Richard J. Foster's book, "Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth" lists meditation, prayer, fasting, study, simplicity, solitude, submission, service, confession, worship, guidance and celebration as spiritual disciplines. Of these, submission and guidance are perhaps the furthest from mainstream thought and to these, it can be argued, silence and chastity might be added. For the most part, entries in other lists can be correlated with those listed here.
It is useful to note that while the word 'discipline', in the sense considered here, can conjure negative images and feelings, it more often than not implies active participation. Just considering the above list of 14 practices, only 4, fasting, solitude, silence and chastity, are primarily sacrificial, with another 3, simplicity, submission and guidance, focused on replacing certain behaviors with others. Fully half of the list, meditation, prayer, study, service, confession, worship and celebration are active practices requiring additional effort.
A similar list was posted by Phil Steiger in his blog of several years back:
He also divides the disciplines roughly in half, with 7 listed as Disciplines of Abstinence (solitude, silence, fasting, frugality, chastity, secrecy and sacrifice) and 8 listed as Disciplines of Engagement (study, worship, celebration, service, prayer, fellowship, confession, submission). Regardless of how the list is divided, a large number of disciplines are clearly participatory.
Given this, it is curious that the church, over the ages, has chosen to accentuate forsaking bad habits, rather than replacing bad habits with good. Could it be that Lenten observances involving both abstinence and engagement rather than abstinence alone might be more successful in the long run? It is certainly something to consider.
May God give you peace in your spiritual disciplines of choice.
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