There are times in life when we’re sure we’re probably going to need a bit of willpower to get something done. It seems to go without saying that without it our chances of success will be pretty slim. But is this really true? Common endeavours, which seem to require will power include
· Changing eating habits
· Quitting Smoking
· Giving up alcohol
· Sticking to an exercise regime
· Getting and staying free of a toxic relationship
It seems like any time we want something to happen and we don’t think it’s going to be easy, at some point during our pep talks, we’ll probably find ourselves thinking about willpower.
We've already told ourselves it’s not going to be an easy ride but then with willpower as our wingman, It seems like we might have a friend and ally to help us achieve our end goal. But wait! Before we agree to this partnership, what if we were to take a moment to check out its credentials a bit first.
So what is willpower? It’s funny isn’t it because we don’t often stop to ask ourselves questions like this. We are pretty sure it’s something we need but if we pause here a moment, which I love to do. Perhaps we can wonder, what is it, and what does it do for us?
Then we can go back and choose it or not, but we are a bit better informed.
Statistics show that around 90% of diets ultimately fail with dieters often ending up gaining more weight than when they started. According to studies approximately 75% -80% of smokers who attempt to quit, relapse within the first six months. A recent study carried out by Fridge Readers found that over 4 billion pounds a year is spent in the UK on unused gym membership. Just some fun facts I found.
Of course, there are lots of reasons for any and all of the above but they are also all things that we heavily associate with the need for willpower at some point. So hold on… If willpower is so useful why are these “failure” rates so high?
Perhaps we should take a little more time to check this willpower thing it out then, just before we strap ourselves to it and leap because what I see is that despite the loudness of its shouty voice on subjects such as how we’ll never succeed without it in our goal of… Losing 20lbs, putting the ciggies down for good this time, keeping up the exercise routine for longer than the first-month membership, or getting sober, the evidence suggests that for all its posturing and promises, as a strategy alone, it is as associated with the non-sustainment of long terms goals as it is with the achievement of them. Hmmm…
So is willpower overrated?
What I’ve also noticed is that when we deem ourselves to have failed, we don’t seem to question that it might have been partly the idea of willpower that failed us, but rather assume that we just didn’t have enough of it. What if this wasn’t true...
I’m not saying willpower, whatever it’s made of, can’t be a useful companion on our journey, but as head of the expedition, it turns out that it really hasn’t read the map as well as it would have us believe.
So let’s take a closer look. What is willpower?
When I feel the need to deploy willpower, I find that along with the voice of mustn’t and don’t, I have an internal ‘face’ made of gritted teeth and furrowed brow. If I can bear this uncomfortable feeling for just long enough, or switch off the thoughts that are telling me to do or not do the thing I “should” or “shouldn’t” do then I’ll get through to the other side and be another step closer to success. So willpower seems to be about just bearing it in the moment and sometimes it can feel like this is all we’ve got. But too often we imagine that it actually is all we’ve got and perhaps this isn’t true.
My voice of willpower can often be heard saying things like, you mustn’t do this or that thing, or you must do this or that thing forever more, at all costs or you’ve failed. If you stick with it, you’ll be free sometime in the future but just not today. My willpower doesn’t believe I really want to do or not do the thing. My willpower is afraid of choice. My willpower whispers ‘I am the only way’. My willpower shouts if you don’t stick with me, you’ll be out of control you crazy fool! (That was my personal favourite)
Put simply, willpower can be a bit of a bully. It doesn’t encourage or celebrate our triumphs with us but rather tells us that it protects us from all the terrible things that we might become if we do or don’t do ‘the thing’ and on and on, and when we are finally done with being bullied we stick two fingers up at it and go back to being nicer to ourselves, which is always a relief until we remember that we didn’t achieve ‘the thing’. And so we begin again, back into the fray, determined that this time we shall prevail.
So what’s that all about then? Firstly, willpower is just an idea really isn't it. It’s nothing more than a thought designed by the thought-factory area of our mind that likes to judge, berate, live in the past or future tell us there’s something wrong with us and generally create conflict. It’s forever telling us we are in battle with something and that something is often ourself. Crazy.
