AuthorADD Crusher

Know and Avoid Everyday Willpower-Killing Behaviors!

Willpower helps you tackle the tough stuff. The critical stuff. The stuff that makes a big difference in your career and home life. But there are things you’re doing across your day that undercut it. Seriously. I’ll share how you’re hampering your own willpower and what you can do to avoid these traps — and even boost willpower.

Let’s First Define Willpower

The dictionary definition is something like: self-control deliberately exerted to do something or to restrain one’s impulses.

As such, it’s not just willpower (“I will do the harder-but-more-noble thing”), it’s also “won’t-power” (“I won’t do this tempting thing that’s against my long-term interest”).

The more willpower — and won’t-power — you’re able to muster, the better you can keep your ADHD brain out of trouble, and your actions pointing in a positive direction.

But another thing about willpower is that it’s depletable, like gas in your car’s fuel tank. And there are things you’re doing throughout your day that are needlessly burning it. That’s right — you’re undermining your own willpower every day. We all are.

I can control my available willpower? Yep.

How NOT to Boost Willpower

Willpower allows you to resist temptations, make hard decisions, manage emotions and steer your behavior. But from the moment you wake up, your willpower fuel tank heads toward empty throughout the day. Ironically, a few things that accelerate that fuel burn are resisting temptations, making tough decisions, managing your emotions and regulating your behavior. All positive things! So doing the right thing burns willpower!

But there are other things you’re doing that further burn your willpower fuel. Not-so-right things. Let’s look at the range of these (bolded) in the context of a hypothetical work day.

Let’s say that your supply of willpower for the day fits in a gas tank. You start your day by giving 20 minutes of your attention to emails before you even leave for the office. Oops, that burned some willpower. OK, you’ve got plenty left, no worries.

Off to work! First thing at your desk, you tap into this tank of willpower to dive into that big project you’ve been putting off. Yep, that eats up some, too, but that’s what it’s there for — doing the tough stuff.

Oh geez, now you’re interrupted by a phone call — your boss insists that you attend an unscheduled meeting, right now. Your stress response fires up because you did not plan on this and do not want to be there, but you have to. You can smell the fuel burning off.

OK, so you get to the meeting. You’re still carrying those negative vibes, which make it even tougher to give your full attention to the meeting so you impatiently start multitasking — listening to the meeting, taking notes, checking and responding to emails and texting with a client.

OK, meeting’s over. Now back to work. But now it’s lunch time. You’re A) famished, B) a little stressed about getting back on that project and C) having a tough time deciding where to get lunch. The hunger, stress and decision-making each eat up some willpower.

Thinking that time is at a premium today, you dart out to Mickey D’s and after debating which menu item is the least evil, you opt for a Big Mac combo. You multitask through lunch but manage to squeeze in a half-decent single tasking session on your tough project until you hit the three o’clock wall, at which time you escape into 10 minutes of rampant rumination about this and that. Your fuel tank takes a triple hit from the crappy food, more work and then a round of worrying.

Then you partake in some pseudo-productivity — emails, texts, emails, paper shuffling, emails, Facebooking, emails — until it’s finally 5:30 p.m. and you’re happy to get out of the office before 6 p.m. because you’ll have time to stop at the gym.

But your tank is now so low on willpower fuel that you can’t muster the firm decision to just do it. So, you rationalize skipping the gym because you’re beat and today didn’t flow like you thought it would.

And I could go on about your evening TV habits, cracking open a bottle of beer or wine, staring at your smartphone before bed — all of which further weaken you for tonight and for tomorrow.

So let’s review…

• Your very exertion of willpower leaves less of it available, for instance, every time you resist a temptation or buckle down on a tough task.
• But there are also things you’ve done throughout your day that needlessly drained your tank — multitasking, stressing, ruminating, junk food, pseudo-productive busywork — to name just five.
• And as a result, at the end of the day, the things that don’t get attended to as they should were things like working on tough, priority tasks, working out and getting to sleep earlier.

Good News: Manage a Few of These and You’ll CONSERVE Willpower

Let’s start with a few of the more obvious ones…

• Cut your weekly beer/wine intake and you’ll sleep better and wake with a fuller willpower tank.
• Ditto for your media intake — especially right before bed.
• Low-quality foods are poor brain fuel and will leave you hungry and grumpy more quickly than quality, high-protein/high-nutrient foods.

