
Learning How to Exert Self-Control - prostoalex
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/opinion/sunday/learning-self-control.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=fb-nytimes&bicmst=1409232722000&bicmet=1419773522000&smtyp=aut&bicmp=AD&bicmlukp=WT.mc_id&_r=0
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yellow_and_gray
_Whether you eat the marshmallow at age 5 isn’t your destiny. Self-control can
be taught.

The secret of self-control, he says, is to train the prefrontal cortex to kick
in first.

To do this, use specific if-then plans, like “If it’s before noon, I won’t
check email” or “If I feel angry, I will count backward from 10.” Done
repeatedly, this buys a few seconds to at least consider your options.

Self-control alone doesn’t guarantee success. People also need a “burning
goal” that gives them a reason to activate these skills, he says._

~~~
narag
That's just a part of self control, and the easier if you ask me. I have no
problem doing nothing, no problem to freeze and avoid undesirable reactions.

Getting myself to start something difficult, form a habit, this kind of thing
is hard.

~~~
medell
The book The Power of Habit (2012) has been highly recommended to me on this
very topic.

~~~
narag
Thank you!

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Lagged2Death
_The children who succeed turn their backs on the cookie, push it away,
pretend it’s something nonedible like a piece of wood, or invent a song.
Instead of staring down the cookie, they transform it into something with less
of a throbbing pull on them. Adults can use similar methods of distraction and
distancing ... When a waiter offers chocolate mousse, imagine that a cockroach
has just crawled across it._

It sounds a lot like something we often call "cognitive dissonance" in other
contexts. It's easy to imagine that this sort of self-deception is an
important foundational part of a lot of belief systems and zealotry of all
stripes. The more you try to change a believer's mind with facts, the harder
they concentrate on the imaginary cockroach that just crawled across the
mousse. It could help explain why people who are very effective at changing
the world around them are often also profoundly irrational believers in
_something_ , completely resistant to facts; the same basic disciplinary
mechanism underlies both zeal and self-discipline.

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ajuc
I think that's what happened with sex and Catholicism (the cockroach method).

~~~
Spearchucker
You're only partly right. It's what happened with sex and quite a number of
religions. It's also why many Americans (especially in the military) refer to
Muslims as "hajis". In that context it's easier to kill something that doesn't
appear human.

Cognitive dissonance is very, very effective.

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ilaksh
I wonder when we will see technologies that help engage the prefrontal cortex
while reduxing the influence of the limbic system. Focusatwill.com might be
one of them (seems essentially to be about playing 'hardcore' dance music to
increase beta waves).

Another thing mentioned is stress. That is a big problem contributing to self-
control.

Honestly during times when I am not being constructive it seems that my
prefrontal cortex is not even really active.. The types of thinking that I do
when I am working just aren't happening.

Actually it seems to me a bit like resting a muscle or letting a car cool down
that is overheated. Sometimes I just need to actually start the engine of that
part of my brain that handles goals and higher level thinking. Other aspects
of health like general energy levels affect it.

~~~
maneesh
Check out Pavlok.com

~~~
graeme
How do you handle a goal like "don't eat ice cream"? I'm having difficulty
imagining a trigger that would automatically shock you in that case.

~~~
harryjo
Read about factory farming, read about mammalian biology, and have an anti-
interest interest in the suffering of sentient beings, and ice cream is
impulsively repulsive.

~~~
graeme
That's not a bad answer (even of non-vegetarians....I'm paleo, but avoid
factory farming in my meat. So this would help me if I staill ate ice cream)

But, you've missed the larger question, which was: how do you make triggers
for acts _similar to_ eating ice cream, which don't occur on screen or have
any location based trigger?

~~~
maneesh
tooth sensor that knows when sugar passes through it

~~~
graeme
you put the ice cream on the bracelet?

~~~
justuseapen
I bet perceived sugar and olfactory responses are measurable by EEG...

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metra
Have we all agreed that higher SAT scores, advanced degrees, less coke, and
more money are all things that we want? Am I missing something? Other than
coping with stress, I'm not sure I want any of the other qualities.

~~~
yjm
To get those things you need willpower and the research was about measuring
willpower.

