

How do you grow willpower? - rantfoil
http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/2008/how-do-you-grow-willpower/

======
timr
_"I refuse to grant credibility to anyone using a study to support an argument
without a reference. If the study was published I can read it myself and see
what it actually says."_

Red Herring. There are widely-known tools to look up research articles, and
it's not conventional to cite such articles in newspapers because the journals
are not easily accessible to the general public.

I wonder how many other things he refuses to believe in because he's never
read the papers?

~~~
timr
Ugh. Then he follows his straw man with an over-generalization and appeal to
ridicule:

 _"anyone with above average willpower has a busy enough life not to have time
to participate in psychological surveys"_

and an appeal to personal belief (which also happens to be biased, and begs
the original question):

 _"I think I possess above average powers of will, but I would never test them
against things I thought were pointless."_

Finally, he closes by quoting a section of the original article out of
context, and misinterpreting the meaning:

 _"there are tons of higher level masters of teaching willpower, but since
they don’t have neuroscience degrees, this article neglects to give them a
voice....Why use 10% of the article on a guess, when a phone call could bring
an expert with data."_

(the original Times article explains that the theory of glucose-induced
willpower was tested in specific experiments, and found to have some merit.)

For a guy who wants to take a science reporter to task for sloppy reporting,
he sure does play fast-and-loose with the logical fallacies....

~~~
mynameishere
That first point has merit. Studies and surveys in general always pretend to
be dealing with random samples, but that's never the case.

~~~
timr
You're committing to the same fallacy. I don't care what "studies in general"
do -- I care what _this_ study did.

Same goes for your use of the words "always" and "never" -- given that sample
bias is a well-known scientific phenomenon, you're going to have to provide
extraordinary evidence to convince me that studies "always" make the
mistake...that's a rather extraordinary claim.

~~~
mynameishere
C'mon. If I say, "Okay, here's my random sample", and it's a self-selected
group, you know immediately it's not a random sample. Whether or not this
matters has much to do with whether we are testing physiological or
pyschological criteria.

~~~
timr
C'mon nothing:

A) I don't know if the study authors claimed that they used a "random sample"
(not all experiments require it).

B) Even if it wasn't a "random sample", unless the selection bias was
correlated with the trait under study, it's highly unlikely to matter.

C) All of this is window dressing. The point is, Berkun's argument was overly
general (" _Anyone_ with..."), and based on ridicule of the experiment,
without actually _knowing_ anything about the experiment (by his own
admission!)

If Berkun knew the details of the experiment, and was pointing out a
methodological flaw, he'd be making an argument. Instead, he's speaking from
the comfort of ignorance, attacking a study based on second-hand information
and his own personal biases.

------
aschobel
Grow willpower? It's not a sprint, the harder thing is sustaining willpower.

The trick is balance.

Force yourself to take breaks and give yourself rewards. I finished a big
piece of code on Tuesday and went for a bike ride to the Persidio. Exercise is
also a great way to deal with stress.

Eat well, splurge a little and make sure you are eating foods high in Omega-3.
Your brain will thank you.

Talk to your friends about your ideas. It is energizing evangelizing your
ideas and getting people passionate. Doing so over a pint at the Toronado is a
bonus.

And finally have fun! We have one life to live, do something that you deeply
care about.

------
wallflower
If a short-term motivational boost like attending a conference/event (Startup
Weekend) is like "fast food" (sugar rush, temporary infusion of can-do'ism
enters your system quickly and exits just as quickly, no real long-term
benefit (unless of course, you apply will-power...)

Then applying will-power to a challenge is like "Fibercon" - not the most
pleasant to subject yourself, something you have to intend yourself to do
regularly/everyday.. _and_ better for you in the long-run.

I'd like to share with you one of my favorite essays that I've read - it's
about Salsa dancing but it's really on 'willpower' and the importance of
effort over time: [http://www.unlikelysalsero.com/2007/08/magic-of-time-last-
on...](http://www.unlikelysalsero.com/2007/08/magic-of-time-last-one-
standing.html)

------
ebukys
Growing willpower is pretty much impossible for me--I'm smart enough to reason
my way out of anything, even if it's something that will benefit me in the end
(ie: exercise). The key is to not think about it. If I start to think about
not wanting to go to the gym, I won't go. I realized that I was doing this,
and decided to use my incredibly stubborn nature to defeat it.

I just say, "No."

Cliche, yes, but it works. It works so well, in fact, that none of my friends
will discuss anything with me if I'm in a jovial mood, as when the argument
begins to look up for them, and I no longer feel like defending my own point
of view, I will simply contradict whatever they say.

I'm sure they also hate that I'll start arguing fine points that really have
no relevance to the topic at hand, but...haha.

Willpower is exactly that, the strength of your will. The person with a strong
will will do exactly as he decides fit, regardless of arguments presented by
any camp, including his own.

Some call it will power, some call it determination. Even others call it
perseverance. But in the end, it is pure OBSTINANCE.

------
divia
"As a baseline, anyone with above average willpower has a busy enough life not
to have time to participate in psychological surveys."

I wonder if that's true. Aren't a lot of psych experiments done with college
students? I think I know a lot of people with above average willpower that did
psych experiments in college because they were kind of fun and paid pretty
well.

------
Prrometheus
>The real problem here is that it’s hard to respect any article that mentions
a study without providing references. I refuse to grant credibility to anyone
using a study to support an argument without a reference. If the study was
published I can read it myself and see what it actually says.

Unfortunately, most research today is behind a pay-wall, leaving little
opportunity for an average Joe to check it.

------
Alex3917
>The real problem here is that it’s hard to respect any article that mentions
a study without providing references.

This guy wrote two books and doesn't know how to use Google?

------
morbidkk
1) seek what you aim for

2) work on interestring problems; toil hard and achieve them

3) remind yourseves first two things whenever you are alone

------
edw519
"Willpower" is a word to describe a non-issue.

"What, you don't beat your children? What willpower!"

"You'd rather miss a meal than rob a bank? What willpower!"

"You don't murder your enemies? What willpower!"

Funny how easy life gets when you stop thinking about "willpower" and start
doing the right thing.

