How to increase your Willpower?
Willpower is a powerful word that we used to inspire in a person. Many inspiring and successful stories in life are always talking about the willpower of the protagonist and how he used his willpower to achieve his goals and stand powerful. Willpower is something present in every human being; at least once in your life, you feel your willpower or aware about it. Somehow, life challenges, cultural development and environments make you to search your willpower and looking for the tips to increase our willpower.
Difference between Willpower & Self-Discipline:
Both perceive as similar but there is a thin line of differences between willpower and Self-Discipline which elicited as major difference in our day to day life.
Willpower is control of your own impulses and actions. Could say, Self-control and it’s your ability to stay focused.
Self- discipline is discipline and training of you usually for improvement. It is the action of consistently doing something productive.
“Willpower is the response that comes from both brain and the body” – Kelly MC Gonigel
Location of Willpower in Brain:
I have already mentioned the details of the brain and brain mind relationship in my previous articles. Here is the link
Coming to the point, Pre-frontal cortex is the area which deals with cognitive thinking, Decision making and Behavior regulation. Some studies suggested that Willpower also from prefrontal cortex area of the brain. Will power is the clash between your logics and Emotions.
Tips to increase your Willpower:
Willpower is like a muscle, it becomes strengthened if you are working on it. Just think about, how muscles are strengthened, how do you build your muscles, when will the muscle become powerful, how long it takes to build your muscle?… If you know the answer for these, then you will know the tips to increase your willpower.
As I said earlier, it is the battle between your frontal area and Amygdala area of your brain.
Shift yourself to Parasympathetic mode:
When there is a danger, your Sympathetic nervous system gets activated which means “Fight or Flight” response. You either react immediately or escape from it. When you do it consistently,{because nowadays threat is psychological}, there will be a continuous release of stress hormones which has direct impact on your body and mind and thus by it finds difficult for you to control your impulses.
So shift yourself to parasympathetic mode which is like brake in a running vehicle. Just pause the moment, take a deep breath, observe – way to shift yourself to parasympathetic mode.
Working on Willpower depletion habits:
There are some habits and behaviors which deplete your willpower, aware, acknowledge and address it immediately. Habits and Behaviors like,
- Masking your originality
- Suppressing your temper
- Ignoring distractions
- Procrastination
- Poor sleep & imbalanced diet
- Poor self care & Mental & Emotional distress
Aware about your Auto-pilot mode and be mindful:
Introspect and retrospect about your automatic decisions which help you to improve your focus and self-control
Don’t exhaust yourself:
If you can able to do everything, don’t do everything. Sounds funny, Right? Let me tell one example, If you want to be productive and wants to work continuously 9 hours per day but at present you are working for 4 hrs per day, then, you gradually increase the hours like 5 hours for a week, later 6 hours for 5 days. Likewise, you should gradually increase that. Don’t put yourself immediately up to 9 hours because it exhausts you and depletes your willpower too.
Improve your Self-awareness & Find your purpose:
Anything which you don’t aware is harder to change. So Self-awareness is crucial. Start finding your values which defines and understand your purpose.
Plan ahead and stick to it:
Effective planning and sticking to it gives a useful break to your willpower. This break enhances your self-awareness and understands your ability which acts as a catalyst for increasing your willpower.
Build Habits:
Habits are very important for your growth in every aspect of your life. Many times, people fall in to bad habits when they are facing struggles. Most common belief that drives addiction is the assumption that, since you feel empty inside, happiness, peace and fulfillment should come from outside. So they fall in to habits which destruct them. So try to build good habits whenever you feel dull or monotony which helps you during your difficult times.
Enhance Neuroplasticity:
Use your opposite hand when you are doing your routine work like brushing, bathing etc. your brain is wired to your dominant hand, so it takes your will power to use the opposite hand.
Take away:
Lack of willpower is not only the reason for your failures in achieving your goals. But at the same time, will power and self-control are essential for your happiness and leading a successful life
Emotion regulation strategies
Work from Health effects and tips to take care of overall wellbeing
Emotional Intelligence- an overview