[HN Gopher] Studies suggest that relying on will power to break ...
___________________________________________________________________
Studies suggest that relying on will power to break habits is
hopeless (2019)
Author : PaulHoule
Score : 109 points
Date : 2024-01-06 20:54 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newyorker.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newyorker.com)
| proc0 wrote:
| > Wood ends her book with advice for those of us who have become
| hostages to our smartphones. She offers a stepwise strategy.
| First, recognize your dependency, and acknowledge how the habit
| disrupts work, social interactions, and safe driving. Next,
| "control the context cues," meaning identify what triggers you to
| grab the phone
|
| That still requires will power. It could probably be reduced to
| intention, and not so much the discipline to stick to some habit
| and avoid others. Even if you need to change your environment,
| the decision to do so comes from the intention and awareness to
| want change. I think it's dangerous to dismiss this and think
| will power is not a factor because it is a self-fulfilling
| prophecy. If you think you don't have will power you will reduce
| the chances of having it.
| tpmoney wrote:
| I think the problem becomes that most people use "willpower",
| especially when talking about bad habits, in a sense of "just
| stop doing The Thing". Without deep examination about WHY you
| do The Thing, that is a very hard thing to do because all the
| triggers and incentives for you to do The Thing continue to be
| present and push you back towards doing The Thing. Saying
| someone lacks Willpower is often a fancy substitution for
| judging them for a moral failing.
|
| This is largely why the "war on drugs" has failed to make any
| meaningful headway into stopping drug problems (and how despite
| more money than ever being poured into the war on drugs, the
| "opioid epidemic" still happened). This is why the "calories in
| < calories out" approach to weight loss while a simple and
| effective measure fails most people, because it doesn't address
| the root causes of the behavior. Likewise diets don't work
| because they implicitly are "temporary changes" rather than a
| permanent change to your entire approach to food. It's also why
| something like a safe and effective appetite suppressing drug
| will be so important to weight loss, because when you're not
| constantly hungry, it's a lot easier to have the "will power"
| to not eat that whole bag of chips after dinner.
|
| Incentives matter a lot, and immediate incentives matter much
| more than long term incentives. Finding things that change the
| immediate incentives and changing those will go a lot further
| than just "willing" your way into change.
| akira2501 wrote:
| Will power is not some magic force that we are born with. To
| me "will power" comes from precisely the process you are
| describing, the self interrogation into the source of these
| negative behaviors, examination of how they hold you back,
| and anticipation of what you might be able to achieve if you
| master them.
|
| What I've observed in people is the disconnect on the last
| part of that pathway. They understand their deficiencies but
| they either believe the costs are too great versus what they
| might be able to achieve otherwise, or they are not able to
| truly appreciate the scale of change that is possible in
| their life by starting on the smallest part of their problem.
| There's also people who were just raised poorly and reliably
| self defeat at this point as well.
|
| Anyways.. to me, it's like anything else, it's much easier to
| do if you practice it, and most people just aren't truly
| given the opportunities to practice it successfully in their
| formative years.
| tpmoney wrote:
| >To me "will power" comes from precisely the process you
| are describing, the self interrogation into the source of
| these negative behaviors, examination of how they hold you
| back, and anticipation of what you might be able to achieve
| if you master them.
|
| That may be how you describe it, but just hop into any
| discussion on Wegovy here on HN (or anywhere else) and
| observe the number of people who "don't get why it's so
| hard to just eat less". Or again, look at the entire war on
| drugs.
|
| Willpower defined as a deep interrogation of your
| incentives and psychological state and making fundamental
| changes not (just or even mostly) to your behavior but to
| the environment around you and the incentives you are
| responding to, possibly and including accepting that your
| are unable to change your current environment and
| incentives and are therefore also unlikely to make the
| change in behavior you are attempting, is definitely not
| the norm.
| antwerp1 wrote:
| It's just like decision fatigue: your capacity for it diminishes
| the more you use it (within a given time range).
|
| Instead, carefully curate your identity . This is described well
| in Atomic Habits. Train yourself to think "I am just not the kind
| of person who does x."