~~~
jonnytran
You're only saying that b/c you've never been in a situation where you were
compelled to do the "wrong" thing. :-)

~~~
edw519
<sarcasm>

My probation officer would beg to disagree.

</sarcasm>

------
LPTS
They actually have a lot of the pieces out there but unconnected. I will
answer the question.

Willpower is an equilibrium between two distinct drives, one of which is a
drive to act, and one of which is an inhibitory drive. The first step to
growing willpower is to make sure your lack of willpower isn't caused by a
biological problem or a mental health problem. Before struggling too long to
grow willpower, have a physical, have your thyroid level checked, and get a
mental health evaluation.

The reason you can build willpower is that it is an equilibrium between the
parts of your brain that produce fear and anxiety and the parts of your brain
that produce good feelings. Your right prefrontal cortex produces negative
emotions, and your left prefrontal cortex produces positive emotions. This
circuitry is linked up to the circuitry that primes your body to move.
Assuming no mental or physical illness, willpower is simply a measure of the
relation between these systems.

We know that monks who meditate for 10,000 hours have much greater gamma ray
function. Gamma rays underlie large scale brain synchronization. These monks
also had a different relationship between the left and right prefrontal
cortexs (corti?). In monks, the positive emotion producing left prefrontal
cortex was much more active than the right. Also, they were much more primed
to move.

Meditation, particularly certain kinds from Zen Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism,
are scientifically proven to work on this, to such a degree that
neuroscientists haven't seen some of those neurological states in normal
people. From studying these monks, we know what to do.

It's scientifically proven that you can grow willpower by getting a physical,
and a mental health eval, and then meditating. It's the best, most efficient
way. Everything the nyt article lists as a way of increasing willpower is an
example of an activity where you must be continually bringing your attention
into the present. I don't want to sound like some stupid hippy, but meditation
can be the most concentrated way to practice this focusing of attention, and
directing your focus in certain Tibetan buddhist ways hits all the main parts
of increasing motivation.

I consulted <http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma8/monkstudy.html> to refresh my
memory on the monk neurology study.

~~~
wallflower
I think exercising the mind is the hardest thing to do because it's so easy to
take the path of least resistance.

What are your thoughts on the (1) Marathon Monks of Japan and (2) the Lung-
Gom-Pa's (near mythical if not mystical) of Tibet?

(1) <http://www.millennium-tv.com/Monks.htm> (2)
<http://www.planetultramarathon.com/lunggomparunners.htm>

~~~
as
Great links, thanks.

Here's a video for anyone who's interested:
<http://youtube.com/watch?v=S06oMxdt40A>

------
sabat
Don't try.

Instead, find a way to _want_ the thing. Really want it. No tricks; they don't
work.

You can't pretend passion (and sustain it).

~~~
euccastro
Even if you want the thing, some of the stuff you need to do to get the thing
may be less immediately rewarding than other stuff you could be doing instead.
Even if you consciously know it's worth it in the end, there are subconscious
forces within us that are not as far seeing.

So you need willpower to get past some local lows. Without it, you'd have to
restrict yourself to goals that can be accomplished with only constant
enjoyment along the way. That leaves out many worthy goals, and most
opportunities to create value.

