill confidence and provide excellence as its hallmark.

But discipline takes on many forms, and it is my purpose to unveil how we are to apply this to our daily lives.

So here are five areas where I have found discipline to help me live a fulfilled and productive life.

1. A Disciplined Mind

How you fill your mind will determine the way you think and the way you live. That is why I spend a portion of each day in the disciplining of my mind. Most days I start by reading wisdom literature, which includes the Bible along with material written in that field – from both the past and the present. I flick though the newspapers with one purpose only, and that is to find commentary on the businesses I’m either involved or interested in, but I refuse to focus on the negative.

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Life is a battlefield, and we are the soldiers engaged in the battle for our future.

Along the way many of us have been wounded. And many of us have been healed, and yet there are many of us that although we appear healed on the surface our wounds are left festering beneath.

This comes in the form of blaming that our past has impacted our future. It is also found in the unforgiveness still held against the offenders who may have wounded us.

The result?

Stunted growth. Opportunities lost. Potential waylaid.

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