Willpower

What do you do when you’re having a rough day?

I dropped out of law school before a semester was over but I do remember one Big Idea from Contracts class.

So, as per our last +1, bright lines are super helpful in making deals with ourselves.

In our last +1, we talked about the fact that Speed Is a Force.

Although I’m not a huge fan of some of the drawbacks of animal testing, this study is astonishing and worth knowing about.

Most of us wonder how we can have more willpower in those moments of temptation.

In our last +1, we talked about the power of recommitting. You make a big commitment, then you fall a little off track. No big deal, REcommit and continue on.

In our last +1 we talked about Odysseus and his contract with himself as he navigated past the Sirens. As we discussed, willpower scientists tell us that precommitments are where it’s at. Again: Play OFFENSE with your willpower rather than DEFENSE. Install habits that run on autopilot rather than fight temptation all day every day.

Continuing our theme of powerfully facing our challenges, let’s talk about THE most powerful way science says we can rock it.

In our last +1, we had our brains scanned and learned that the pain of procrastination is only in the ANTICIPATION of doing something—not in the actual doing. (Good to know!)

As we recently discussed, Walter Mischel is one of the world’s leading researchers on the science of willpower. You’ve probably heard about his classic study called The Marshmallow Test.

We know it’s important to take good breaks. We want to work for a certain period of time (NASA says no more than 90 minutes or so) and then take a break. Repeat. Making waves as we oscillate from being on to being off.

We’ve had a number of +1s on how to Optimize the use of our limited Willpower to install Habits that run on autopilot.

Today we wrap up our tour of the 7 Habits. One more pop quiz. Can you recall each of the prior 6?

Adam Alter wrote a great book called Irresistible in which he walks us through how we become addicted to technology and tells us about the businesses built on hacking our brains to capture our attention and create those addictions. It’s a powerful read and goes nicely with the must-see 60 Minutes special on Brain Hacking.

This morning I woke up early with a bunch of +1s forming in my head. I smiled as I unpacked them a bit while enjoying a few more minutes in bed.

Continuing our Optimal Breathing theme, here’s a little gem from Kelly McGonigal’s The Willpower Instinct.

In our last +1, we talked about the awesome CEO-dads (and Harvard interns!) who are committed to mastering their Love as much as their Work. (Inspiring!!!)

In our last +1, we talked about the fact that willpower outpredicts IQ by a factor of TWO for academic performance.

The other day, Phil and I were celebrating some Heroic goodness including exciting opportunities on the Social side of things (!) and the fact that over 400 Coaches signed up in the first week (yay!).

Joe De Sena’s newest book is called The Spartan Way. It’s all about the ten Spartan virtues. It’s awesome.

Mel Robbins has a super-popular TEDx Talk called How to stop screwing yourself.

In our last couple +1s, we talked about Seneca’s wisdom on the importance of “fortifying our pertinacity” until our will to do the right thing becomes a disposition to doing the right thing.

In our last +1, we talked about my impulsive little foray into a Dropbox Paper chat—allowing myself to get distracted reacting to some inputs BEFORE doing my (pre-inputs!) Deep Work.

In our last +1, we talked about the fact that, if we could figure out how to take 30 EXPONENTIAL steps, we’d be able to hop in a rocket and go around the Earth two DOZEN times.

BJ Fogg founded the Behavior Design Lab at Stanford University.

In our last +1, we talked about BJ Fogg and his Behavior Design Equation.

In our last +1, we talked about some parallel wisdom from BJ Fogg’s Tiny Habits and Alex Korb’s The Upward Spiral.

A couple +1s ago, we spent some time with Admiral McRaven hours before the launch of his successful mission to bring justice to Osama bin Laden.

Today I want to go spend another minute or three with Trevor Moawad and some more wisdom from his great book It Takes What It Takes.

In our last +1, we (that would be me, the Secret Agent DoubleO-You and our daimons) spent some time hanging out chatting about the power of agency.