Willpower Is Not Infinite

One thing that you absolutely have to realize in order to adopt the Agile Mindset is to realize that willpower is not infinite. That’s very sad realization but on the other hand it gives you a way to improve your life the agile way.

 

Abuse Willpower For Mental Fatigue

What I’ve reluctantly accepted two years ago was that mental fatigue is real. If you’re exercising your willpower all the time then you’ll eventually run out of it. What’s even worse, you’ll be upset about it and you’ll have no one to blame but yourself.

That’s probably not a positive introduction you were hoping for.

I written before that the agile mindset requires not only pragmatism but also positive attitude. It is hard to be positive if you’re fighting your basic instincts all the time. And if you’re unable to accept all the human flaws and cognitive biases that plague our reasoning, then you’ll be fighting yourself.

You don’t want to fight. You want everything to happen habitually, that way you won’t even need that much willpower.

 

The Power of Habit

Okay, I admit it. The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg is on my short list of most useful books. I can easily recommend it to everyone.

Because of confirmation bias I also started to see discussions about habit forming all around my Twitter feed. Thus, I started to ponder about my own habits and their development over time. Surprisingly to no one except me, I usually don’t struggle with habits. I just do them relentlessly until they become part of me. That’s why my friends sometimes call me a robot.

Being a dedicated man is a good thing. Becoming obsessed is a straight way to great success… or mental breakdown.

I always suspected that you can train your “habit muscle” (i.e. brain). I think I’m so good at it because I’ve been working on it for a very long time. It’s just something inside of me that doesn’t want to quit, doesn’t want to become a loser. It’s a kind of intrinsic motivation.

Joke all you want, I’ve never had any childhood trauma but I was always very dedicated to achieve whatever I set myself up for. I’ve quite quickly learned the difference between instant pleasure and delayed gratification.

 

Horrors Of High Conscientiousness

When you know you won’t stop until you’re done, you pick your activities carefully. But how does that knowledge help anyone who isn’t like that? Many people say they don’t have any willpower and that they can’t do anything about it. Wrong!

As I already said, you can train your “habit muscle” and can make it stronger. You should never think “I can’t ever be like that”. Just view it as any other muscle or skill you want to train. It’s not like you’re not going to the gym because you’ll never look like Mr. Olympia. Hell, most people don’t even want to look like one!

The same goes for habits. Maybe you don’t want to become another robot but you could use some more persistence in working on your goals. If you’re “not like that”, then don’t despair. Research shows that personality trait conscientiousness gets higher with age. You only have to wait, right?

Conscientiousness is the word of the day.

On the other hand, conscientiousness can also be increased as a result of training your “habit muscle”. Neural paths grow proportionally to their use. The more you do something that you didn’t want to do, the easier it will be in the future. Just like with any muscle work.

 

The Limits Of Willpower

Bear in mind that if you treat mind like any other muscle then you can also fatigue it. Then, the next big effort will break your will. Unfortunately, as a consequence the neural paths that made you quit will grow. That, in turn, will lower your conscientiousness.

As shown in the Power of Habit, heavy test of will were passed by people with strong willpower. The same people failed miserably on the consecutive tests, even if they were much easier. Not only test subjects were less able to persist but they also were tense, edgy, anxious and unpleasant. All that just because they were trying to exercise their will beyond their current capabilities.

That’s why I repeatedly suggest “systems over goals” approach. Put yourself in a position to succeed and get rid of everything that can make you fail. You don’t need much willpower when all your life is set up exactly as needed.

If you’re trying to form a habit of waking up early then reading books until 3 am isn’t going to help you. Conversely, if you’re trying to read more books, then just having them at hand in places where you have time to read will help (we all thought about the toilet, didn’t we?). It sounds reasonable but far too many people are trying to eat less carbs while stockpiling unhealthy stuff in their fridge.

If you don’t have any beer in your fridge, then it will be next to impossible to drink one every evening.

 

Make Your Bed

The one habit that anyone can start with is making one’s bed. That’s so easy to implement as it also helps with the clarity of your thoughts. No one thrives in disorder. Making your bed every morning is the most basic training for your willpower and your habit-forming abilities. The gym is usually next in line.

Gym is the most logical activity to start your self-development journey. Being healthy and fit helps you with everything. You feel better, you think better, you like yourself more, other people ascribe positive qualities just because of how you look, you have more energy, etc.

Once again, you’re simply putting yourself in a position to succeed. Plus you exercise your muscles… and your mind. You’re pushing your limits, you’re working on your habit forming that translates to all areas of your life.

“Mens sana in corpore sano” (“a healthy mind in a healthy body”)

I’d say habit forming and building systems (not trying to achieve goals) are the two most important theories that helped me understand how to convince people to agile mindset. Whether it’s appealing to you or not – those theories largely explain how successful people act.

But there’s more. The strong, prosperous agile mindset consists of much more than healthy habits and strong willpower. But we’ll get there next time.