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How to Increase Willpower and Be Mentally Tough
Limit Alcohol Intake
Alcohol impairs judgment, reduces self-awareness, and impedes willpower.
Be mindful of how much you’ve had to drink when making decisions.
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Protein rich meals
The brain is a decision making muscle and needs to be sufficiently fed to provide the necessary willpower.
Eat meals at regular intervals. The meals should contain healthy proteins, vegetables and complex carbohydrates, to avoid the glucose rush.
Slow and steady
Willpower can be increased, but it is a slow and gradual process (just like increasing muscle mass).
Real change requires one small start at a time.
Dark chocolate
Sometimes we are in a position where we need to make a quick decision, and it feels tough.
Take a bite of dark chocolate to help boost your willpower.
Adequate rest
Rest reduces the body’s need for glucose, and it allows our bodies to make better use of what we have.
Self-control requires brainpower, and when we are tired, our bodies don’t deliver enough glucose to our brains.
An adult should sleep for 7-8 hours a night.
Avoid temptation
Steer clear from “danger spots” where temptation is present and willpower is necessary.
Develop good habits
Good habits strengthen our willpower because they build self-discipline and self-control, and they spread to other areas of our life.
Start with something as simple as making your bed. This can have a positive effect on your willpower.
“To-do” lists
Making endless lists that cannot be completed leaves us worrying more than doing.
Make sure your "to-do" list is manageable.
Take frequent breaks
We can “run out” of willpower and end up making poor decisions if we don’t allow ourselves to take breaks.
Rest from time to time. You will feel refreshed, have more willpower and produce better work.
Meditate
When we become “mindful,” we are also engaging that part of our brain that we need for willpower.
Take 5 minutes and detach from the chaos around you.
Limit Alcohol Intake
Alcohol impairs judgment, reduces self-awareness, and impedes willpower.
Be mindful of how much you’ve had to drink when making decisions.
Plan in advance
Having a pre-determined plan can significantly increase your willpower when presented with temptation.
Do you have a plan to deal with your temptations? Write out an action plan even if it is very simple.
Remember the purpose
When you consistently remind yourself why you are doing this, your willpower increases to stick to your plans.
Figure out what you are trying to accomplish. What will you lose if you give in to your bad habits?
Do the opposite
Every time you change your routines, you are exercising self-control.
Start with small changes. When you succeed in making small changes, you develop the ability to take on much larger ones.
Choose a reward in advance
Our brain is hardwired to pursue positive rewards. Determine a reward in advance for making a change.
Anticipate roadblocks
When you anticipate roadblocks in advance, you will have a stronger willpower to deal with them.
Consider what roadblocks may arise in your path.
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What willpower is
The willpower response is a reaction to an internal conflict. You want to do one thing, but know you shouldn’t. Or you know you should do something, but you’d rather do nothing.
How willpower works in the brain
The prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that helps us with things like decision-making and regulating our behavior, needs to be looked after.
Feed your brain with good-quality food so it has enough energy to do its job and get enough sleep.
Willpower is finite
Willpower is like a muscle—it can get exhausted by overuse, but we might be able to strengthen our willpower by training it.
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The reasons we crave junk food
- The sensation of eating the food: what it tastes like, what it smells like and how it feels in your mouth.
- The blend of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates t...
How craving are stimulated artificially
- Salivary response: the more a food causes you to salivate, the more it will cover your taste buds.
- Rapid food meltdown: this tells your brain that you’re not full, even though you’re eating a lot of calories.
- Calorie density. junk foods are designed to convince your brain that it is getting nutrition, but to not fill you up.
- Memories of past eating experiences: When you eat something tasty, your brain registers that feeling and will bring it up in the future.
Building better habits means changing your environment
Most people think that building better habits or changing your actions is all about willpower or motivation. But your environment has an incredible ability to shape your behavior.
Nowhere is this more true than with food.
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Get More Sleep
Sleep deprivation makes you weak and tired. It has a direct impact on your focus and decision-making, whilst slowly exhausting your source of energy.
Sleep between 7.5 and 8....
Meditate
Meditation improves your attention, focus, self-awareness, and lower your stress levels.
Meditating for even just a few minutes every day will help you to clear your head while activating the areas of your brain related to decision-making and emotions.
Develop Good Habits
When we are stressed, we tend to unconsciously fall back on ingrained habits, whether they are helpful or harmful.
