The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It [Hardcover]

A superb summary of the latest research findings in neurophysiology and social psychology for regular people. Presented in ten chapters/lectures with real-life examples, jokes and practical tips and exercises in the end of each chapter. The book focuses on willpower, motivation, how to stay on track and not get distracted, how our choices and decisions are made through interaction of our different multiple selves. The concept of our "two brains" - one, impulsive "fight-flight" and "grab what you can", shaped by survival of our wild ancestors, and another, social, goal-oriented, analythical, Homo sapiens' latest acquisition, can explain a lot in behaviour of oneself and people around.

The book makes you think and, in addition, is a pleasure to read. I could do with fewer examples on excessive shopping (this is an American book, after all), but the author also examines the other problems, addictions and distractions (excessive eating, smoking, internet), and one can easily apply the workings to anything one would like to take control of.

McGonigal brings together the newest insights about self-control from psychology, economics, neuroscience and medicine to build willpower. She is a health psychologist at Stanford School of Medicine where she teaches a course called "The Science of Willpower" that quickly became the most popular classes ever offered by Stanford. Course evaluations call the course "life-changing".

The book's 10 chapters reflect her 10-week course, written in an interesting and easy style, without any "academic pompousness":

1. effective willpower - just noticing what's happening is key
2. the willpower instinct - anything that puts a stress on your mind or body can sabotage self-control but too much willpower is stressful
3. self-control is like a muscle - it gets tired from use but regular exercise makes it stronger
4. why being good encourages bad behaviour - we use past good behaviour to justify indulgences
5. why we mistake wanting for happiness - even false promises of reward make us feel alert and captivated, so we chase satisfaction from things that don't deliver
6. how feeling bad leads to giving in - self-compassion is a far better strategy than beating ourselves up
7. we discount both future rewards and future costs - we consistently act against our own long-term interests and we illogically believe our future selves will (magically) have more willpower
8. why willpower is contagious - humans are hardwired to connect and we mimic and mirror both willpower failures and willpower successes of our social network
9. inner acceptance improves outer control - attempts to fight instincts and desires ironically make them worse
10. final thoughts - the aha moment

Each chapter makes use of fascinating paradoxes to dispell common misconceptions about self-control. While I preferred the deeper "Willpower" by Tierney and Baumeister (who has studied contradictory human behaviour for decades), this book is way ahead of any others I've read on the subject, for its wide range of down-to-earth and practical strategies for greater success.

(Oddly, the paperback and kindle versions are called "Maximum Willpower".)

I wanted to start with "Rarely, if ever..." but quite a few of the books I've read lately do a very good job of explicating the science & tie it to specific actions we can take in the light of that science. And this book is no less rewarding if such is your expectation.

In my mind, the greatest value of this book, to start with, is in the mere recognition of willpower problems. For example, during my long (Ok, longish...) runs, I've often given in to a 30 to 60 sec temptation of walking a little. I'd never have thought that this was a willpower challnge & always thought of this as "not pushing too hard, should a injury happen" but this book made me realize if there was cash prize at the end, I could easily push myself to do it. So the question was never really about fatigue, it was about motivation. Similarly, in recognizing the continuous challenges of willpower - from that of indulging while feeling bad or while feeling good, to the futile chases after "happiness", or our mistaken notion of happiness - lies the many tactical takeaways for its readers.

Its made better by the science behind. At least, for those of us that are interested. I'd say here that if you're pursuing a good general & holistic appreciation of the brain's working, this is not the best book (for example, there is no content on memory & how cortisol overdose can lead to chronic stress) but the science is just enough to understand isolated concepts pertaining to the willpower challenge at hand. So if that kind of thing interests you, then you can dig deeper for the actual neurological workings (this book has a great bibliography) after understanding the basics from reading this.

And thirdly, just the plain & simple knowledge of the case studies is empowering. It is a great help to know that these challenges have been isoloated, experimented with & eventually overcome by deploying certain strategies. Just the knowledge of something is "do-able" was very empowering for me.

McGonigal writes with clarity & plentiful humour. The book is structured very well, & the chapter summaries help a lot in quick refreshes - I'd say this book was one of my best science reads this year.