Willpower...

Yesterday I started talking about the 5 pillars of self-discipline and began with acceptance. Tonight, I will be shifting the focus of our conversation to willpower (something I seem to be lacking at the moment).

It seems to me that willpower is not a very popular notion these days. As Americans, we want things our way and we rarely want to put any effort into getting it, especially where health is concerned. If we want to get skinny we get liposuction or take a magic pill that will miraculously cure us of our obesity without the unpleasantry of eating right or exercising. Why work hard and lose 100 pounds in 15 months when you can have surgery to bypass your stomach and lose 100 pounds in 6?!?!? Who cares if you'll fight malnourishment for the rest of your life or you could die from bleeding out into your abdomen when the procedure ruptures...you'll be skinny at least! Now, I'm not dogging on the people who have these surgeries or those who try diet pills (even though it doesn't seem like it...I know what it's like to give up on everything else); I'm simply trying to demonstrate how we have moved away from willpower and turned to quick/easy fixes. Let's be honest and just come right out and say what these pills and surgeries are: substitutes for willpower. It's not pretty, but there it is. If we want to survive on this journey and keep working towards self-discipline, it is important that we find our willpower and have faith that it works.

So, what in the world is willpower? It's easily defined, willpower is the trait of resolutely controlling your own behavior. The website I found defined willpower as the ability to set a course of action and then engage it. I think both of these definitions are excellent because, although there are slight differences, the main concept is the same, we have to control our path, it's all us...nobody else.

Now, will power is not perfect and it's not eternal. Self-discipline can be constant whereas willpower cannot. Imagine willpower as a temporary boost, a surge in greatness to get you on the right path. I love analogies (I'm sure you've caught onto this by now) so I will share the analogy from the website I found with you in regard to will power. And I quote:

"Willpower is the spearhead of self-discipline. To use a World War II analogy, willpower would be D-Day, the Normandy Invasion. It was the gigantic battle that turned the tide of the war and got things moving in a new direction, even though it took another year to reach VE Day (Victory in Europe). To make that kind of effort every day of the war would have been impossible."

If we approach willpower the way the author of this site does, it would make sense to focus on willpower more heavily in the beginning of this challenge than later on. It is now in the early stage of the game that we need to get ourselves on the right path. I think buying your treadmill Jenny was a surge of willpower. You had the money, could have spent in on a myriad of things, but chose to spend it wisely. Now, you've had some set backs but those set backs will not lose you the war. Getting on your treadmill yesterday was another good use of willpower. I think you really needed a good day to get back on the right track...a few more days and you're right back where you need to be.

So, how does one go about the application of willpower? Like with all good things in life, there are steps to follow:

1. Choose your objective: I want to lose 100 pounds in a safe and permanent manner without pills or surgical intervention

2. Create a plan of attack: this should be detailed, instead of just saying I want to cook at home and make smarter choices about my food, you should detail how you're going to accomplish this. I will buy healthier groceries, find recipes and make a menu at the beginning of each week. DO THIS FOR ALL OF YOUR GOALS.

3. Execute the plan: DO IT!!! This is the time for action. Attack all at once. It's not a gradual thing. Now, you can't change everything immediately but the change you want to make right now, like the cooking at home thing, needs to happen NOW, not later, NOW!!!

I think the last important concept to discuss in regard to willpower is that you're not necessarily directly affecting your diet or exercise when applying willpower. What you're doing is changing the environment around you to make your goals more realistic. Going back to the WWII example, D day did not win the war, but it changed the environment. Our boys now had a beachhead established and it made the execution of other attacks easier, their environment aided them in their success. Sure, they still struggled, there were still battles. Life was still challenging but it was possible to overcome those challenges. It's the same for us. Just because we use our willpower and make things a little bit easier for us now doesn't mean that it's a cake walk from here on out. We're going to struggle, there will be challenges, but hey...at least we don't have to worry about being run down by tanks!

Alright, I think that's enough for tonight. Sorry if this blog is a little bit all over the place, I'm feeling a bit spacey tonight! Have a great one ladies and keep up the good work!