The Inner Game of Getting Fit, How to become your own Willpower Master.

According to Mike Tyson, "Discipline is doing what you hate to do, but nonetheless doing it like you love it". Most people quit around the period of 3 months, because people get sick, or take a "week off" or making excuses of why they don't want to be in shape anymore. This is because many people aren't happy with their gains, and there are "outer" and "inner" games of getting fit. 

The first is the physical stuff on how to train and eat, but the inner game or the mental stuff is also equally important. You need to adopt a disciplined, orderly approach to how you handle your body, and the two biggest barriers are lack of motivation and lack of discipline. Stop making excuses, and there are tricks to get more disciplined. It's like the cravings and excuses you make when you want one more cigarette. The struggle of self-discipline is what makes people human. Self-awareness comes with a deeper understanding of how we tick. We need to manage our "willpower reserves" and avoid pitfalls that drained them.

When someone lacks willpower, they lack the ability or inability to say no. There are 2 parts of it, "I will" and "I want". "I will" is to do something you don't want to do, like paying the bill or working to make money. "I want" is the ability to remember when the temptation strikes. "Reprogramming yourself" will be uncomfortable, but don't be drawn back to what is familiar. Let's probe into why it's so hard to resist being "bad". 

Real willpower isn't a "wouldn't be nice" thought, it's an all-consuming battle between yin and yang. It's like dopamine rushes when you see the cheeseburger and it says you must consume the sandwich immediately. The brain lowers your sugar levels when it senses the immediate spike, making you want the burger even more. This chemical is made to simulate us to action, not make us feel happy and content. It's dopamine's emotional tool to make sure we obey its commands. We have to identify promises of pleasure and raise red flags. Else, the ultimate rewards elude us every time, but the possibility of payoff makes us anxious. This is why we chase down the short-term dragon, like a burger, an item, or a wink from your rush. 

Before, you needed to work for dopamine, like it's vital for survival. But now it's not, and the dopamine problems will make use trigger even more mouthwatering temptations. Today's society is literally engineered to make us want more, using psychology, and we want to scratch these itches. This is why the average person is overweight hit on dopamine-chasing activities. We need to distinguish between false rewards and go for the true rewards that would bring fulfillment or our own goals.  

The archenemy of willpower is stress, you have to view some rewards as a threat to you like the cheeseburger can't force itself down your throat. We need protection from ourselves, relaxing muscles, and slowing down the heart rate. The more stress we feel, the more we are willing to trigger our impulses. People who are less stressed have better self-control, and anything that induces stress drains our "reserve" of willpower. This is why people turn to food, alcohol, pornography, etc, and these can actually increase stress. Sugary food spikes blood levels, and it gives us temporary relief but it comes with higher repercussions, a crash. Make sure your blood sugar levels are high enough, with carbs. The best way is to relax or breathe. Make sure to meditate and do yoga. You also want to start exercising, since you have better self-control. Think of it as your "secret weapon" for self-control.

Many people sing "Don't care how I want it Now!" but when we think of reward, the more we have to wait, and the less desirable they become, and this is called "delay discounting". This is why credit cards make so much money and why people do drugs. We don't want to lose something we have even if we're going to gain something greater later. A doughnut feels a lot more desirable than weight loss, and this is the reason. Think of your future reward first. 

Few people exercise and eat enough vegetables and fruits, and we become addicted, and you're not immune to these mechanisms. What others do has marked the behavior of what we do. This is why it's comforting to get fat because a lot of people do it, and it's called "social proof". The more people believe others watch porn or do drugs, the more likely they will do the same. Hearing someone skip class might justify cheating on your test. So join forces with someone who is in the same boat, and spend a few minutes each day to review all of your goals.

When people screw up,  they are more likely to indulge in toxic behavior. This is known as the "what the hell" effect, like "I messed up, what the hell, might as well have some fun", which leads to even bigger failures. What we do next after the failure is what is important. WE don't go down when we mess up, don't be super tough or strict, show kindness and compassion. Pride is an effective weapon, tell yourself you will be proud when you achieve your goals. This helps you stay strong in the face of temptation. 

A lot of people justify their sins of the present with planned virtues of the future. Simply planning on exercising later can increase the likelihood of cheating on a diet. This type of thinking reeks of moral licensing, and we wrongly assume that we make different decisions in the future than we do today. We can't bring our future selves too much credit. When tomorrow comes following through with what you did earlier is slim. You can then improve your future self-continuity, which is the ability to connect future consequences with future actions. We can also use a couple of mental exercises to build future self-continuity. You should also write a letter to your future self about what your hopes for him are on futureme.org. Physical mental, emotional ways. We want to ride the wave, not fight the urge. 

We can ride the wave, we shouldn't fight the urge. The problem isn't the spark of the imagination but the forceful attempt at suppressing it, and a willingness to think thoughts and feel feelings without having to act helps with temptation, don't think negative thoughts, ride the waves. This helps mainly for dieting, and we cannot control what we have. This is surfing the urge and it helps smokers to cut back on daily cigarette smoking. Wait 10 minutes before acting on craving, and now most of the time, you don't actually want to do it anymore. Commit to doing a task for 10 minutes and then figure out what you're gonna do next. 

Sometimes you make excuses just to go home vs work. Do I order pizza or cook? etc. People use excuses to do whatever they can. We need to push ourselves past the mental and physical barriers. Push it, it's not as tough as it looks, just one step at a time. However, we can "run out" of self-control juice" and willpower is a muscle and you can train your willpower to be much more resistant to fatigue. We can build our own "willpower workouts" and build "I won't" or "I will" by practicing things more, and these help you make bigger changes in life. Precommitment entails taking action now to strengthen your position and commit to behavior and ward off future attempts.

There are some good links such as putting money on the frame in a timeline, showing that you mean business. We crave progress more but it comes with complacency as a risk, and people use progress as an excuse to let off the gas since now we have feelings of accomplishment and acknowledgments. We should view our successes on how our goals are important to us instead of patting ourselves on the back and use this as a reason to keep going. 

LINKS: 

www.macfreedom.com (turns off internet for a set period of time)

www.anti-social.cc (blocks social networks and email) 

www.diet-better.com (diet betting website)

www.stickk.com (gamify goals, putting money on the line to achieve a goal)