If you want different things that's your choice but for most good things in
life you need willpower. You can't do what the guy from "Into the wild" did
without willpower.

~~~
auggierose
Not such a good example ...

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hyp0
_tl;dr_ to distract constructively; to distract in ways that are in themselves
satisfying

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dskhatri
The marshmallow experiment results are not as clearcut as the article implies:
[http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/10/13/t...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/10/13/the-
marshmallow-test-revisited/)

~~~
im3w1l
I think that is a dishonest refutation. Sure you can construct a situation
where trust is the driving mechanic, by lying to them shortly before making
promises. But that doesn't mean it was the deciding factor in the original
experiment.

A better way to demonstrate that would be to measure trust and see to what
extent it explains delaying gratification.

~~~
mtrimpe
If you're interested the book "The Truth About Trust" goes into that in great
detail and even includes the trust relationship with your future self which is
very relevant to the original article. I thoroughly enjoyed it...

[http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18114085-the-truth-
about-...](http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18114085-the-truth-about-trust)

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fma
Back in college, one of my girlfriends broke up with me...the most heart
breaking of all my breakups. It took a mental toll on me for weeks. At one
point, my roommate gave me an advice.

Every time I think of her, picture her taking a crap on the toilet...yeah it
worked and eventually I stopped thinking of her in a positive manner. I
continue to pass on this advice!

~~~
mjklin
Haha, I had a similar experience when I lived in Central America. I came in
crying to dinner with my host family because my girlfriend Alejandra had
broken up with me. The mom of the family said, no problem, just memorize this
poem: "Alejandra era una rosa, y Alejandra era un clavel, pero ahora es un
cerrote envuelto en un papel!" (Alejandra was a rose, and Alejandra was a
carnation, but now she's a piece of shit wrapped up in toilet paper!).
Definitely made me feel better.

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jrapdx3
While Walter Mischel is enormously accomplished, the ideas described in the
article re: self-control appear to be simpler than observation of people
struggling with behavioral control reveals.

I'm not familiar with Mischel's work, though he's admirably produced a lot of
it, no doubt reading some of it would teach me things worth knowing. I'm not
assuming the article is truly representative of the breadth of such a prolific
mind. My ideas on the subject reflect what I've seen and learned so far.

To say we are driven by limbic system emotion in one way and goal-driven
prefrontal cortex (PFC) opposing it would be minimizing the magnificent
complexity of our construction. Thing is, control of our own behavior is
limited and the nature of such control hardly understood by neuroscience,
leaving us in no position to confidently prescribe methods of self-control in
general.

It should not be surprising that kids performing better on a test that
measures exactly what is successful in school and the corporate world will be
more successful than kids scoring poorly. Academic achievement requires a
talent for anti-hedonism, and those not as gifted in this trait will likely
not do as well.

OTOH the persistent stubbornness ("grit") required for some kinds of success
isn't synonymous with pleasure denial as seems to be implied. Determined
persistence has a strong emotional component, individuals with such traits
take pleasure in their accomplishments even if others don't understand it at
all. They also react strongly to attempts to deflect them from their path.

Emotional salience is intrinsic to strongly bound goals, one must have the
desire, the drive in order to sustain the effort to achieve. The emotion is
not suppressed but harnessed in service of the mission. To the goal-seeker,
foregoing other pleasures "normal" people covet is not a sacrifice, it is
simply unimportant and not missed.

In this paradigm, imagine the kid who's more eager to finish building the
tower of blocks than interested in the taste of candy.

History shows us many people built like that: Paul Erlich (chemotherapy),
Thomas Edison, Harold Edgerton, among so many others.

The saying "knowledge is power" applies, fully knowing what we feel and having
the "grit" to feel it, connected to logical problem-solving is a very potent
tool.

Maybe that's what the article about Mr. Mischel was really trying to say.

~~~
bernardlunn
If you are in creative flow, the urge to splurge literally goes away. Whatever
it is - coding, writing, sport, painting - doing something obsessively takes
attention away from one's boring ego driven needs.

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peritonia
All of the methods used by the doctor to avoid triggers and delay
gratification are exactly those used in NLP

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virmundi
I find the creativity and focus tones to be helpful for focus.[http://iso-
tones.com/index.php/tones/miscellaneous](http://iso-
tones.com/index.php/tones/miscellaneous)

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vonnik
Pamela Druckerman is a fraud. I lived in Paris, France, for years, and I would
not consider that society as a model of good parenting.

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rch
I wonder if there were any kids who immediately took the one cookie and then
went on to other things.

