Throughout my life, discipline has been deeply ingrained into my idea of success. Those who wake up early get more work done. Those who maintain a healthy diet live longer. Those who persevere for months make breakthroughs.

While this philosophy has merit, something has always struck me about how this opposes the personal value I place on spontaneity. Being spontaneous allows you to interact with people outside your normal routine, not worry about a plan, and end up in cool situations. My best memories have all been spontaneous: A trip to Vancouver, pickup basketball games, morning hikes, and late night walks. When you stop planning out your days, you feel free.

Additionally, being spontaneous shows you care about people. Imagine I run into you on my way home, you invite me to dinner, and I drop the plans I had scheduled to vibe with you. Those are the type of people I want to invest my time in. People that live in the moment.

In today’s world, there is an overwhelming emphasis on work and productivity that often takes precedence over the human aspects of life. This societal push towards constant productivity has a subtle yet profound impact; it chips away at the essence of what makes us human — our relationships and shared experiences. As we shift focus from one task to the next, we forgo the casual, unplanned interactions that are the heartbeat of our social existence. There is an irony in working towards a better life while inadvertently distancing ourselves from the spontaneous connections that enrich it.

So, as someone who wants to be disciplined but also live a very human experience, how do I balance these two, seemingly opposing ideals?

The Concept of Proactive Discipline

I was always taught that opportunity = luck + preparation. In the same way, I think to be truly spontaneous, you have to be prepared to not be doing what you “should be doing.” This idea sounds simple, but can be effective. For example, if you stay a week ahead on your homework, getting swept away to play volleyball on Wednesday night isn’t such a big deal.

The challenge is that the idea of ‘proactive discipline’ must be applied in every aspect of your life because it is a limiting factor. Getting ahead on work is straightforward since it’s not hard to predict what you will need to complete in the future. Where I personally struggled with this was in home organization. In fact, I have been implementing the idea of proactive discipline out in my apartment recently- keeping it quite clean. I feel happier, cleaner, and am able to come home late and not worry about chores.

I believe that finding balance between discipline and spontaneity is possible, but it requires intentional effort and self-awareness. It comes down to setting priorities and being mindful of how those priorities fit into your daily life. Discipline should not be a rigid set of rules that control your every move, but rather a tool to help you achieve your goals and create the space for spontaneity in your life.

You might wonder why I have written this particular article. The answer is, I found a solution to the ‘proactive discipline’ problem, and I want to share that answer with those in the same predicament.

Your Brain Sucks

The key to solving the ‘proactive discipline’ problem is to use software to track your many aspects of your life. This relieves the stress on your brain to remember everything. A great example of this is a calendar, allowing your brain to forget about all time based events. When the event eventually comes around, your calendar patiently reminds you that you have an event soon. I use Google calendar to accomplish this.

To-do lists serve the opposite end of this- one-off and random tasks. For this, I use the Apple Reminders app. However, there is still the critical need to track cyclical tasks, like intermittent cleaning and updating. For this, I built my own app, called Depletables.

Depletables are my way of modeling recurring tasks that you must be on top of to be spontaneous. A Depletable is any cyclical task that has a state of “depletion.” Instead of reactively responding to tasks like home cleaning, shopping, connecting with family, a Depletable notifies you when to accomplish all of these tasks.

To track Depletables, I developed an iPhone app and launched it on the App Store. Instead of saving all my tasks for the dreaded Sunday cleaning, I get an iPhone notification to complete them throughout the week. As a student, this is a great way to balance busy work days and allows me to spend time on the weekend doing what I truly want to do- being spontaneous.

I made a Depletable to clean my bathroom, change my contacts, and clean the fridge. I also made Depletables to text my family members each week and post consistently on social media. After using this app for the past few months, I can genuinely say it has changed the way I live.

By combining Depletables for recurring tasks, a calendar for date-based tasks, a to-do list for random tasks, and time-chunking my continuous tasks, I have built a system that allows me to operate ahead of my deadlines and accomplish more than I thought possible.

‎Depletables - Recurring Tasks‎When was the last time you cleaned your phone? Or changed your bedsheets? Depletables is here to make those questions…apps.apple.com

Thanks for reading! If you made it this far, like the post and download my app!! Have a great day.