Discipline - The Key to Happiness?

Howdy! With the holidays over I'm back to throw my thoughts about happiness around. First though - I need to check in on my current happiness score. After reviewing all the tools over the last several posts I've decided that the Subjective Happiness Scale is the best one for my purposes. It's brief, and it actually aims at "happiness" as reported and understood by the person using the tool. 

Today's Subjective Happiness Scale Score: 4 / 7

Instructions: For each of the following statements and/or questions, please circle the point on the scale that you feel is most appropriate in describing  you.

1. In general, I consider myself

not a very happy person 1,    2 ,   3,   4,    5,    6 ,   7 a very happy person

2. Compared to most of my peers, I consider myself

less happy 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 more happy

3. Some people are generally very happy. They enjoy life regardless of what is going on, getting the most out of everything. To what extent does this characterization describe you?

not at all 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 a great deal

4. Some people are generally not very happy. Although they are not depressed, they never seem as happy as they might be. To what extent does this characterization describe you?

not at all 1,    2,    3,    4,    5,    6,    7 a great deal

Scoring: 

To score the scale, reverse code the 4th item (i.e., turn a 7 into a 1, a 6 into a 2, a 5 into a 3, a 3 into a 5, a 2 into a 6, and a 1 into a 7), and compute the mean of the 4 items.  Norms are available in the reference below, as well as in many other publications that have used the scale (see PsycInfo).

Discipline - The Key To Happiness?

So I've been sifting through this idea of "discipline" the last few days as I've tried to understand what the recipe for my happiness is. For me discipline is the act of or the characteristic of being able to do the thing you SHOULD do instead of something you WANT to do. Most of the times that I've decided to be disciplined, I've been pretty happy with the results. For example: when I choose to work on my portfolio instead of watching a movie with my free time - I'm generally happy that I did that. And the opposite is true, when I opt to watch a movie instead of working on my portfolio, I may beat myself up later. 

The hard part about this idea is that, while it is definitely true for me, I don't know whether this phenomenon is the result of some inherent rule about happiness, or if it's something I've been taught/conditioned into by my community. I do believe that in America (and even more so in Utah where I grew up) we have a bit of a problem with overworking - and there's a sense of shame that we feel when we aren't overworking. Every moment of my life should be "productive, that's what I was raised on. 

I can recall individuals preaching that part of happiness is learning to "let go" of the need to be productive, and try to really enjoy your free time (think about the sudo religious, yoga, meditation, Buddhist types of messages). I can also recall other individuals who say that part of happiness is just knuckling down and doing the work (think about the hyper financially successful business men like Elon Musk who advocate for 12+ hour workdays). Who is right? Or is anyone right? I don't know.  I guess for now I'm going to focus on deciding what is the balance that works for me personally.