15 Scientific Tips to Acquire and Strengthen Will

Would you like to eat that second donut? Are you trying to get more exercise in your day to day? Do you impulsively buy from Amazon? Did you know willpower is it a mental muscle that can be trained? Those who train their willpower are more likely to lead happy and successful lives.

Before you read these 15 Tips to Strengthen and Increase WillpowerI invite you to watch this short video in which they explain why our willpower fails.

The video focuses on the resolutions we make ourselves when a new year begins and what is the reason why we do not end up fulfilling them. He gives us a series of tips that will make our brain strong and endow us with an unbreakable will:

[You may be interested «Willpower: 5 reasons why it fails us"]

Recent research shows that strengthening willpower is the real secret to resist temptations and achieve our goals.

The good news is that scientists say that strengthening our willpower is not as difficult as you might think. Here are 15 research-based hacks that can strengthen your willpower:

1. Smile 🙂

Smiling helps improve willpower. In a recent study, the scientists tested the willpower of the participants in the experiment. They had to be able to resist a certain temptation.

The first group was given unexpected gifts or shown a funny video. The other group was not given any kind of positive reward.

The first group significantly improved their ability to resist temptation later. So the next time you need to resist some kind of temptation, try to improve your mood by smiling or watching a funny movie.

2. Clench your fists.

Clench your fists, close your eyes or even hold the urge to urinate can help you improve self-discipline.

3. Meditate.

Meditation is good for many things (reduces stress, increasing focus, managing emotions ...).

Now the investigations suggest that it even helps improve willpower.

An easy way to start meditating is to spend 10 minutes a day sitting in a quiet place and concentrating on your breathing.

4. Reminders.

Our immediate desires to give in to temptations make it very difficult to resist.Our emotional desires seem like a huge elephant and our rational being is like a little ant.

However, one way tame the elephant it is putting up physical reminders of what our rational selves want to achieve. So put a note on your fridge that says "just a donut" or set an alarm that goes off when you need to stop playing video games.

5. Eat.

Did you know that willpower also needs to feed? It's no wonder dieting is so difficult. When we have low glucose levels, our willpower goes down the drain. The best cure is a protein-rich meal that produces a steady, steady level of glucose… and allows the willpower to stay strong as an oak tree.

6. Self-forgiveness.

La science shows that feelings of guilt drain the willpower. This is why those who eat ice cream and feel remorse are more likely to get carried away and continue to eat more sweets. Instead, when you succumb to temptation, be more compassionate to yourself.

7 Commitment.

The most important thing to strengthen your willpower is the commitment to do it. Only by committing yourself do you improve your willpower. To do this, evaluate your situation and establish why you want to strengthen your willpower, make a clear decision to work in this regard and set a long-term goal.

8) The will is like a muscle: it needs exercise.

If you go to the gym to develop your muscles, why not dedicate an effort to develop a muscle that will allow you to achieve great things in your life. How does the will develop?

a) Day by day: constantly.

b) Setting small challenges: do not try to achieve something big at the beginning. It starts with conquering small challenges and consolidating them. Slowly.

9) You need to be in top shape: physically, mentally and emotionally.

We are talking about strengthening a mental or even spiritual dimension. It's not as easy as building a biceps (although it works as an analogy). You will need to be in top shape, to the best of your abilities to make this effort as it requires self-discipline.

Being well rested, well fed (varied diet), in top physical shape and staying mentally and emotionally balanced, you will be in a better position to strengthen your will.

10) Be self-motivated.

Unprepared effort is a harbinger of failure. Preparation is necessary before undertaking the challenge. I'm saying that to overcome that challenge you need a strong willpower. Motivation will help you strengthen your willpower.

Spend 5 minutes before taking the challenge to visualize the benefits that it will bring you once it is conquered. Think about how you are going to undertake it to be able to do it in the best possible way. Challenge yourself to be the best doing it. 5 minutes thinking about these things will serve to execute it 100% motivated.

11) Look for role models.

We all know people who inspire us either by their achievements, their way of being or their way of doing things. Surely they have an iron will to have managed to form such an attractive personality. Learn from them.

12) Have a detailed action plan for each objective.

Tackling a challenge requires a detailed action plan to act as a guide. The will is strengthened with the achievement of each small objective that is part of that elaborate plan of action.

13) Reward yourself.

If you have achieved your goal based on willpower, award yourself a prize. You know what you like the most, that whim you long for. Why not give it to yourself after the effort you have made?

14) Don't be discouraged, learn from mistakes.

Doing a task that requires a certain amount of willpower, we have already said that it is not easy. Maybe you don't get it the first time or the second. Strengthening your will is a daily job and commitment. If you have not succeeded today, analyze why and try again tomorrow.

15) Look for a partner along the way.

If we want to achieve a goal, it may be a good idea to find another person who shares the goal to walk the path together. Between the two of you you will help each other in times of weakness.

The experiment that showed greater willpower is linked to success in life

In the 60s, a sociologist named Walter Mischel was interested in how children resist instant gratification. Made the famous marshmallow experiment which consisted of offering the children a marshmallow right then or two if they could wait 15 minutes. Years later, he located some of the children who participated in the experiment and made a surprising discovery.

What he found was that, even taking into account differences in intelligence, race, and social class, those who resisted the urge to eat the marshmallow immediately in favor of eating two marshmallows 15 minutes later were healthier, happier, and financially richer adults.

In contrast, children who succumbed to temptation had higher rates of school failure. They became adults with low-paying jobs, had more overweight problems, problems with drugs or alcohol, and had more difficulty maintaining stable relationships (many were single parents). They were also nearly four times more likely to have a criminal conviction.

Mischel's findings were confirmed by a study conducted in New Zealand.

How we can improve our willpower according to Roy Baumeister

Dr. Roy baumeister, an eminent researcher in social psychology distills three decades of academic research into self-control and willpower. This prestigious social psychologist openly identifies willpower like "The key to success and a happy life." After listing these guidelines to increase your will, I explain an experiment that corroborates this statement.

Bausmister argues that willpower is one of the aspects that differentiates us from animals. The ability to contain our urges, resist temptation, do what is right and good for us in the long run is what makes a person have a fulfilling life.

Like a muscle you can train your willpower. With small acts of your day to day you can strengthen your willpower, examples: maintain a good posture, speak using complete sentences, ... As you can see they are simple exercises that are part of our daily life. To better remember your assigned task (for example, you have decided not to speak ill of anyone all day), you can sit or stand up whenever you do not remember. According to Baumister, this type of reinforcement helps maintain attention.

Another good advice that Baumister gives us to strengthen the willpower is that don't try to do too many things at once. Establish good habits and routines that don't strain your willpower. Learn how to make an effective to-do list.

Don't expose yourself to temptation And if he can't help it, make it harder for you to succumb to it.

This similarity of willpower to a muscle means that there may be signs of exhaustion. Faced with this type of signs of fatigue, a very effective measure can be adopted that consists of take more glucose. In order for there to be good glucose levels in your body, you must sleep and eat well.

Baumister cites an "impressive demonstration" of the glucose argument: a study showed that Israeli judges who had to make a difficult and sensitive decision about whether or not to grant parole to a certain prisoner, they chose to make the decision (in 65% of the cases) after lunch. Source

Has this article helped you? Why do you want to strengthen your willpower?