The Willpower Instinct
2011 • 275 pages
Ratings25
Average rating4
15
Ratings25
Average rating4
The first book to explain the new science of self-control and how it can be harnessed to improve our health, happiness, and productivity.
After years of watching her students struggling with their choices, health psychologist Kelly McGonigal, Ph.D., realized that much of what people believe about willpower is actually sabotaging their success. Committed to sharing what the scientific community already knew about self-control, McGonigal created a course called "The Science of Willpower" for Stanford University's Continuing Studies Program. The course was an instant hit and spawned the hugely successful Psychology Today blog with the same name.
Informed by the latest research and combining cutting-edge insights from psychology, economics, neuroscience, and medicine, McGonigal's book explains exactly what willpower is, how it works, and why it matters. Readers will learn:
Willpower is a mind-body response, not a virtue. It is a biological function that can be improved through mindfulness, exercise, nutrition, and sleep. People who have better control of their attention, emotions, and actions are healthier, happier, have more satisfying relationships, and make more money. Willpower is not an unlimited resource. Too much self-control can actually be bad for your health. Temptation and stress hijack the brain's systems of self-control, and that the brain can be trained for greater willpower.
In the groundbreaking tradition of Getting Things Done, The Willpower Instinct combines life-changing prescriptive advice and complementary exercises to help readers with goals ranging from a healthier life to more patient parenting, from greater productivity at work to finally finishing the basement.
Reviews with the most likes.
Interesting book with a number of inspiring ideas. The only downside is I get inspired for a bit then forget to apply them. Going to try a few of them again...
I really liked this book; I constantly ran across examples where I was behaving similarly in my own life, and I appreciate the pointers on how to address some of the problems. I'll be keeping this one, and I can see re-reading it in the future to brush up on some of the things I learned.
The only real niggling issue I had with the book was the constant references to “Some studies”, “recent research”, etc. It got pretty repetitive. Also, I usually think twice when I see references to “some” studies, because it makes me question whether the author is cherry-picking research to support his or her thesis (see Gladwell, Malcolm). Fortunately, the end of the book is filled with references to the actual research mentioned in the book, and although I haven't had the willpower to validate them (see what I did there?), it at least makes me more comfortable that it's legit.
Also, big props to the larger print. It's nice to be able to read without squinting.
A lot of interesting points, and a lot of fluff and repetition. The book could have been losslessly distilled down to half it's length. Rather than the book, read a comprehensive summary.
I've read a lot of books on procrastination and improving personal productivity, so I was pretty skeptical of this book having anything new or surprising to reveal. But, I was wrong. What I appreciated about this book was the reassuring tone and the ideas for cultivating an attitude of self-compassion as a concrete step towards tackling your willpower challenges.
Since the book was developed from the author's wildly popular continuing education course at Standford, the format and progression of the chapters lends itself easily to planning your own “willpower challenge” project.