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| Whether decision fatigue is a real thing has been called in to
| question:
| https://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/cover_stor...
| bitshaker wrote:
| Doesn't matter. Changing via willpower and context cues is
| quite difficult.
|
| Identity change is the best, most lasting way.
| refactor_master wrote:
| What am I going to do with all my identical shirts now!
| rodlette wrote:
| > This is described well in Atomic Habits. Train yourself to
| think "I am just not the kind of person who does x."
|
| Is this just basically willpower?
|
| Or perhaps I should read the book to find out.
| bitshaker wrote:
| No. Changing your identity is much more powerful and sort of
| operates in a background process whereas willpower is more of
| a conscious foreground one and very difficult to sustain long
| term.
|
| Read the book. It goes into some detail.
|
| I've worked with thousands of people personally over the
| years to help them with supposedly difficult to treat
| addictions for instance. Willpower is fine to start, but
| completely fails in the long term. Identity change is the
| only thing I've found that works long term.
| rodlette wrote:
| I'll look into it. I think I acquired frugality from
| reading a few books that made me frugal.
|
| I'd like other traits too.
| dyno12345 wrote:
| This might be a stupid question, but what is "identity" in
| this context?
|
| I ask because when this subject has come up I realize I
| don't seem to be able to think up theories about myself so
| easily
| devbent wrote:
| People who consider themselves "gym rats" go to the gym
| because it is what they do.
|
| People who are mountain bikers don't ride to keep in shape,
| they look forward to getting on their bike.
| rodlette wrote:
| Those are easy to see, but there are few people who clean
| their dishes for fun/leisure.
| sgillen wrote:
| I clean my dishes because I like having a clean / neat
| household, "I am the kind of person who keeps my space in
| order". I find that helps!
| cvwright wrote:
| No but there are people who pride themselves on always
| keeping a clean kitchen etc
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| For years, I was "a person who liked to ride my bike 300+
| miles in a day". Then one day I realized that was a lie, or
| at least only a half-truth. Then I realized that most of
| why I did it was that I liked to keep in shape, and to eat
| a lot.
| LargeWu wrote:
| It's more like discipline. You don't do something because you
| decide to become a person who just doesn't do that thing. It
| becomes part of your identity, rather than a decision you
| have to continuously make.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| The way I like to think of it is that it's possible to have
| willpower when I'm feeling strong and only have to make a big
| decision once - what's really hard is having to use that
| willpower over and over.
|
| Thus, I've always felt it's better to change _your environment_
| than trying to improve your willpower. For example, I got a ton
| of exercise when I lived in a city when the most convenient
| thing to do was walk everywhere or take public transportation.
| When I moved out to the suburbs, I tried to force myself to
| walk more, but it never really worked. Driving was just by far
| the easier "default" way of getting places in the 'burbs.
|
| The way I think of it is to try to set things up so you don't
| have to use willpower in the first place.
| bitshaker wrote:
| Environment change >>> willpower
| hinkley wrote:
| Environment change takes willpower, but is a force
| multiplier.
| hinkley wrote:
| Buying groceries when you're feeling good, and changing your
| route through the store to groom yourself for success instead
| of failure, are common, effective bits of advice for weight
| loss and healthy eating. Most of the garbage really is in the
| middle of the store, and I imagine myself diving into deep
| water to grab ketchup, soup, flour. Get in, get out, no
| sightseeing.
| analog31 wrote:
| My shopping list is sequential by aisle, so I don't go down
| the aisle if it's not on my list.
|
| I wonder if shopping online for delivery helps curb impulse
| buying
| jancsika wrote:
| > Instead, carefully curate your identity . This is described
| well in Atomic Habits. Train yourself to think "I am just not
| the kind of person who does x."
|
| Interesting but orthogonal to the article.
|
| The article: "I am the kind of person who has changed my
| environment such that doing x is inconvenient enough that I can
| avoid it most of the time without having to use much
| willpower."
| somewhereoutth wrote:
| Or perhaps (and by extension?) help to curate a _society_ where
| these sorts of bad things don 't happen.