Creating good habits helps you get through stressful situations without affecting your willpower.
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Self-Control
... is the ability to regulate and alter responses in order to avoid undesirable behaviors, increase desirable ones, and achieve long-term goals.
Research on Self-Control
- A 2011 survey found that 27 % of respondents identified a lack of willpower as the primary factor keeping them from reaching their goals.
- One study found that students who exhibited greater self-discipline had better grades, higher test scores, and were more likely to be admitted to a competitive academic program.
- The study also found that when it came to academic success, self-control was a more important factor than IQ scores.
- A health study found that people who were rated as having high levels of self-control during childhood continued to have high levels of physical and mental health in adulthood.
- Research has found that self-control is a limited resource. In the long-term, exercising self-control tends to strengthen it.
Motivation and Monitoring
A lack of willpower is not the only factor that affects goal attainment.
- There needs to be a clear goal and the motivation to change. Having an unclear or overly general goal and insufficient motivation can lead to failure.
- You need to monitor your actions daily towards the achievement of the goal.
- You need to have willpower.
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Self-control
It’s your ability to resolve conflicts between your short-term desires and your long-term goals.
For example, successful self-control means sacrificing immediate pleasure (cookies a...
Why self-control matters
People who have high self-control aren’t missing out on enjoyment. Not being able to resist temptation and enjoying life are not the same things.
They tend to eat in a healthily way, exercise more, sleep better, drink less alcohol, smoke fewer cigarettes, achieve higher grades at university, have more peaceful relationships, and are more financially secure.
Biological limits to self-control
Research showed that self-control is ultimately limited by our biology. We can’t exercise effortful self-control indefinitely – the brain has to do regular maintenance to remain functional.
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“Keystone” Habits
The primary keystone habit is regular exercise. People who exercise habitually start changing other unrelated patterns in their lives, even unknowingly. They eat better, use their credit car...
Do the most important things first
Willpower is limited. It is highest early in the day but decreases as we make more decisions. Most self-control failures happen at night.
Do the most important things first. As the day goes on it will only get harder to face big challenges.
Don't Use Willpower
Research shows we don’t use much willpower when something is a habit.
Build new habits by manipulating your environment so as to make what you should do easy and what you shouldn’t do hard. Remove the cookies from eyesight and put your running shoes next to the bed.
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Self-control
We all possess the ability to develop self-control.
Instead of immediately responding to impulses, we can plan and evaluate our actions beforehand.
Master Self-control
- Eat. Our brains need fuel to run properly, and when that fuel runs low, the brain has difficulty regulating our emotions. Eat high protein foods.
- Meditate. Devote a few minutes a day to simply focusing on your breath and your senses. You will be calmer and your decision making will be sounder.
- Sleep. Your brain’s ability to absorb glucose is significantly diminished without rest. Stay consistent with your sleep every night.
- Exercise.
- Force Yourself until a new habit is formed.
- Get Others Involved. Find a support system.
- Do Your Research. Whatever your struggle, make it your priority to be the master of it.
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Avoid willpower depletion
Building willpower is similar to building muscle. Continually exercising without giving yourself a break is not the best way to increase your strength or performance.
Use your imagination
If you imagine lying on a peaceful beach, your body will respond by relaxing. If you imagine being late for an important meeting, your body will tense in response. Use this to your advantage in building willpower.
Think about something else
Every time that unwanted thought occupies your mind, consciously think about something pleasant instead.
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Self-Control
Self-control is a key component of emotional intelligence, yet in a study where two million people were asked to rank order their strengths in 24 different skills, self-control ended up in t...
Strategies for self-control
- Meditate.
- Eat. If your blood sugar is low, you are far more likely to succumb to destructive impulses.
- Exercise releases GABA, a neurotransmitter that makes your brain feel soothed and keeps you in control of your impulses.
- Sleep. When you are tired, your brain cells’ ability to absorb glucose is highly diminished.
- Ride the Wave. Desire has a strong tendency to ebb and flow like the tide. Waiting out this wave of desire is usually enough to keep yourself in control.
- Forgive Yourself when you slip up. Focus on what you’re going to do to improve yourself in the future.
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How to Build a New Habit
- Start with an incredibly small habit, one that is easy enough that you don't need motivation to do it
- Increase your habit in very small ways -...
Jim Rohn
"Success is a few simple disciplines, practiced every day; while failure is simply a few errors in judgment, repeated every day."