How to Increase Your Will Power and Feel Better About Your Life?

Some say willpower doesn’t work. Some say willpower works. Who is telling the truth? The answer is both of them.

As per my own experience with willpower, it gives lots of benefits, but at the same time in some goals and situations, it does not help much. But the benefits it gives overpower the cons.

What is Willpower?

As per my own experience, when I have willpower, I feel a high sense of control over myself. My mind is clear, calm, and confident in myself. I am better able to delay all sorts of instant gratifications like social media, YouTube, Netflix, news, and gossips. I am able to make myself do hard work like exercise, some business work, and some important boring work.

One of the best benefits of willpower is that it will make you feel really good. There will be less or no negative thinking or emotions inside you. When you have high willpower, you do not feel much sadness, your thoughts are balanced, and all seems fine in life.

So when you have high willpower, you are better able to make good decisions in your life, better able to deal with failures, better able to move on, and better able to modify your behaviors, etc.

The Effects of High vs. Low Willpower

Now let’s talk about what happens when we have less willpower. When you have less willpower, you are more prone to negative emotions than ever. When you have willpower, your conscious mind is easily able to protect you from your own impulsive thoughts and emotions. Without it, you succumb to all types of impulsive thoughts, negative thoughts, and negative feelings.

Due to this, you will feel mostly lazy and demotivated. You will make wrong decisions most of the time and are prone to all types of instant gratifications. In short, lack of willpower makes you miserable.

I hope you understand both the pros and cons of having high willpower vs. lack of willpower. Now let’s talk about how to improve your willpower. But before this, let me give you some twists/facts related to willpower.

Facts About Willpower

Willpower is limited. No matter what you do, it will always be limited. The more you use, the faster it reduces. Some people may not agree with this statement as per their life’s experience, but as per my own experience and many psychologists, willpower is really limited.
It is like the gas tank in a vehicle. The more you drive, gradually the gas depletes, and ultimately you run out of gas and have to refill. Similarly, every morning, you wake up with a full tank of willpower. Then as more time passes, it starts to go away, and by the evening, it goes into reserve mode.
Have you experienced why you are more prone to all types of instant gratification at night time? Have you ever noticed why clubs are filled with lots of customers at night time only and not in the daytime? It’s because at night time, we have almost zero willpower left. So we are highly prone to distractions and go into all types of instant gratification. Not only this, but our impulsive thoughts dominate our mind and due to this we are more prone to feel all types of negative emotions easily at night time.

This is the fact about willpower and it can’t be changed. So accepting this fact, compromising, and moving on will be the smart choice. Now let’s talk about how to increase your willpower so that you can get maximum benefits from it.

How to Increase Your Willpower

Have a very good night’s sleep: Treat your sleep like a gas station. When you have a very good sleep, you wake up with a full tank of willpower. If you have a bad sleep, you will wake up with half or below half a tank of willpower. So it’s better to schedule some naps to refill your willpower tank.
Have good mental health: If you are depressed, anxious, or have any types of deep negative emotions, your willpower will go away very, very fast. It is like a leak in the gas tank. So do everything in your capability to have good mental health, to be happy. If you are able to do this, then not only will you have good sleep, but you will always have a full tank of willpower every morning.
Take care of your body: Do some exercise in the morning. Do some meditation in the morning. Or try to be silent in the morning. Take some deep breathing and relaxing exercises. This will boost your willpower.
Avoid all types of negative things in the morning like fights, arguments, etc. I know some events can’t be avoided, but try to avoid them in the morning.
Eat good foods: Nothing much to explain, but having a good diet affects your body, your mind, and thus your willpower.
Avoid all types of digital entertainments in the morning time, especially avoid news, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TV, etc. Especially ignore them in the morning. Why this? Because in my experience, if I spend even 15 minutes of time there, it feels like it takes away 2 hours of willpower from my day. It seems like it makes holes in my willpower tank.
Avoid all types of smoking, alcohol, or any other drugs in the morning: I have experienced that whenever you take them, no matter morning time or night time, they just take away 50%+ willpower almost instantly. Even a 1-piece of smoke in the morning will take your 1 hour of willpower. Test it yourself to find out.

These above tips are enough to have good willpower every day. Now, what will you do with your willpower? Should you consciously use it or just go with the flow? It’s up to you, but here are some ways I use it in my life. As per my experience, my willpower stays strong from morning to evening and gradually goes away with each night hour. So I use them in the following ways:

I make important decisions in the morning time: Because my mind is cool, logical, and emotionally stable. So I am better able to make the right decisions in the morning than at night time. So I avoid any types of risky, important decisions at night and schedule them for the morning.
I enjoy some peace of mind in the first 1-2 hours of my high willpower: Because it is very easy to do. When I wake up, no matter if it is very early like 4-5 AM, or delayed like 8-9 AM, I easily enjoy my first 1-2 hours of time. I avoid all types of digital entertainments to stop any leaks and as usual start my day. And it feels very good.
I do all types of difficult work in the morning to daytime: Because only at this time am I better able to do them. My mind and emotions give full support. I am less distracted and able to ignore most of the instant gratifications easily.

That’s it. These 3 benefits are enough to improve anyone’s life. So by having high willpower, you will be able to enjoy some highly peaceful time, make better decisions, and complete your difficult tasks more easily. Isn’t this cool?

But will your willpower solve your other problems like addictions or habit changes?

The answer is – it depends. You may be in full control over yourself with all good habits throughout the whole day, but at night you are more prone to your old habits. Does this mean willpower doesn’t work? No, it doesn’t. Even if you revert to your old self at night time, at least you are able to make progress during the day. You are better able to make progress in your life goals, and make better decisions; doesn’t this matter?

So even if willpower is not a permanent solution, it has very high potential benefits. So start improving your willpower now and see how your life improves within a few days.