| refactor_master wrote:
| > Train yourself to think "I am just not the kind of person who
| does x."
|
| We are rarely who we really want to be. Yet, here we are. I've
| been trained, literally since infancy, to obey bedtime, but I'm
| writing this response an hour past my bedtime.
| ur-whale wrote:
| https://archive.is/OCuQK
| xeckr wrote:
| lol
| alphazard wrote:
| Huberman did a very nice review of the literature here. Highly
| recommend.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wcs2PFz5q6g
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Love Huberman, although gripping it is not the format for quick
| revision. Each episode is movie length. Take notes.
| martinbaun wrote:
| Replacing bad habits with good ones seem to be the easiest thing
| for me.
|
| Going for that cookie? Go for some pushups instead when you
| crave. Usually your mind is just bored.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Even replacing the cookie with 100g strawberries and 100g
| yoghurt goes a long way. And why is that cookie there? Shop on
| a full stomach. Take a list.
| hinkley wrote:
| If I didn't keep a bowl of fresh fruit and fancy teas in the
| house I'd be having some very uncomfortable conversations
| about diabetes with my doctor right about now.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Once you realise you are more of a sheep than you think you can
| do things like adapt your environment to encourage giving up the
| habit. Or replace the havit with a new more powerful one. Or use
| a star chart!
| I_am_uncreative wrote:
| Yes! If you eat too much, take up smoking instead. That's one
| old habit gone, and a new one added!
| peterleiser wrote:
| Reminds me of a friend who's New Year's resolution over 20
| years ago was to pick up smoking. He tried a few times but
| just couldn't manage to start the habit.
| hotpotamus wrote:
| Ah, I did this too, though it was actually a New Year's Eve
| resolution to start smoking which I did successfully - had
| one cigarette with some friends who were planning on
| quitting as their New Year's resolutions which I then
| joined with them as a new smoker. I was the only one able
| to follow through on that.
| hinkley wrote:
| Type one versus type 2 thinking, and pitting one against the
| other.
| henriquez wrote:
| Every time I've quit drinking I used will power. So it's not
| hopeless. Now I'm 8 days sober! Checkmate, studies.
| CPLX wrote:
| In my old age I have become exhausted with the "studies show
| [some element of human personality that's impossible to define
| and even more impossible to test]" genre.
|
| It's just all bullshit all the way down.
|
| Every time you dig an inch below the surface it's something like
| "we took six college students half of them millennials and played
| a sad Taylor Swift song while images of skyscrapers were
| projected and asked them to report their math skills on a legal
| pad whenever we rang a bell" or something.
|
| It's just all nonsense. And the sad part is that the main real
| enduring accomplishment of spreading social "science" bullshit so
| widely in society is that people now distrust actual science and
| engineering too.
| johntask wrote:
| > The students were told to report every time they thought,
| "Oops, I shouldn't do this"
|
| Close enough!
| vanjajaja1 wrote:
| This kind of study in this kind of magazine smells like they're
| pushing more 'dont even try' / 'no free will' propaganda... but I
| do with the premise. Relying on will power to execute is a set up
| for failure, better to rely on will power to create an
| environment that helps you succeed.
| jawns wrote:
| I am not a smoker, but I recently read through Allan Carr's "Easy
| Way to Quit Smoking Without Willpower" book. (There is a similar
| book out there called the Easy Peasy Way to Quit Porn, for those
| who are struggling with that.)
|
| The tl;dr is that it's much harder to quit an addiction with the
| mindset, "This thing is great, but I'm going to deprive myself of
| it." Instead, you need to realize that you've been deceived and
| maybe even brainwashed into thinking that this vice has any
| redeeming value. Lots of people who've never become addicted are
| walking around enjoying life without it. So you kind of have to
| do your own reverse brainwashing to get your brain back to that
| state.
|
| I used these techniques to break a bad habit. Every time my mind
| so much as wanders in that direction, I have a mini speech I give
| myself. "Boy, I am so glad that I have escaped the slavery of
| that dopamine cycle, where I wasn't getting joy from the habit
| itself, but just satisfying the craving of the addiction. I'm in
| such a better place now."