I know, those solutions aren’t very sexy and you’ve heard them before in one context or another. But they make a big difference. And here are a few of the trickier — but even more immediately impactful — ways to stop burning up willpower…

• Watch out for pseudo-productivity: those activities you slip into because you’re avoiding tougher tasks (like that big project), and which you justify by thinking, “Hey, I hafta do this stuff anyway.” Things like excessive email checking, robotic email deleting, administrative stuff that’s not really important right now, etc.
• Try to catch yourself in bouts of worry and rumination. These stinkin’-thinkin’ sessions may feel “necessary” in the moment, but they’re eating up energy and willpower. If you’re able to catch yourself, the quickest way out is a simple gratitude prayer, e.g., “Today I am thankful for ______.”
• Listen to your body for signals of stress. When, for instance, you feel your shoulders tense up as you struggle with a task, or a colleague or on a phone call, hear that siren and answer it with some deep breathing.

Even Better News: Ways to BOOST Willpower on Demand

There are things you can do to improve willpower fuel economy and even refill your tank throughout your day. A few of my favorites…

1) Know and Obey Your Ultradian Clock: Not to be confused with your circadian clock, that inborn system that tells you when it’s time to sleep and time to wake, your ultradian clock controls your exertion and recovery cycles throughout the day. And we tend to operate in 90-minute cycles.

Of course, everybody’s different. The key thing is to know your optimal sprint/rest cycle and also your strong and weak times of the day. This way you’re attacking your toughest willpower-burning tasks during your strong times and not expecting too much of yourself in your weak times.

2) Pride & Shaming
Psychologist David Desteno says social emotions like pride and shame have a quicker and more direct influence over our actions than rational arguments about long-term costs and benefits. He calls it “hot self-control.”

Examples here are thinking about your 9-year-old child before lighting up a smoke or visualizing the pride you’ll feel by nailing that presentation a week early.

3) Goal Contagion
This is where we see others pursuing a goal and get swept up into pursuing that same goal. For instance, the more you read about successful business people’s pursuit of their goals, the more effortlessly focused you will be on yours. This is one reason why inspiring figures are powerful, as is spending more time with your goal-oriented friends.

A powerful way to fuel goal contagion? Get an accountability partner or sign up for some group coaching. When you share your goals — and your proclivities to procrastinate, prevaricate or escapinate — it effectively doubles your willpower.

4) Practice
In Crusher™TV Episode 45: The Power of No, I talked about how practicing the easy nos helps you build your “no” muscle. And like the willpower muscle, the more you use it, the stronger it gets. Practice self-control on the easy ones — not checking your email constantly, not having that sugary snack.

As uber-coach Beth Main says, “Any time you don’t feel like doing something, look at it as an opportunity to practice your self-discipline. Catch yourself in the act of blowing something off and say to yourself, ‘I really don’t feel like doing this. But because I’m working on self-discipline, I’m gonna to do it anyway.’ Then do it.”

Then either share your victory with someone or journal it, which will help motivate you next time your willpower is called upon.

Stanford’s Carol Dweck says that, “[Willpower is] not unlimited — but it’s a much larger resource than previously thought.” TWEET THIS  …and those who believe they have abundant willpower are able to push on.

Want to Learn More Ways to Boost Willpower?

There are a bunch more ways to boost willpower on demand. The 4-7-8 Technique, the Progress Principle (scoring successes), the 5 Whys, Tasks vs Systems, and more (yes, I LOVE this stuff!).

I dedicated Crusher™TV Episode 54 to 8 Ways to Boost Your Willpower, and you can click the image below to preview that episode.

Bless!

Alan

P.S. You might also get a lot out of watching that entire episode of Crusher™TV where I dig deep into this topic. (You can become a member for a buck and cancel any time you like.) Again, it’s Episode 54 , and you can preview that episode here:

“If I only knew then what I know now (about mental performance hacks!).”

As a “mess-to-success entrepreneur,” I’ve seen both the deep end of drug addiction and the pinnacle of corporate success, as well as entrepreneurial glory with multiple start-ups. But in between were several years where I really struggled as an executive.

Worked my butt of…but couldn’t make my mark.

Nose to the grindstone every day…but constantly overwhelmed.

It took me a while, but eventually I learned some mental performance secrets that helped me go, in the space of just two years, from struggling, underachieving, lowly account executive, to vice president and employee of the year at the largest ad agency in the U.S.; while in my spare time co-founding a start-up that was later sold for 8 figures. Not bad for a classic ADHDer with a sordid history of booze/drugs/crime.

But what does that have to do with you?

