6/19/2017 6WaystoImproveYourWillpower|BufferBlog

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The Science of Self-Control: 6 Ways to Improve

Your Willpower Today

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Written by Belle Beth Cooper

Dec 5, 2013 Last updated: Apr 28, 2016 4 minutes to read

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One of the key parts of our culture at Buer is a focus on self-improvement.
We each pick an area to improve on each week and share our daily progress
and challenges, making it a social, supportive way to adjust, create or change
our habits.

Theres still a lot of work to be done for self-improvement to be eective,

though. Ive been through a bunch of dierent improvement focuses in the
last few months, including positivity, running, reading more and learning
French. Each one has been fun to focus on, but its hard to keep more than
one new habit going at a timepartly because it takes so much willpower.

What willpower is and how it works in the brain

Kelly McGonigal, PhD and author of The Willpower Instinct says willpower is
a response that comes from both the brain and the body.

The willpower response is a reaction to an internal con ict. You want to do one
thing, such as smoke a cigarette or supersize your lunch, but know you
shouldnt. Or you know you should do something, like le your taxes or go to the
gym, but youd rather do nothing.

The prefontal cortex (that section of the brain right behind your forehead) is
the part that helps us with things like decision-making and regulating our
behavior. Self-control, or willpower, falls under this heading, and thus is
taken care of in this part of the brain.

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To be eective at controlling our urges and making sound decisions, the

prefontal cortex needs to be looked after. That means feeding it with good-
quality food so it has enough energy to do its job and getting enough sleep.

How willpower gets depleted throughout the day

McGonigal points out that one of the most replicated ndings about
willpower is that it seems to be nitethat is, we only have so much and it
runs out as we use it.

Trying to control your temper, ignore distractions or refuse seconds all tap the
same source of strength.

We can look at willpower like a muscleit can get exhausted by overuse, but
just like our physical muscles, there are some researchers who believe we

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might be able to strengthen our willpower by training it.

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How to increase your willpower

Okay, we know that we only have so much willpower and as we go about our
day, stress and normal self-control depletes our resource. Lets see what
options we have for increasing the pool of willpower we have to draw from.

1. Increase your capacity for pressure: Learn how to manage stress

To start with, we need to manage our stress levels, says McGonigal. Being
under high levels of stress means that our bodys energy is used up in acting
instinctively and making decisions based on short-term outcomes. Our
prefrontal cortex loses out in the battle for our energy when high-stress is
involved.

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McGonigal says that stopping to take a few deep breaths when we feel
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overwhelmed or tempted can be a great start in managing our stress levels
and improving our willpower.

2. Encourage yourself to stick to your plan

To make it even easier, it appears that self-armation can even help you to
have more self-control when youre running out, according to a study
published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. A good
example of this is the dierence between telling yourself I cant and I
dont. Taking back control of the situation using the phrase I dont has
been shown to be more eective at helping you to stick to your plan and
break bad habits:

Every time you tell yourself I cant, youre creating a feedback loop that is a
reminder of your limitations. This terminology indicates that youre forcing
yourself to do something you dont want to do.

So try telling yourself that you dont do that bad habit, rather than punishing
yourself by saying I cant.

3. Get more sleep to help your brain manage energy better

McGonigal also says getting enough sleep makes a big dierence to how
eciently our prefrontal cortex works:

Sleep deprivation (even just getting less thansix hours a night) is a kind of
chronic stress that impairs how the body and brain use energy. The prefrontal

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cortex is especially hard hit and it loses control over the regions of the brain that
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create cravings and the stress response.

Luckily, McGonigal also cites studies that have shown we can make this work
in our favor by ensuring we get enough sleep:

When the sleep-deprived catch a better nights sleep, their brain scans no longer
show signs of prefrontal cortex impairment.

And if youre wondering how much sleep is enough, heres a rough guide:
one of the most acclaimed sleep researchers, Daniel Kripke, found in arecent
study thatpeople who sleep between 6.5 hours and 7.5 hours a night, live
the longest, are happier and most productive.

4. Meditate (for as little as 8 weeks)

Meditation has also been linked to increasing the reserve of willpower we

have available, as well as improving attention, focus, stress management and
self-awareness. McGonigal suggests this can even give fast results:

And it doesnt take a lifetime of practice brain changes have been observed
after eight weeks of brief daily meditation training.