|
| In the moment, I might not always fully believe the words I'm
| saying, but it does help.
| mhalle wrote:
| This American Life had an episode that challenges the premise
| of this book: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/806/transcript
| joshghent wrote:
| Completely agree! Ultra processed people by Chris Van Tullekan
| is similar for eating unhealthily.
| hinkley wrote:
| Additionally people crowd out a bad habit instead of abstaining
| from it.
|
| Give yourself less time to be bad. Do something instead to
| sublimate some of that energy.
| wruza wrote:
| If your automatic firewall is too hard, there are ways to
| bypass it and eventually punch a hole. E.g. instead of "I'm
| much better without it" (obviously wrong, you're suffering) you
| can carry the thought "I _like to think_ that I'll become
| happier without it". There's no obvious contradiction, so it
| can incorporate and create a tunnel where there was a thick
| wall. Learned that from my therapist.
| clwg wrote:
| I was a smoker for over 20 years, then I switched to Juul - I
| was content. Nicotine is by far my favorite drug. I could smell
| again, and my stamina and breathing were noticeably improved.
|
| When they started to ban the stronger vapes, my options were to
| go back to cigarettes, suffer withdrawal from a less potent
| nicotine concentration, buy one of those contraptions and start
| a hobby, or quit entirely.
|
| I quit entirely, and it sucked. Luckily, there was a pandemic
| going on, so I could contain the 'blast radius', but it was
| very much a self-hate process to get through it - hating myself
| for smoking in the first place as a teenager, hating that I was
| controlled by something like that, and hating that I didn't
| have agency over my own cravings, and just hating because
| Nicotine withdrawal sucks.
|
| I don't think I could have done it with a positive attitude and
| inner strength. I still miss nicotine, and if they brought back
| the stronger Juul's, I'd probably start again.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > Instead, you need to realize that you've been deceived and
| maybe even brainwashed into thinking that this vice has any
| redeeming value.
|
| This has been 50% of my approach to trying to (almost entirely)
| give up drinking. I realized that (a) I rarely, if ever, get
| the happy buzz any more (b) it doesn't get me the sex that it
| once did (c) it doesn't actually assist with being emotionally
| open with my wife the way it once did (d) it contributes to
| weight gain (e) it probably has other negative health effects
| (f) it costs quite a bit of money.
|
| All that's left of the positives is that I really, really enjoy
| the actual taste of the wines I love.
|
| The other 50% was being told I had high blood pressure, and
| realizing the alcohol can play a role in that too.
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| Quitting things for me personally requires tricking my base
| lizard brain. I recall an Onion News video with a parody PSA:
| "Smoking is Gay". You have to use the smart guy you to outsmart
| the dumb guy you. Set traps for him. Anticipate his moves and
| crush him.
| jnsie wrote:
| You can't bring us this far without some examples! Fess up, OP!
| Boogie_Man wrote:
| Cigs: Not telling him he couldn't smoke, but that he could
| only smoke outside bare-chested one winter Eating: Mirror at
| gut hight in the kitchen Drinking: Reading that Infinite Jest
| section [pick one] twice a week Weed: Picked a fist fight
| with the guy I bought it from (he won) (this section is just
| a joke I do not commit crimes) The only thing a human man
| can't give up is onanism (I don't believe those who say they
| do).
| SilasX wrote:
| Haha I remember seeing that and thinking ... hm, that ... would
| probably be more successful than most of their PSAs.
|
| https://www.theonion.com/new-anti-smoking-ads-warn-teens-its...
| zogrodea wrote:
| My first thought after reading the title was about ego depletion
| (a controversial theory that willpower is a limited resource),
| but the claim here seems unrelated to that since it instead
| states that willpower is just not effective at eliminating bad
| habits, not touching whether willpower is a limited resource or
| not.
|
| Common advice for at least a millenium has been that a consistent
| good habit, even if small, is better than a large gesture that's
| not long maintained. Andreas Kling (author of SerenityOS) can
| relate to this. https://awesomekling.github.io/Excellence-is-a-
| habit-but-so-...
