What happens when you make decisions all day long? Why do some people seem to have an endless supply of self-control while others run out quickly?
In Willpower, Roy Baumeister and John Tierney explore the science behind self-control and decision-making. They reveal how willpower works like a battery that can be depleted and recharged—and how willpower fatigue affects our choices throughout the day.
Keep reading to discover practical strategies for maintaining your mental energy and making better decisions.
Willpower Fatigue
Baumeister and Tierney say that you use willpower for any act of self-control. As such, it’s crucial for pursuing goals, which generally require you to exert consistent effort while avoiding distractions and temptations. Another way to think about this is that willpower is what you use to make good decisions, as opposed to easy decisions—for example, cooking and eating a healthy meal to support your health goals instead of ordering a pizza.
It’s also important to recognize that willpower, like any other form of energy, is limited. Just like your phone runs out of battery power if you overuse it, your mind can run out of willpower if you overexert yourself and don’t take time to recharge. This is called “willpower fatigue.”
(Shortform note: Making good decisions instead of easy decisions may make you think of discipline, rather than willpower—and, in fact, many people use the two terms interchangeably. However, many psychologists and productivity experts say that willpower is the ability to resist short-term temptations to pursue long-term goals, while discipline is a support system of habits and plans that reduces the need for willpower. For instance, someone who’s in the habit of going for a jog at 5 a.m. every morning might seem to be using a superhuman amount of willpower, but in reality, they’re barely using any; they aren’t really choosing to go for an early morning run each day, they’re just following a habit.)
We’ll explore how you can effectively set and pursue goals without experiencing willpower fatigue. We’ll then discuss what happens when you do run out of willpower.
Setting and Reaching Goals
The authors say that the basis of self-control is setting clear goals and then working to achieve those goals. The key is to do so while spending as little of your limited willpower as possible, so you don’t become tired and give up. You can achieve this with effective planning and motivation.
This is because willpower is, in essence, how you force yourself to stay on task and do things you don’t want to do. Having a plan helps you to stay on task and minimizes the need for further decision-making (which, remember, requires willpower). Similarly, the right motivation makes you want to do a task, rather than needing to spend a great deal of willpower to force yourself to do it. Therefore, these two strategies minimize how much willpower you actually have to use while pursuing your goals.
We can illustrate this principle with a metaphor. Imagine that you’re a car, and your willpower is your fuel. Forcing yourself to stay on task and do something you don’t enjoy is like driving up a steep hill—it requires a lot of power, and therefore a lot of “fuel.” On the other hand, effective plans and the right motivations will instead put you at the top of a hill, allowing you to coast down much more easily.
Making Plans to Reach Your Goals
The authors say that, in addition to helping you stay on task, planning is helpful due to the psychological phenomenon known as the Zeigarnik effect. This effect states that people tend to remember unfinished tasks more clearly than finished ones, which explains why unfinished tasks tend to persistently occupy your thoughts and drain your mental energy.
However, making a plan to complete those tasks can greatly reduce how much time you spend dwelling on them and how much they worry you. Therefore, having a clear plan will largely undo the Zeigarnik effect, even before you’ve finished everything that you’re worried about.
When it comes to making those plans, Baumeister and Tierney recommend making monthly schedules for yourself, rather than daily, weekly, or yearly ones. They say this approach provides you with a beneficial balance between structure and flexibility, allowing you to adapt to unforeseen circumstances while maintaining a clear direction toward your goals. In contrast, planning more than a month in advance can leave you scrambling to update your plans as unforeseen circumstances arise, while only planning a day or a week at a time can cause you to lose sight of your long-term goals.
Finally, Baumeister and Tierney warn that having too many different objectives can lead you to a state of mental paralysis characterized by endlessly cycling thoughts, unhappiness, and a lack of motivation. Therefore, it’s crucial to prioritize your goals in a way that aligns with your values. That way, if you find that you don’t have the time or energy to achieve all of your goals, you can still be certain you’re working toward the goals that are most important to you.
For example, if you value your family more than anything else, it’s likely that working so you can support them will be one of your top priorities. Since you’d devote a lot of time and mental energy to that goal of earning money for your family, other goals—such as, say, losing weight—would have to move farther down your list of priorities.
The Cycle of Motivation
The other way to minimize your willpower use is to keep yourself motivated. On this subject, Baumeister and Tierney say that the real secret isn’t getting motivated, but rather staying motivated over the long term. Fortunately, you can use motivation and work to create a loop, each feeding into the other to form a largely self-perpetuating cycle.
To begin this cycle, consider the reason behind whatever goals you set. Perhaps you want to improve your health or self-image, make a positive change in the world, or simply have some fun. Whatever it is, that reason can give you the initial motivation to take action. Unfortunately, that motivation doesn’t last forever, which is why it’s so common for people to start new projects and then lose steam after a short time.
To help you stay on task over the long term, Baumeister and Tierney point out that, when you notice that you’ve made tangible progress toward a goal, it boosts your motivation to keep working. This increased motivation then drives you to put forth more effort, leading to further progress, and so on. Therefore, the secret to staying motivated is to come up with highly visible ways to track your progress toward your goals and to celebrate small milestones.
For example, if you’re trying to lose a large amount of weight, you might weigh yourself every day and use a simple spreadsheet to track the dates and your weight. You could then treat yourself to a small gift for, say, every five or 10 pounds you lose.
Decision Fatigue
Baumeister and Tierney say that you should minimize your willpower expenditures because you have only a limited amount of willpower, and it’s possible to run out—a condition known as decision fatigue. When suffering from decision fatigue, you become more susceptible to impulsive behavior, poor decision-making, and diminished performance on tasks requiring self-control.
Decision fatigue leads people to minimize the effort they put into making decisions, much like how they’d try to avoid using a muscle that’s already tired and sore. In fact, people who have exhausted their willpower tend to avoid decision-making altogether: They’ll default to “standard” or pre-set options, or else impulsively agree to the first option they’re presented with. For example, someone who goes shopping for a car while in a state of decision fatigue might simply buy the first car they’re offered at the sticker price, instead of looking for a car that more closely matches their needs and haggling for a better deal.
In less extreme cases of decision fatigue, people often simplify their decision-making criteria by focusing on just one factor, rather than thoroughly comparing their options. Someone in this state might go to a restaurant and just order the cheapest thing on the menu, rather than comparing their options to find the best combination of cost and enjoyment.
