You may wonder now - if self-control is exhausting, why do some people seem to have an iron will? The main takeaway from research is 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. The reason why some people are good at self-control nonetheless is not because they make more effort . Instead, these people avoid effortful strategies (such as suppression and resistance) and use easier strategies (such as re-appraisal). Instead of effortfully inhibiting their automatic drives, they bypass them. In this way, they don't tax their brains, which then don't have to do housekeeping so quickly. As a result, they are free to invest their effort into pursuing their goals, instead of fighting with themselves., , , ,

This study shows that it's much better to bolster your want-to rather than have-to motivations. If you only have have-to motivations, then you'll experience self-control conflict. You'll know you should choose the option with the delayed reward, but you'll want the option with the immediate reward.

In general, temptation bundling, self-rewarding and commitment contracts are a kind of 'trick' you play on yourself - you sweeten the goal-promoting activity with a few perks (or you punish yourself for failure), but the core activity remains as unpleasant as ever. Although these techniques may work to in the short run, we wouldn't completely rely on them in the long run. You should always aim to find some want-to reasons for your goals. This is the only way to persist in them in the long run.

In summary, you can avoid having to use your willpower by doing the following: <ul><li>choose 'want-to' goals (for which you have intrinsic motivations) rather than 'have-to' goals (for which you have extrinsic motivations) </li><li>if you can't choose want-to goals, increase your want-to motivation for the thing you have to do <ul>find activities that promote your goals and which are enjoyable at the same time </ul> </li><li>if you can't find enjoyable goal-promoting activities, <ul><li>look for aspects within the activities you have to do which are immediately rewarding, </li><li>use temptation bundling (pairing an activity you have to do with an indulgence), </li><li>or decrease the value of indulgence with commitment contracts (agreeing to incur costs if you fail) </li> </ul> </li><li>be careful not to self-reward with indulgence and don't rely on temptation bundling and commitment contracts only </li> </ul>

To counteract epsilon-cost temptations and correctly identify a self-control conflict, you need to group the decisions together. To do that, use one of these three techniques: broad bracketing, connectedness and self-diagnosticity. For example, when thinking about whether to buy a chocolate bar, you can bracket this choice narrowly - compare the pleasure of eating this delicious sweet with the costs to your health. If you do that, your decision-making system will likely give you a green light to indulge because this single decision bears zero costs in the long run. (see 'Motivation' for value-based self-control)

On the other hand, you can also bracket this choice broadly - instead of eating a single chocolate bar, you're considering the rule of eating like this all the time. If you ate a chocolate bar like this every time you're at the checkout counter, you'll quickly be overweight. Now, your epsilon cost just got a lot bigger.

It's very useful to get into the habit of broad-bracketing all of your decisions. Whenever you're making a choice regarding food, exercise, expenses, ask yourself: What are the costs and benefits of this decision if I make it every time from now on? Another way is to reframe your behaviors from independent choices into rules or habits. Instead of asking yourself, "What's the harm in doing this once?" You ask yourself, "Suppose this were to be my habit for this behavior, would it still be okay?" Although broad-bracketing is helpful, it can fail when applied on its own. Broad-bracketing won't work if you don't care about your future self or if you think that your future self will be different.

The way you can boost your connectedness is by reflecting on how much your character changes over time. Although people's personalities naturally change, the changes are gradual and span over decades. Moreover, some of our core personality remains constant across the lifespan., Imagine yourself vividly as a person who's 5, 10, 20 and 50 years older. Will you be a completely different person? Or will you have similar tastes and preferences? If you connect to your future self this way, then you'll realize that what you find tempting today, you'll also likely find tempting tomorrow (and next month, next week and next year). Therefore, if you indulge today, you're probably going to indulge tomorrow.

Fortunately, there's another strategy that can help you tip the scales in the right direction. Scientists have shown that people who have developed a self-image around virtuous activities are more likely to identify and resolve self-control conflicts. For these people, indulging incurs a cost to their self-image - it contradicts the beliefs they have about themselves. On the other hand, avoiding the temptation and choosing the option with delayed rewards protects their self-image.,

James Clear, author of <a href="https://jamesclear.com/atomic-habits">Atomic Habits </a>, has a useful way of framing these issues of identity, "Every action you take is a vote for the kind of person you wish to become." Do you want to take up running? Start thinking of yourself as a runner. Try to emulate the way a runner thinks, how they feel, how they overcome obstacles and how strong their willpower is. Whenever you're faced with a self-control dilemma (staying home or going for a run in bad weather), imagine what a strong-willed runner would do.

One of the ways you can self-affirm is by taking <a href="http://www.viacharacter.org/survey/account/register">this online test </a>. The test is free and takes about 15 minutes. In the test you'll answer a series of questions designed to assess your core strengths. The test result will provide your with a sorted list of your biggest strengths.