| elchief wrote:
| use your lack of will power to your advantage
|
| fill your fridge with healthy food, and force yourself to leave
| the house if you want junk food
| arcastroe wrote:
| That doesn't work at all. Ordering junk food is a few lazy taps
| on your phone whereas eating the healthy food requires forcing
| yourself to cook and prepare it as well as washing dishes
| afterwards
| maximus-decimus wrote:
| That's why you need Soylent^TM bottles, so that drinking them
| is even less effort!
|
| The way I see it, that's kinda the whole advantage of
| something like soylent.
| arcastroe wrote:
| +1, also look into Huel. I personally like it better than
| Soylent.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| Move to a small village with no services and 25 miles from the
| nearest town, so you'll have to drive for an hour round trip if
| you want junk food (or any food, actually).
| wcarron wrote:
| What a foul load of crap. I'm a former decade-long nicotine
| addict, coke user, and heavy drinker. Power of will enabled me to
| crush all those habits. You are not some helpless, pitiable waif
| blown about by the winds of your subconscious. Stand up straight
| and martial yourself. Lechery is a small voice within you which
| you allow yourself to be consumed by, not an omnipotent force
| governing your existence.
| wruza wrote:
| That is a commonly observable post-willpower attitude.
| Unfortunately it doesn't help those for whom it didn't work.
| It's like saying get up and live to a depressed one.
|
| Saying that as a guy who punched evolving clinical depression
| in her face without medications with character-intrinsic anger.
| The problem with that approach is that not everyone has anger
| as a reaction so default that it still remains in a depressed
| state.
|
| That said, glad you're fine.
| keyle wrote:
| One of my friends who's a marathon runner told me once something
| rather powerful. We have all these ways of
| losing weight: you can poop it, sweat it, band it off, run it
| off, lift it off, swim it off, dance it off, on and on. And yet
| there is only one way to put it on (pointed to his mouth) with
| these things (showed his hands)
|
| Made me think for a while and he made an impact on me. We control
| our hands. We control what goes in our mouth.
|
| I don't mean to be insensitive to people who have real weight
| issues, I'm talking for the majority of people. We over eat by
| choice and blame everything else.
| NoZebra120vClip wrote:
| According to the eminently reliable folks at SciShow, the chief
| way that anyone loses weight is by breathing it out.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8ialLlcdcw
| tacocataco wrote:
| I quit smoking by delaying my first smoke in the day as long as I
| could. There was no "end date". Just me lasting as long as I
| could.
|
| Someday, it's a smoke right in the morning day. Shit happens and
| I wouldn't feel bad for smoking when I needed it.
|
| But after a couple of months, I started getting later and later
| in the day.
|
| Rolling my own and buying the worst tobacco in the world helped
| to. Have as much as you like! But it's shit.
|
| Of course if I buy delicious smokes i was not going to quit! But
| a all you can smoke buffet of the worst smokes? Yeah I'll pass.
|
| They were so bad people didn't want to bum smokes from me. 50
| cents a pack back in the day, help yourselves!
| BaculumMeumEst wrote:
| Good thing I didn't read such a bullshit defeatist conclusion
| before I dropped 40 lbs 7 years ago (adopted sane diet, never
| gained it back) and dug myself out of a deep hole of alcohol
| dependence.
|
| haven't beaten the habit of falling for engagement baiting
| headlines though i suppose
|
| do not let yourself believe you are weak or a victim
| endisneigh wrote:
| what a bizarre comment. the conclusion is hardly defeatist.
|
| the TLDR of the article is that if you (for example) are
| struggling with focus, a strategy that is basically telling
| yourself to focus (while loud music is playing around you) will
| not yield as much success as removing distractions (turning off
| the music) in your environment, then trying to focus again.
|
| the efficacy of the two strategies is dependent not entirely on
| ones fortitude, rather ability to craft an environment that
| plays to the strength of will, so to speak.
