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Willpower by Roy Baumeister

by Parker · 111 things on NewTwos

Rediscovering the greatest human strength
Introduction
Success depends on intelligence and self control and you can only increase your self control
“The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.” - Charles Darwin
Improving willpower is the surest way to a better life
Most major problems, personal and social, center on failure of 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
“I can resist everything except temptation.” - Oscar Wilde
“Genius is patience” - Samuel Smiles
“The man who assumes success tends already to have success.” Norman Vincent Peale
The first step in self-control is to set a goal
Chapter 1: Is willpower more than a metaphor?
The more things we try to change at once the greater the chance we will fail at all of them
Choose one thing you want to change and focus on it
Chapter 2: Where does the power in willpower come from?
No glucose = no willpower
The body uses glucose during self-control, it starts to crave sweet things to eat
When people have more demands for self-control in their daily lives, their hunger for sweets increases
Marijuana merely intensified what you’re already feeling
Women have fewer problems with self-control than men
Controlling your emotions starts with controlling your glucose
Glucose depletion can turn the most charming companion into a monster
If you have a test, an important meeting, or a vital project, don’t take it on without glucose
If you’re a smoker, don’t try quitting while you’re also on a diet
When you eat, go for the slow burn. Foods that are converted into glucose quickly are said to have a high glycemic index
When you’re tired, sleep
Chapter 3: A brief history of the to-do list, from god to drew carey
“It’s easy to frame a good bold resolution; but hard is the task that concerns execution.” - Benjamin Franklin
“On the whole, tho I never arrived at the perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet I was, by endeavour, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been if I had not attempted it.” - Benjamin Franklin
The monthly planners did much better and stuck with it much longer than the daily planners
Mind like water: imagine throwing a pebble into a still pond. How does the water respond? Totally appropriate to the force and mass of the input; then it returns to calm. It doesn’t overreact or under react
When you make an agreement and you don’t keep it, you undermine your own self-trust. You can fool everybody but yourself, and you’re going to pay for that, so you should be aware of the agreements you make
Identify the next action for each thing on your todo list
43folders.com
31 folders for each day of the current month, 12 folders for each month of the year
Zeigatnik effect: uncompleted tasks and unmet goals tend to pop into one’s mind. Once the task is completed, and the goal is reached, however, the stream of reminders comes to a stop.
The simple act of making a plan clears your mind and eliminates the zeigarnik effect
Chapter 4: Decision Fatigue
Glucose is a crucial component of willpower
Making decisions uses up glucose
When you have so many options to choose from, you start striving for perfection. You don’t want to settle for someone who’s not ideal
When parents can never say no to projects at the office, their children suffer at home
Chapter 5: Where have all the dollars gone?
When people were placed in front of a mirror or told that their actions were being filmed, they consistently changed their behavior. They worked harder, gave more valid answers to questionnaires and their actions were more consistent with their values
Whenever people focused on themselves, they seemed to compare what they saw with some sort of idea of what they should be like
Self awareness involves a process of comparing yourself to standards
Public information has more impact than private information
Chapter 6: Can willpower be strengthened?
Suffering makes the spirit flower
“Getting your brain wired into little goals and achieving them, that helps you achieve the bigger things you should be able to do. It’s not just practicing the specific thing. It’s always making things more difficult than they should be, and never falling short, so that you have that extra reserve, that tank, so you know you can always go further than your goal. For me that’s what discipline is. It’s repetition and practice.” - David Blaine
Things to try to improve self-control: use your left hand, correct your posture, say yes and no rather than yeah and nah, don’t say curse words
Exercising self-control in one area seemed to improve all areas of life
Licensing effect: when you act as if one good deed gives you license to sin
Chapter 7: Outsmarting yourself in the heart of darkness
Charity and generosity have been linked to self-control
Thinking of others can increase your own self-discipline
Orderly habits improve self-control in the long run by triggering automatic mental processes that don’t require much energy
Workers who produce steadily over a long period of time tend to be the most successful in the long run
Write every day. Use your self-control to form a daily habit and you’ll produce more with less effort in the long run