When you've finished the test, choose one of your greatest strengths. Alternatively, you can choose a value that's personally important to you without taking the test (this could be relationships, religion, humor, kindness, etc.). Once you've picked your strength/value, write a short essay (or journal note) about why it's important to you and when is it important. If you need some inspiration, then have a look at essay excerpts which you can find on the sixth page of <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/7fe3/234bd35d814caed6e3cf43a3f3ed76ecd6e2.pdf">this article </a>.

By self-affirming, you'll program yourself to be more accepting of information about your health without the need to defend yourself. The more information you accept, the more you'll boost your motivation, which will help resolve future self-control conflicts. There's another way you can enhance your self-integrity with self-affirmation - by repeating positive statements about important areas in your life. These can include: 'I am capable of change, even if it's difficult'

In summary: <ul><li>when people receive information about the risks of their current lifestyle, they tend to avoid, downplay, or derogate such information (this is called defensive processing) </li><li>you can overcome your own defensive processing with self-affirmation <ul><li>one way to self-affirm is by reflecting on your most cherished personal values and strengths (see an <a href="http://viacharacter.org/survey/account/register">online test </a>) </li><li>another way is to repeat positive statements about possible change in important areas in your life (e.g. "I'm capable of gradually improving my diet") - these need to be grounded in reality </li> </ul> </li><li>self-affirmation helps you realize that you're a competent and adequate person, even though you may not always have perfect self-control. </li> </ul>

If you find yourself in a similar situation, then your best chance is to down-regulate the self-control conflict. A powerful way to do that is by changing the way you think about it, in other words, 'reframing' it. There's two broad ways you can think about any situation - you can adopt a high-level or a low-level construal. If you're in a low-level construal, you're thinking more concretely - you're focusing on the particular details of the situation, ignoring the bigger picture.

Interestingly, when a 'high-level' symbol was displayed during the 'taste rating', the participants consumed almost 1/5 fewer snacks. The most well-established technique is the one used in the study above. Whenever you're faced with temptations, ask yourself a series of 'why' questions : Why do I want to lose weight? Then turn your answer into another question (e.g. Why do I want to be attractive?). In this way, you link your current decisions whether to indulge or not with your deepest wishes and values (such as self-compassion and caring), which boosts your want-to motivation. You could even come up with a specific symbol that reminds you of high-level construal and use it whenever you're faced with temptations.

You can easily apply high-level construal to all important decisions in your life. Are you deciding whether to work on your career skills or go to the pub? Ask yourself why you need better career skills. Is the answer 'to get promoted and reach a higher salary'? Then ask yourself why you want to reach a higher salary. In this way, you should gradually get to answers such as: Because I want to enjoy a freer lifestyle. Because I want to be happier. Because I want to spend more time with my children without worrying about my income. Because I deeply care about my life.

In summary, we recommend the following: <ul><li>whenever making an important decision, get yourself into a high-level (=abstract) construal by asking yourself a series of 'why' questions <ul><li>for instance, if you want to lose weight, ask yourself: Why do I want to lose weight? </li><li>if your answer is 'to be more attractive', turn it into another 'why' question: Why do I want to be attractive? </li><li>Do this until you've connected to your deepest values (because it gives me great joy, because I deeply value my life, etc.) </li> </ul> </li><li>whenever you need to plan how to achieve your goals, you need to get into a low-level (=concrete) construal </li><li>if you have a tendency for harsh self-criticism, practice mindful construal (described later in the guide) </li> </ul>

Buddhist monks used a version of this technique where they detach themselves from sensory pleasures by imagining the human body in various states of decay. Seen from that perspective, worldly pleasures lose some of their allure. The re-appraisal strategies included: imagining being full, bringing to mind negative consequences (stomach ache, weight gain, heart problems) or imagining there was something wrong with the food (someone sneezed on it, it was moldy, etc.). When the subjects used a re-appraisal strategy, their cravings dropped down by as much as 50% compared to the control group .

Positive appraisals seem to be more effective than negative appraisals. For instance, positive appraisals of healthy food reduce eating of unhealthy food more effectively than negative appraisals of unhealthy food. Also, thinking about the long-term benefits of not eating unhealthy food seems better than thinking about its long-term costs.

In summary, when deciding between a tempting option (watching TV, smoking a cigarette, eating a high-calorie dessert) and a healthy option (exercising, drinking herbal tea, eating fruit), you can use three re-appraisal strategies: <ul><li>you can stimulate disgust by imaging the possible negative consequences of choosing the tempting option (e.g. someone sneezing on food) </li><li>you can think of the positive consequences of not choosing the tempting option (e.g. not putting on weight) </li><li>the best approach is to focus on the positive aspects of selecting the healthy option (e.g. staying slim and healthy, feeling proud of yourself) </li> </ul>

Indulge now and pay the price later? Or wait a little and reap bigger rewards in the future? Many of life's biggest challenges come down to a simple trade off. Self-control isn't easy. But it is possible to make it easier. In this guide, I've teamed up with cognitive science PhD student Jakub Jilek for ...

The Complete Guide to Self-Control | Scott H Young

Matthew Mitchell