three—probably because they have too many simultaneous demands on their willpower. Research has likewise found that people who seek to control their drinking tend to fail on days when they have other demands on their self-control, as compared with days when they can devote all their willpower to limiting the booze.
Above all, don’t make a list of New Year’s resolutions. Each January 1, millions of people drag themselves out of bed, full of hope or hangover, resolved to eat less, exercise more, spend less money, work harder at the office, keep the home cleaner, and still miraculously have more time for romantic dinners and long walks on the beach.
By February 1, they’re embarrassed to even look at the list. But instead of lamenting their lack of willpower, they should put the blame where it belongs: on the list. No one has enough willpower for that list. If you’re going to start a new physical exercise program, don’t try to overhaul your finances at the same time. If you’re going to need your energy for a new job—like, say, the presidency of the United States—then this probably isn’t the ideal time to go cold turkey on cigarettes. Because you have only one supply of willpower, the different New Year’s resolutions all compete with one another. Each time you try to follow one, you reduce your capacity for all the others.
A better plan is to make one resolution and stick to it. That’s challenge enough. There will be moments when that will still seem like one resolution too many, but perhaps you can persevere by thinking of Amanda Palmer heroically frozen in place on her pedestal. She may not consider herself a disciplined person, but she did learn something inspiring about her species even during her days surrounded by drunken hecklers and gropers.
“You know, humans are capable of incredible things,” she says. “If you simply decide that you’re not going to move, you just don’t move.”
2.
WHERE DOES THE POWER IN WILLPOWER COME FROM?
Whether or not ingestion of food stuffs with preservatives and sugar in high content causes you to alter your personality somehow, or causes you to act in an aggressive manner, I don’t know. I’m not going to suggest to you for a minute that that occurs. But there is a minority opinion in psychiatric fields that there is some connection.
—Defense’s closing argument in the trial of Dan White, the murderer whose taste for junk food inspired the term “Twinkie defense”
I have terrible PMS, so I just went a little crazy.
—Actress Melanie Griffith, explaining why she had filed for divorce from Don Johnson only to immediately withdraw it
I f willpower isn’t just a metaphor, if there is a power driving this virtue, where does it come from? The answer emerged by accident from a failed experiment inspired by Mardi Gras and the other carnivals held on the eve of Lent. Mardi Gras means Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, when people prepare for a season of fasting and self-sacrifice by shamelessly indulging their desires. In some places it’s known as Pancake Day and begins with all-you-can-eat flapjack breakfasts at churches. Bakers honor the occasion by producing special treats––the names of the delicacies vary from culture to culture, but the recipes generally involve gargantuan quantities of sugar, eggs, flour, butter, and lard. And the gluttony is just the beginning.
From Venice to New Orleans to Rio de Janeiro, revelers move on to more interesting vices, sometimes under the cover of traditional masks, but often just letting it all hang out. It’s the one day you can strut down the street with a beaded headdress and nothing else, proudly parading to cheers from drunks. Losing self-control becomes a virtue. In Mexico, married men are officially granted one day of liberty from their obligations on what’s called El Dia del Marido Oprimido—the day of the oppressed husband. On the eve of Lent, even the sternest Anglo-Saxon churchgoers
Above all, don’t make a list of New Year’s resolutions. Each January 1, millions of people drag themselves out of bed, full of hope or hangover, resolved to eat less, exercise more, spend less money, work harder at the office, keep the home cleaner, and still miraculously have more time for romantic dinners and long walks on the beach.
By February 1, they’re embarrassed to even look at the list. But instead of lamenting their lack of willpower, they should put the blame where it belongs: on the list. No one has enough willpower for that list. If you’re going to start a new physical exercise program, don’t try to overhaul your finances at the same time. If you’re going to need your energy for a new job—like, say, the presidency of the United States—then this probably isn’t the ideal time to go cold turkey on cigarettes. Because you have only one supply of willpower, the different New Year’s resolutions all compete with one another. Each time you try to follow one, you reduce your capacity for all the others.
A better plan is to make one resolution and stick to it. That’s challenge enough. There will be moments when that will still seem like one resolution too many, but perhaps you can persevere by thinking of Amanda Palmer heroically frozen in place on her pedestal. She may not consider herself a disciplined person, but she did learn something inspiring about her species even during her days surrounded by drunken hecklers and gropers.
“You know, humans are capable of incredible things,” she says. “If you simply decide that you’re not going to move, you just don’t move.”
2.
WHERE DOES THE POWER IN WILLPOWER COME FROM?
Whether or not ingestion of food stuffs with preservatives and sugar in high content causes you to alter your personality somehow, or causes you to act in an aggressive manner, I don’t know. I’m not going to suggest to you for a minute that that occurs. But there is a minority opinion in psychiatric fields that there is some connection.
—Defense’s closing argument in the trial of Dan White, the murderer whose taste for junk food inspired the term “Twinkie defense”
I have terrible PMS, so I just went a little crazy.
—Actress Melanie Griffith, explaining why she had filed for divorce from Don Johnson only to immediately withdraw it
I f willpower isn’t just a metaphor, if there is a power driving this virtue, where does it come from? The answer emerged by accident from a failed experiment inspired by Mardi Gras and the other carnivals held on the eve of Lent. Mardi Gras means Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, when people prepare for a season of fasting and self-sacrifice by shamelessly indulging their desires. In some places it’s known as Pancake Day and begins with all-you-can-eat flapjack breakfasts at churches. Bakers honor the occasion by producing special treats––the names of the delicacies vary from culture to culture, but the recipes generally involve gargantuan quantities of sugar, eggs, flour, butter, and lard. And the gluttony is just the beginning.
From Venice to New Orleans to Rio de Janeiro, revelers move on to more interesting vices, sometimes under the cover of traditional masks, but often just letting it all hang out. It’s the one day you can strut down the street with a beaded headdress and nothing else, proudly parading to cheers from drunks. Losing self-control becomes a virtue. In Mexico, married men are officially granted one day of liberty from their obligations on what’s called El Dia del Marido Oprimido—the day of the oppressed husband. On the eve of Lent, even the sternest Anglo-Saxon churchgoers
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