Since there doesn't seem to be much activity here yet, I might as well start things off. I'll be telling you the story of a discussion I had with an old classmate over an internet community, so please be patient and finish before you voice your opinions on the matter. I know it's long, but please bare with me. I'd quote it, but it was in swedish, so I doubt many of you would be able to read it.

Telling the tale of how he's been struck with homesickness for the first time, I commented that I congratulated him on being an experience richer. I said that insight was a cruel lover, but that you never knew when you'd need it.
Amused he told me that he had become many experiences richer lately and then told me about his issues with finding a job, politely asking if I had found one yet. I pointed out to him that I had no work-experience, a low level of education, no contacts worth mentioning and that we were living in a time of disturbingly high unemployment-rate. In fact I should have gotten a job four years ago, which I failed to get, because they were out of jobs. Now I am too old for simple work, since people of 18 and beyond are entitled to more money, yet too inexperienced for more advanced work, since I didn't get a job when I was younger.

I proceeded to point out that my only choices in life was to either make a name on one of my not-too-exceptional talents, to educate myself relatively far or to fail in life and end up living on governmental aid. I said that this was not exactly what I had imagined life would be like when I was a kid.
Ever the optimist he told me that I should never give up, that if you work hard and if you are nice to people everything will work out in the end, that things would solve themselves automatically (I'd like to see him say that to the over 73 000 unemployed students with over 100 points of university-studies and huge depts, not to mention those that are employed, but ended up driving the icecream car or sitting behind the counter in a suburbian supermart). Then, claiming that the last alternative didn't sound too nice, he told me that being as talented as I was at drawing he was sure that in combination with a good education my future would be secured. I suppose he was not aware that people who have studied art are among the most common on the unemployment-market.

I decided not to enlighten him on this fact, thinking, perhaps, that I may in fact have a chance. I do, after all, have cousins who succeeded in making a living off of their art. Instead I merely told him that people do not succeed with talent alone and that there are few ways to educate yourself to a decent job based on the ability to draw, that I would, for example, not be very likely to end up an architect.
Seemingly very eager to prove me wrong he told me that Iron Maiden had succeeded on nothing but talent and that they were hardly the only example. By now his dreadful abuse of the questionmark started driving me nuts, but that's another story.
Seeing where this was going and not being in the mood for a public debate of the kind that was not likely to get us anywhere, I said that it seemed it was all a matter of definition. I asked him if Picasso became a great painter on talent alone, if Musashi became a great warrior on talent alone, if Cicero became a great speaker on talent alone. I told him that if his answer to all these questions was yes, then we clearly had different definitions of the term and a dispute would get us nowhere.
I also pointed out that the issue with art-school is that a potential employer rarely, if ever, recruits based on grades.

He did not seem to have read the part about a dispute getting us nowhere, or perhaps he simply disregarded it utterly, as he followed up by admitting that you also needed to be conscious of your goals, to have discipline and a bit of luck.

And that sometimes just luck seemed to be enough.

I told him that while discipline was highly practical, it was hardly a neccessity in order to succeed within the arts (yes, the discussion had very much turned to focus on art, literature, music and the likes) and that being conscious of your goals hardly seemed very important either, looking at the likes of Kafka. Just mentioning Mozart, who lived for his art more than life, sacrifing the baser needs and desires to write his music, gives you the feeling passion is a much greater part of the typical artists life than discipline. I also briefly mentioned Van Gogh.

He followed up by telling me that you did too need discipline and consciousness of your goals in order to succeed and that all the people I had mentioned had showed signs of discipline through their commitment to their art. He referred to bands from the 70s and 80s who had little discipline in real life, but extreme discipline when it came to playing instruments, which was the only thing they were good at. By now I was starting to think he was confusing discipline with willpower.

Becoming weary of the discussion (more than before) I pointed out that I had imagined there being a very clear difference between discipline and passion, one which I had found especially clear when I studied the life of Sir Isaac Newton, but that I (once more) found little use in discussing the topic further. I had heard his thoughts and I had come to the conclusion that we had very different perspectives that obviously were hard to unite and that a conflict would do us little good. I simply posed him one last question, out of curiousity - what was his definition of discipline?

Obviously there is a certain difference, he tells me, but if you're truly passionate about something, the discipline to do what you enjoy turns up automatically, "or am I wrong?"
He then told me that "discipline is discipline, quite simply" (or "dicipline" as he always spelled it), to "do what you've decided to do", following up with the example of him liking to play guitar and thus playing an hour a day in order to be better, since he likes being good at what he enjoys and since he "forces" (he used quotation-marks as well) himself to play an hour a day it is discipline.

Deciding to use a metaphore this time, I told him that a man reading a book, as if hypnotized, not eating nor sleeping, until he collapses, because he found the book too good to put away, hardly shows signs of discipline by reading the book. That that was the point I was trying to make by comparing discipline and passion, a comparison with many similarities to the one with reason and instinct that was popular during the age of reason.
I said that I found it hard to understand how he finds it a good example of discipline to talk about the ability to regularly do things you enjoy doing (especially when you're not exactly spending all that much time on it anyway). I asked if he concidered it an equal display of discipline to eat when you're hungry as to fast for a week.

Thus far he has not answered. It is possible that I have put the discussion to an uneasy rest, but it is very likely that he's just thinking of a way to counter my statements. I am not saying that I'm right, but I didn't exactly seek out the opportunity to express my views and now I ask of you, what are your definitions of discipline and what do you think of our discussion? Do you see obvious flaws in my argumentation (shouldn't be too hard) or do you have something further to contribute with? And finally, how do you think this is going to end?

It's not exactly related to martial arts, but then again, neither was the sub-forum.