How to Improve Your Willpower with Meditation
Kelly McGonigal, a health psychologist who teaches at Stanford, puts it this way: paying attention to the present moment, to what your body and mind are doing and what surrounds you, makes it easier to notice the many small choices you make every day. There may be several hundred of them. When you tune in, they stop slipping past you.
Maybe you run out of steam halfway through a task. Maybe a hard decision leaves you stuck. If you want to be steadier and more determined, meditation is one place to start. Everyone hits a wall with willpower eventually. That is normal, and nothing to feel bad about. What matters is keeping the goal in view and refusing to quit even when quitting feels like the obvious move.
So why meditation? It lowers stress, tension, anxiety, and the weight of depression. It also builds up both the body and the mind, and that strengthening is what feeds your willpower. On top of that, it gives you a way to reach what might be called your inner self. The steps below ask almost nothing of you physically.
Give it a slot in your day, every day. Right after you wake up works well. Sit somewhere quiet and comfortable and begin there. Morning helps because a rested mind is calmer and more focused, which is exactly the state meditation needs, and because the way you start tends to color everything that follows. Fifteen to thirty minutes is plenty. That stretch of quiet does more than firm up your resolve; it also lifts your self-esteem and confidence.
Pick a spot and make it yours. It should be private, quiet, and comfortable, and above all free of interruptions. Crying babies, barking dogs, a blaring television, kids at play, a radio, a spouse wandering through. Treat the space as off-limits, and ask the people around you to treat it that way too. It can be your bed, a yoga mat, or an oversized pillow, whatever feels right.
Shut the door if you can. Put the phone away and step back from the computer. If your mind refuses to settle, light a few tea candles and play something gentle: jazz, classical, instrumental, soft R&B. The room can be bare or carefully arranged. All that matters is that it works for the practice. Sitting there regularly gets you ready for whatever the day throws at you, and gives you the staying power to push through the rough patches.
Here is one that sounds strange: write down what you want out of each session before you begin. Jot down the aim. Lower my stress. Ease my anxiety. Loosen the grip of depression. Cool my anger. Hold my focus through the day. Find clarity, or a way through a problem. Build my confidence and my willpower. Naming it keeps your attention on the work in front of you and stacks up the resolve you will draw on later.
Note how long you plan to sit, then hold to it. Skip the excuses. Even five or ten minutes counts, so take whatever you can get. Say you commit to ten days in a row and then miss one. Start the whole ten over. By the time you reach the tenth straight day, you will feel the difference, both in yourself and in how hard it is to knock you off course.
Then make it harder. Once the easy goals are behind you, raise the bar. Stretching yourself builds self-control and determination along with willpower. Suppose your first goal was to drop a few pounds in a month. Extend it to six months and let the weight come off slowly. The longer timeline, paired with the practice, pushes you through the frustration and the hard days, and that struggle is what strengthens you. Finishing a tougher goal leaves you with a fresh kind of drive.
Last thing: when it gets hard and you feel your resolve thinning, keep going. Keep setting goals and clearing the hurdles in front of you. Do it for your own health, not to impress anyone. Clarity and growth come out of getting through difficulty and knowing yourself better. When a task defeats you, skip the self-criticism and sit down to meditate instead; let it bring down the stress, quiet the anxiety, and sharpen your focus. Afterward you can hold your ground and finish things that looked out of reach, carrying a real sense of control and a resolve that does not fold.
- Dr. R. Y. Langham
References: EOC Institute. (2015). Meditation and willpower. McGonigal, K. (2010). Meditate your way to more willpower. Psychology Today. Thorne, S. C. (2015). Meditation is mind training. The Willpower Institute.