Will-power is an amazingly accurate predictor of academic success, a flourishing career, effective leadership, a long life, even a happy marriage. We’re all struggling with temptation, addiction, distraction and procrastination as a part of human life. But for some, the bias towards doing “the harder thing” appears to be more consistent and natural, they seem to be sticking to their plan in the face of every challenge.
Your willpower is supported – or not, as the case may be – by your brain, via its powers to bias you to DO certain things (“I Will” – exercise more?) and REFRAIN from other things (“I Won’t” – check emails constantly?). Both of those will-power elements flow from your long term-goals and desires: “I Want”.
However, when you are tired or distracted, your behavior tends to run on autopilot and the decision-making becomes disconnected from your goals. As an example, one study asked people how many food-related decisions they had made in one day. Average response was 14. On careful tracking, the result turned out to be 227!
It’s like we have more than one mind, each with its own point of view on what’s the best behavior. To stay true to your plan, you’ll need to mobilize the “I Want-power”: to make conscious decisions based on your goals, not fly on autopilot where you don’t even realize the consequences of your actions.
And more: It’s not enough to identify what you want to change, you need to know how, when and why you’ll be likely to fail. If you cannot predict when you will give in, you will expose yourself to more temptation, be likely to be surprised by setbacks and give up on your goals in the face of difficulties.
This means, you will need to understand the impulse you’re giving in to, to be able to flex your “I Wan’t” brain-muscle, activate your goals and remember your original objective. This impulse may be very different from what you thought.
One email-addict wanted to cut back on checking emails but was finding it hard to reach her goal. Although she really wanted to not pick up her phone so often, she didn’t even realize what happened before she was already scrolling down the screen (the autopilot was doing the flying). She needed to stop herself sooner! On careful analysis, she discovered that the impulse to check emails felt almost like an itch, a tension that was relieved when she checked her email. Don’t think this is any different from other forms of addiction! By understanding when she was likely to fail, she was able to mobilize her will-power already on the impulse – a first important step towards “owning up” to the behavior.
Active management of your thoughts is an energy-consuming activity that shouldn’t be overdone; it makes no sense to try to exercise your willpower every minute of the day. Still, it’s real work to be pulling thoughts back to where you (really) want them, doing “the harder thing”. It just feels easier to give in to unwanted impulses (being online, losing your temper, drinking too much, yelling at the kids) or to put off work you really had an intention of completing (preparing for an important meeting, cleaning up your emails, upskilling – you name it).
Meditation specifically trains the willpower and is scientifically evidenced to increase the grey matter (I.e. brain cells) in your prefrontal cortex – your Executive Brain, home of “I Will”, “I Won’t” and “I Want”. Meditation works even without spiritual add-ons and if you’re new to this, there are loads of options available for guided practice.
For a great review of scientific research on will-power, packed with “easy-to-do on your own” exercises, read “The Willpower Instinct” by Health Psychologist, Stanford PhD Kelly McGonigal.