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5. Better exercise and nutrition: The most ignored route to higher willpower

Another great way to train the brain, that is often easily ignored or
undervalued, yet can make you a lot more resilient to stress, and thus boost
willpower, is regular physical exercise. Both relaxing, mindful exercise like
yoga and intense physical training can provide these benets, though
McGonigal points out that were not sure why this works yet.

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As I mentioned earlier, what you feed your body aects how much energy
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the prefrontal cortex has to work with. This is why nutrition is so important:

Something as simple as eating a more plant-based, less-processed diet makes

energy more available to brain and can improve every aspect of willpower.

Not only will exercise and good nutrition improve your willpower, but theyll
make you feel better as well. Exercise in particular is known for making us
happy by releasing endorphins:

These endorphins tend to minimize the discomfort of exercise, block the feeling
of pain and are even associated with a feeling of euphoria.

6. Postpone things for later to gain focus on whats important now

Postponing something you really shouldnt have can be eective if youre

trying to break a bad habit. In Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human
Strength, Roy F. Baumeister explains that people who tell themselves not
now, but later, are generally less tormented by the temptation of something
they are trying to avoid (his example is eating chocolate cake).

A treat for you, since you waited this long

One last thing. You might have heard of a famous experiment using
marshmallows to test kids willpower. What happens is a child is left alone in
a room with one marshmallow for an undened period of time. If they can

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resist eating the marshmallow, theyre rewarded with a second marshmallow

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at the end of the experiment. If they eat the marshmallow before time is up,
they only get that one.

Its been recreated a bunch of times, and this is a really fun video of what it
can look like.

Image credits: YlvaS, ADHD & You, Womens Health Network, Free Meditation

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Written by Belle Beth Cooper

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Bu Belle
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is the rstContent Crafter at Bu er and co-founder of Exist. She writes

about social media, startups, lifehacking and science.

Follow@bellebcooper 13.6Kfollowers

Commentsforthisthreadarenowclosed.

13Comments UpdatesandtipsfromBuffer
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SortbyBest
Recommend 7 Share
JonathanMalkin4yearsago
Tryingtogetakidtonoteatamarshmallow.Sowrong.
18 Share

KrisGomula4yearsago
greatpost...didn'tthinkaboutmywillpowerbefore:)
6 Share

WillpowerWorks3yearsago
Greatrecapofthebook.Weknowshe'sontosomethingpowerful...
1 Share

ashokbakthavathsalam3yearsago
Nicearticle!Oneofyourlinksiswrongthough(KellyMcGonigal,PhDandauthorofThe
WillpowerInstinctsayswillpower...)Youprobablymeantittopointtohttp://goo.gl/gafphT.
1 Share

SandyAppleyard4yearsago
Thispostmakessenseonsomanylevels.Idoalltherightthingsandhavesomuchwillpowerit
drivesmyhusbandandmymotherinsane.NowIcanexplainwhy:)Cutevideobtw.
1 Share

BigTime_TJ>SandyAppleyard3yearsago
pleaseshareyoursecrets!
7 Share
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AndersGerdmar 4yearsago

Areyoukindofsellingtheideaaboutmeditation?Iseeitquiteoftenandfrommyreligiousposition
Imnotsokeen.ButIreallylikeyourotherstuff
1 Share

James>AndersGerdmar3yearsago
Meditationispartofmanyreligions,butitisn'tinherentlyreligious.It'saneurological
exercisetoclearyourmindandidealltlytakeyououtofyourdefaultloop.Somereligious
groupsassociateitwithmetaphysicaltranscendence,butsomereligiousgroupsthoughtcats
weredeities.Doesn'tmeanyoucan'tlikecats.
9 Share

Lila>James3yearsago
ithouroughlyagree
Share

Eleanorjane>AndersGerdmar3yearsago
Christianshavetheirownbrandofmeditationifthat'sthereligiouspositionyou're
mentioning...
7 Share

kim3yearsago
Ienjoyedthispost,andIthinkIamgoingtryformyself.Ineedtobreakafewhabitsandcreate
betterselfaffirmations.
Share

parinay4yearsago
Thisisgreat!Andthevideoisamazing.Ialwaysfeltkidshavestrongerwillpowerthanme,and,
nowIknowwhy:)Thanks!
Share

TeleworkRecruiting4yearsago
Superhelpful!
Share

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