Whatever willpower actually is, who even knows really, it’s often accompanied by, or supporting a story of conflict within ourselves. The truth is that we aren’t designed to live in this continuous level of heightened stress so after a time it simply becomes too exhausting to sustain.
So we give up our dream because it seems too tiring to reach it in the end. But what if it was the willpower, its narratives and their accompanying effects on us that were creating the exhaustion, rather than our goal and the things we needed to achieve in order to reach it. What if we swapped the energy-draining willpower story for something else?
Once we get to the stage in our project where willpower feels as if it’s required, which is a human inevitability (why are we always so surprised) we often find ourselves at a point of lower energy. Initial momentum and the hopeful energy that launched our rocket is starting to have been used up, and this is when the more negative helpers appear with their plan.
The issue with this plan is that the initial energy, the stuff that launched our rocket, was made of all the reasons from deep within us that we really wanted to do or not do the thing. Perhaps, motivations of better health, because we value our body and the deep desire to be at peace with ourselves. Something creative we wanted to bring into the world because we could, the love and value of family friends and relationships.
Then we just have a low-energy day and in comes willpower to save us. This can work to a point, short term but what it’s also doing is taking more from our gas tank without putting anything back in, so after a few rounds… Well you can see where I’m going with this. Our life energy can begin to be damped down and drowned out by the voices of conflict.
When I feel like I need willpower I pause a moment and understand that my energy is low in that moment. I can tough it out yes, but I also know that this will only get me so far until the next time and it alone doesn’t put any fuel in my tank, because just toughing it out has no restorative energy in it.
What I can remember is that I do have the gift of choice. If I choose to put the cream bun into my face or light up a cigarette then this is all that’s happened in this moment because I just did it, not because I’m a failure or a bad person.
I can look at it for what it is. I don’t have to make up more stories to justify what I did or didn’t do and why I did it, and instead, simply see that it was just a momentary choice to do something or not do something, that just doesn’t, in that moment seem in line with my projected goal.
Armed with the understanding that I have that choice I can just choose to do or not do the thing and the best part is that either is totally ok. This is freedom.
In this moment I have swapped willpower for choice based on what I really wanted to achieve. If I ate the cream bun there was no failure only the choice to do so and tomorrow, I might choose differently.
So often when I know ‘I can’, I simply find I don’t need to any more and that’s it isn’t it. Will power says ‘no’ and all this does is make me want to do it more. Willpower seems to set me apart from myself somehow, blocking out and denying experiences that I might learn and heal from. Willpower ‘means well’ but it also says that the point is always the gratification in the future rather than the knowing and accepting of myself in the now.
So when I investigate the possibility of swapping willpower in the moment for the freedom of choice, what I seem to gain in that moment is the very thing that builds my better future by default as if without me even trying. It is the absence of conflict, allowing me to open to the help of the greater power of possibility, Insight and wisdom.
It is the absence of the battle, meaning I didn’t exhaust the life out of myself when I needed all of my energy to achieve something that might not feel easy for me. I can relaunch my rocket.
And this is the wisdom I take with me for the next time willpower offers its assistance. Perhaps one of the values of willpower, is in its pointing of us towards other options that might be available and more valuable to us in the moment. Perhaps its value might be in showing us that we really didn’t want that thing as much as we thought we did after all. So thank you willpower.
So maybe I’ll use a bit of both. But I know that when I see only future success or failure, I often find myself “failing” in the end, but when I allow myself to see choice in the moment I often find I choose well. And sometimes I don’t. Oh well.
Of course there are times when a life might be on the line and there is so little energy and self-esteem to call on at this time, that total hard-core abstinence may be the only sensible choice but for many of us, thankfully we are nowhere near this yet, so I say, save the willpower for emergencies and begin to enjoy the journey of freedom and choice, because you can. And because it’s a lot more fun than the other thing.
Maxine Kemp is a transformative life coach based in East Suffolk UK who is dedicated to simplifying and demystifying the journey to greater peace well-being and empowerment.
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