Willpower enables us to get along with others and override impulses that are based on personal short-term interests
SEALs have the ability to step outside of their own pain, put aside their own fear, and ask: how can I help the guy next to me? They had more than the “fist” of courage and physical strength. They also had a heart large enough to think about others
I was not sent into the world to be happy. I was sent for special work
Chapter 8: Did a higher power help Eric Clapton and Mary Karr stop drinking?
Alcohol doesn’t increase your impulse to do stupid or destructive things; instead, it simply removes restraints
A lack of friends tends to contribute to alcohol and drug abuse
Telling stories forces you to organize your thoughts, monitor your behavior, and discuss goals for the future
Once you’re committed to following a bright-line rule, your present self can feel confident that your future self will observe it too
It’s a self-fulfilling mandate. I think I won’t, therefore I won’t
Chapter 9: Raising strong children: self-esteem versus self-control
Every social problem can be traced to peoples lack of self-love
The greatest love of all is love of oneself
The key to success is self-love
For punishments, consistency, then speed, then severity is most importsnt
Ideally, a parent should quickly discipline the child every single time he or she misbehaves, but in a restrained, even mind manner
The more vigilant you are early on, the less effort is required in the long run
Consistent discipline tends to product well-behaved children
This is why Asians are so “smart”. They have more discipline
Parents can’t worry about being judged. You have to do what is right for the child and it really is all about being consistent
The more that children are being monitored, the more opportunities they have to build their self-control
Anything that forced children to exercise their self-control muscle can help strengthen their willpower: taking music lessons, memorizing poems, saying prayers, minding their table manners, avoiding the use of profanity, and writing thank you notes
You need willpower to control attention
Self control is about integrating behavior over time—padding up immediate gratification for future benefits
Chapter 10: The perfect storm of dieting
Losing weight is the most popular New Year’s resolution year after year
If you’re serious about controlling your weight, you need the discipline to follow these three rules: 1. Never go on a diet. 2. Never vow to give up chocolate or any other food 3. Where you’re judging yourself or judging others, never equate being overweight with having weak willpower
The first step in self-control is to establish realistic goals
Once dieters broke their diet and succumbed to the what-the-hell effect, they stopped counting and became even less aware than nondieters of what they were eating
Monitoring is the next step in self-control after setting a goal
Humans are born with an innate gift for eating just the right amount
What is a diet but a plan imposing external rules?
Dieters learn to eat according to a plan, not to their inner feelings and cravings
Instead of squandering your willpower on a specific diet, eat enough glucose to conserve willpower, and use your self-control for more promising long-term strategies
Keep fattening food out of reach and out of sight
“To promise not to do a thing is the surest way in the world to make a body want to go and do that very thing.” - Mark Twain
Telling yourself “I can have this later” operates in the mind a bit like having it now. It satisfies the craving to some degree
When it comes to food, never say never. Vow that you will eat all of it sooner or later, but just not tonight
Conclusion: the future of willpower—more gain, less strain
The best way to reduce stress in your life is to stop screwing up
Set up your life so that you have a realistic chance to succeed
Successful people don’t use their willpower as a last-ditch defense to stop themselves from disaster
People with high self-control consistently report less stress in their lives
Don’t procrastinate and keep putting it off
When procrastinators are feeling anxious about a difficult job, or just bored by a mundane chore, they give in to the urge to improve their mood by doing something else
Your supply of willpower is limited, and you use the same resource for many different things
People who procrastinate perform worse, have more stress, and worse health
While you’re depleted, frustrations will bother you more than usual. You’ll be more prone to say something you’ll regret. Impulses to eat, drink, spend, or do other things will be harder to resist
The best way to reduce stress in your life is to stop screwing up, but when you’re depleted you’re liable to make mistakes that will leave you with more bills to pay, more relationship damage to repair, more pounds to lose
Eat first. Get some healthy food in your body, wait half an hour, and then the decision won’t seem so overwhelming
Get enough sleep. A rested will is a stronger will
“Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn’t the work he is supposed to be doing at the moment.”
Set aside time to do one thing and one thing only. But you can’t do anything else productive during that time. It’s write or nothing
Inner discipline leads to outer kindness

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