WILLPOWER
“Self-control is more indispensable
than gunpowder.”
—Henry Morton Stanley
has become one of the most
intensively studied topics in social science. Researchers around the world have
found that improving willpower is the surest way to a better life.
that major problems, personal and
social, center on failure on self-control: compulsive spending and borrowing,
impulsive violence, underachievement in school, procrastination at work,
alcohol and drug abuse, unhealthy diet, lack of exercise, chronic anxiety,
explosive anger.
Willpower look much more than a metaphor
Researcher Baumeister has arrived to
the conclusion that willpower is like a muscle that could be fatigued through
use and warns us:
“If you’d like some advance warning
of trouble, look not of a single symptom but rather for a change in the overall
intensity of your feelings.
If you find especially bothered by
frustrating events, or saddened by unpleasant thoughts, or even happier about
some good news—then maybe it’s because your brain’s circuits aren’t controlling
emotions as well as usual.”
Sure enough, Baumeister does not try
to make you repress your feelings but be aware of what those feelings can mean,
because ego depletion results in slower brain.
“Ego depletion thus creates a double
whammy: Your willpower is diminished and your cravings feel stronger than ever.”
Focus your energy on the task at hand
sorts out four different types of
willpower and suggests to stick to one challenge since you have only one supply
of willpower.
“We can divide the uses of willpower
into four broad categories: control of thoughts, control of emotions, impulse
control, and performance control.
Emotional control is uniquely
difficult because you generally can’t alter your mood by an act of will. You
can change what you think about or how you behave, but you can’t force yourself
to be happy. To ward off sadness and anger, people use indirect strategies,
like trying to distract themselves with other thoughts, or working out at the
gym, or meditating. They lose themselves in TV shows and treat themselves to
chocolate binges and shopping sprees. Or they get drunk. We can’t control the
impulses, which is what most people associate with willpower, but how we react.
Performance control is focusing your energy on the task at hand.”
Where
does the power in willpower come from?
One of the reasons that cause to succumb to
frustration and anger, even though having self-control of a saint, is the lack
of glucose.
“Glucose depletion can turn the most
charming companion into a monster. The old advice about eating a good breakfast
applies all day long, particularly on days when you’re physically or mentally
stressed.
If you have a test, an important
meeting, or a vital project, don’t take it on without glucose. Don’t get into
an argument with your boss four hours after lunch. Don’t trash out serious
problems with your partner just before dinner.”
The first step in self-control is having a clear goal
“The result of conflicting goals
is unhappiness instead of action, as the psychologists Robert Emmons and Laura
King demonstrated in a series of studies.
By asking people about their goals and then monitoring them, the researchers
identified three main consequences of conflicting goals:
First, you worry a lot. The more competing demands you face, the more
time you spend contemplating these demands. You’re beset by rumination.
Second, you get less done. It might seem that people who think more
about their goals would also take more steps to reach them, but instead they
replace action with rumination.
Third, your health suffers, physically as well as mentally.”
The problem of the decision fatigue affects everything from the careers
of CEOs to the prison sentences of felons appearing before weary judges
“The link between willpower and
decision making works both ways: Decision making depletes your willpower, and
once your willpower is depleted, you’re less able to make decisions.
If your work requires you to make
hard decisions all day long, at some point you’re going to be depleted and
start looking for ways to conserve energy. You’ll look for excuses to avoid or
postpone decisions. You’ll look for the easiest and safest option, which often
is to stick with the status quo: Leave the prisoner in prison.”
Can willpower be strengthened?
If the depletions of willpower leave you with less self-control, can willpower be strengthened?
“Emotion regulation does not rely on
willpower. People cannot simply will themselves to be in love, or to feel
intense joy, or to stop feeling guilty.
Emotional control typically relies on various subtle tricks, such as
changing how one thinks about the problem at hand, or distracting oneself.
Hence, practicing emotional control does not strengthen your willpower.”
explains how other exercises do help.
“The key is to concentrate on changing a
habitual behaviour.
One simply way to start is by using a
different hand for routine tasks. Many habits are linked to your dominant hand.
Making yourself switch to your left hand is thus an exercise in self-control.
Another training strategy is to
change your speech habits, which are also deeply ingrained and therefore
require effort to modify. Break the adolescent habit of peppering your
discourse with ‘like’ and ‘you know’ constantly.”
*****
Click to order I say Who, What, and Where!
Click to order Deconstructing INFATUATION
an inspirational novel about the courage to be oneself
freely.
a thought-provoking novel about infatuation.
Copyright © 2014 by THE PYTHAGOREAN
STORYTELLER. All rights reserved.
No comments:
Post a Comment