| kaashif wrote:
| The conclusion may not be defeatist, but the conclusion is
| different from the subtitle of the article (and the title of
| the submission):
|
| > Studies suggest that relying on will power is hopeless
|
| Which would indeed be extremely defeatist.
|
| Willpower and better strategies can both work in conjunction.
| Willpower is not entirely hopeless as a strategy.
| endisneigh wrote:
| why omit the last part?
|
| > Studies suggest that relying on will power is hopeless.
| _Instead, we must find strategies that don't require us to
| be strong._
|
| nothing defeatist about it.
|
| not to mention, why judge such a long article which is
| summarizing a long book by the subtitle which generally
| isn't even written by the author of the article...
| airstrike wrote:
| Because that bit is not in the title
| Lucky-026 wrote:
| I didn't read this particular article but I've heard of other
| studies that express the same idea. The point isn't that you
| can't beat bad habits, its that the best way to beat bad habits
| is making them harder to do.
|
| If you want to quit smoking you get rid of your cigarettes.
|
| if you want to lose weight you throw away your junk food.
|
| Keeping junk food in your house when you're trying to lose
| weight relies on self control and willpower to avoid eating in
| a caloric surplus. Same logic applies to not going grocery
| shopping when you haven't eaten all say since you're likely to
| indulge and buy some stuff you don't need for example
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| Did you "rely on will power" to do that? They're definitely not
| saying people are unable to change habits!
| aeblyve wrote:
| Something I've been exploring for the past year or so are means
| to increase biological energy, and brain energy in particular.
| If one finds themselves unable to escape their routine, brain
| energy could be a bottleneck.
|
| It seems likely to me that some point along the lines of "sane
| diet" increased your brain energy, which gave you the presence
| of mind to do all those other things.
|
| Really, I think that the premise of the article ought to
| inspire hope, by suggesting that simple materialistic
| interventions alone could be sufficient to produce change.
| k8svet wrote:
| I really like this thread. Thanks to those for sharing their own
| processes and tricks. It's fascinating the ways people trick
| themselves into will power. Cool stuff, potentially life
| changing.
|
| I wrote and deleted mine a few times. Will power is weird and
| I've found weird ways of enabling some in myself. And then some I
| can't explain. I've been destroying my fingers for literally 30
| years and about a month ago I decided I wanted healthy fingers.
| If you know, you know, that sounds absurd. And yet, my fingers
| look better than they have in literally 22 years. I don't get it,
| I actually have imposter syndrome. I've never, ever made it even
| 1/5th this far. It's something I'm embarrassed of and also
| secretly proud of myself.
| andrewstuart wrote:
| Someone explained to me that the subconscious mind does not like
| giving up something that it likes in exchange for nothing.
|
| Say for example you want to give up smoking.
|
| So don't give up. Instead, just stop that behavior for the
| present time - then your subconscious is not fighting you.
|
| So you want a cigarette? Well sure OK you can have one, but defer
| that decision to have it for some period of time. Maybe start
| with 30 seconds. Build up the defer period. See if you can defer
| that cigarette for 1 minute, 2 etc etc. After the defer period
| has elapsed, if you still REALLY want the cigarette then have it
| - don't fight your subconscious mind.
|
| Eventually, you'll have deferred that cigarette essentially
| indefinitely. You never "gave up smoking", so your subconscious
| hasn't been forced to get you back in line by reestablishing the
| cigarette smoking behavior that it likes.
|
| Even with this strategy, it still took me hundreds of attempts to
| give up cigarettes. Those things are addictive.
| a_n wrote:
| lol this is stupid, you can do anything if you want it bad
| enough, all it takes to achieve anything is will power to just
| work hard and be passionate about what you want to do... it's
| literally just a simple decision, do you want to get it or not...
| and if you think this is not true, or dont have the will power,
| carry on living a mediocre life... nobody cares about losers
| pi-e-sigma wrote:
| Exactly. One day I decided to beat Magnus Carlsen at chess and
| I just did it. It's all about hard work, you don't need good
| genetics or supporting family, or a bit of luck with being at
| the right place at the right time. Just iron will, which BTW is
| also 100% a genetic trait but that simply doesn't matter!
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