Willpower

I found myself thinking about willpower years ago when I was in college. I even went so far as to take a sort of self-hypnosis class to improve my willpower. Well it certainly worked for the first year at least. It was just prior to my senior year in college, and I was behind in hours to graduate on time because I worked out in gymnastics 3 to 5 hours a day, 5 days a week and frequently competed on the weekends. At any rate, I knew I had to finish my hours to graduate by the time my elgibility ran out or I might never graduate, since I had no idea what I was going to do with a degree anyway.

Well, I did it. A year later, after I graduated, I started tabulating all I had accomplished in the previous 12 months.  I took 55 hours in college, got my pilot’s license, learned to play the guitar, learned to skydive and got scuba certified all in those twelve months. And I didn’t give up gymanstics, nor did I give up socializing…

So why have I not had another year THAT productive? Again it’s willpower, which I came to realize is like an escalator. You never get to stand still. You’re either going up or your going down. And deciding to change is not A decision. It is the decision to begin making a set of decisions in a certain way.  If you want to lose weight, you have to decide you will make that decision over and over again everytime you are faced with eating less food and exercising more. Although that concept makes the process seem a little more daunting, I think once you understand what you are dealing with in your decision making, it at least makes it easier to determine what you really want to do……..