There’s a good chance you’re not taking advantage of these mental performance secrets – so I’ll share the before-and-after impact of a couple of these principles and maybe they’ll help your mess-to-success story. (Um, I’m not saying you’re a mess…I should’ve said, “Your good-to-great story.”)

Can some simple mental performance hacks help your ADHD? Yep.

Lots of Input. Not Much Output.

I worked HARD throughout my career as an executive. Long hours, weekends were the norm. My input was stellar. But early on, my output was in the gutter.

And there’s a good chance you’re operating at a high level of input, but not getting your full potential of output and accomplishment. And you may not be savvy to some of the performance secrets that I’m about to share. Principles I wish I’d known when I was a struggling executive.

Mental Performance Secret #1

I wish I knew… that My Brain is My Engine. Might sound obvious. But few of us truly understand that our brain has its own life – and its own needs that are distinct from those of our body.

Think about your car’s engine: You treat it differently than you do the fenders and leather seats…which you care for from the outside with buffing and polishing. You care for your engine from the inside…the right amounts of high quality fluids, lubricants and of course, high-octane fuel.

Before I learned this principle, I was “buffing the outside” with nice suits, a few push-ups and sit-ups here and there, and fueling my body with whatever quenched my thirst and quelled my hunger – lots of sugar, carbs and coffee. But your body can get energy from any crap – your brain needs to be fed right.

After I understood this – I began tending to my body in one way, and to my brain in another…in two simple ways:

1. I adhered to my brain-feeding mantra – sugar sucks, carbs kill, protein is power and omegas are mega. For instance, a 30-gram protein breakfast every day would fuel strong output all morning long – and guess what…fewer late nights at the office!
2. As Dr. John Ratey says, “Exercise creates a brain chemical that acts like Miracle-Gro® for the brain.” That chemical is brain derived neurotrophic factor, or BDNF. But occasional sit-ups and push-ups don’t make enough BDNF to make a difference in your performance.

The research tells us that “aerobic exercise for 40 min offers the greatest probability of significant BDNF elevation.” So line up some protein snacks (sugar sucks!! carbs kill!!) and push yourself a little harder on whatever your workout routine is. You WILL feel the results.

Mental Performance Secret #2

I wish I knew…when I was a struggling executive, that  My Energy is Not Linear. We don’t operate like machines – just flip on our brain and it  goes until we decide we’re done. We all kinda know that much. But neither is our energy linear in a FOOT steady declining fashion, where we just gradually lose mental clarity and stamina over the course of the workday. Our energy is FOOT cyclical.

Before I knew this, here’s what would happen: I’d set about working on a tough, important task and as soon as I’d begin to flag, I’d think, “Welp, that’s it for me!” …and I’d switch over to easier work – more often than not, into pseudo-productivity (meaningless tasks that make you feel productive). So the tough, important task’s completion gets delayed.

Plus, I’d get frustrated, and further reinforce the belief that “I just can’t work on tough stuff for very long” …or that I’m lazy.

After I understood that our energy is cyclical – I began using a timer for single-tasking sessions…then doing a simple recovery ritual when the timer goes off or when I feel the energy dip. To ride the energy cycle back into another powerful singletasking session: Re-fuel with protein — nuts and dried fruit is my magical mix. Or do a “powerpose” (stand for two minutes with hands-on-hips, just like Wonder Woman/Superman) or a quick 5-minute meditation. Mandatory is to get up and walk around. Or bang out 10 push-ups.

Then you’re ready to settle back into crushing it. Set that timer again…Work, recover, work, get a raise, work, recover, work, get promoted, work recover…

Easier said than done, I know. But productivity hacks and other mental performance tips like these made a massive difference for me — and they definitely can for you.

Intrigued About the Potential for Mental Performance Hacks Like These?

I dedicated an episode of Crusher™TV to 5 Mental Performance Secrets I Wish I Knew as a Struggling Executive, and below is the preview of that episode. My Guest Expert, Dr. Evan Hirsch, also shares insights on how toxins may be affecting your mental performance! Click the image below to check out the preview.

You might get a lot out of watching that entire episode of Crusher™TV where I dig deeper into this topic. (You can become a member for a buck and cancel any time ya like.) It’s Episode 73 , and you can preview that episode above.

Bless!

Alan

Alan P. Brown, an internationally recognized Productivity Coach, TEDx Speaker and #1 Best Selling Author of Zen and the Art of Productivity: 27 Easy Ways to Have More Time, Earn More Money and Live Happier is the host of Crusher™TV, where he and his Guest Experts share simple ways to get more done in less time with less stress. Follow Alan on Twitter and on Facebook.