How to fail your resolution: rely on willpower

In Life Strategies (1999), self-help guru Dr. Phillip McGraw writes that willpower is a myth – “an unreliable emotional fuel, experienced at fever pitch”.

Willpower may temporarily energise our efforts, he says – helping us to take a leap that initially changes our behaviour. But it will also hinder our progress once the emotional responses to our early endeavours have dissipated. For those wanting to change their behaviour, this makes willpower a dangerous energizer: a fuel that will evaporate, bringing us to a halt at the first difficulty – like a coasting car out-of-petrol and facing the slightest of inclines.

Of course, we are in the land of the New Year’s resolution: those moments when we decide upon change but, all too often and all too quickly, end up reinforcing our failings. The momentum of the new behaviour rarely lasts beyond a week, leaving us gritting our teeth and relying on willpower – all the while secretly knowing it is only a matter of when we fail. The if seemingly dealt with at the first pang of weakness.

So how can we improve our chances of success, whether in big pursuits (a new man/job/career) or small (quit smoking/biting nails/being a couch potato)? McGraw suggests that we replace willpower with a well-developed and well-executed strategy – especially one that manages to remove our emotions as key drivers. But what is a strategy? I spend some time struggling with the concept in What’s Stopping You? (TBP 2011) simply because people with high fear of failure (my target readership in the book) can be easily put off by such ambiguities. And while motivational concepts such as “goals” and “action points” are easily understood, the concept of a strategy can be confusing.

McGraw describes a strategy as the “operational definition” of a plan, which to me sounds like a plan with some detail included. Fine, but a plan for what? Clearly, it’s a plan to meet our goals, but aren’t those our action points – our day-to-day activities that lead us towards our objectives? Well only if they do, in fact, lead us towards our objectives. So perhaps our best definition of a strategy is that it’s a plan that ensures our action points move us in the direction of our ultimate objectives.

I’ll give one (silly) example to illustrate. Say we're arrivistes: social climbers having moved to a new location. If our goal is to ingratiate ourselves with the local squirearchy then one action point could be to hold a smart dinner party in which they are invited. Yet this is one event, which is likely to be well-received but unlikely to secure our invite to her Ladyship’s intimate circle. What’s needed is a strategy. A plan that joins a series of action points to create a co-ordinated and effective advance focused on success. So membership of the tennis and golf clubs is a must, as is some local charity work that may offer an excuse for a direct approach (being careful not to ask for money). The WI, an interest in the Parish Council, championing a local issue, horse riding – all may lead us towards our goal if pursued in a co-ordinated and strategic fashion.

Of course, my example is frivolous and old fashioned. It’s just stating that resolution will fail without a strategy. That action points are not enough without a goal. And that a strategy relies on a series of action points all focused on a calculated and positive objective.

In fact, positivity – the idea of moving towards something rather than away – is crucial for a successful strategy. Saying I want to change my job is negative and, ultimately, meaningless without positive direction (and brings me back to the previous post on running away). Probably, you will achieve your goal, but as it’s a negative pursuit you may find yourself repeating the exercise next year. Far better to move towards something – having calculated our positive and long-term goals and strategized our action points for achieving them.

This even works for habits – the most common target for New Year’s resolutions. Such small and negative pursuits are unlikely to succeed unless they’re one action point in a strategy towards a wider objective. Quitting smoking, for instance, is a narrow and negative objective and therefore one entirely dependent on willpower (leaving aside Allen Carr’s reframing of smoking as an addiction). Moving towards the healthier person you visualise in, say, six months – perhaps losing 10 pounds in weight and that horrible rasping noise in your breath when you climb stairs – makes the end of your smoking habit just one action point is a positive pursuit with a measurable and thought-through long-term objective.

Less and better food, more exercise, new clothes, less alcohol, a remodelled back garden, a walk rather than drive to the station – all are action points along the way: bundled into a strategy for achieving your objective. Of course, willpower isn’t banished as a requirement. We will always need to navigate the occasionally-triggered desire for our old behaviours. But willpower is no longer the central pillar in our pursuit. Instead, our central pillar is a strategy for achieving our positive and long-term goals.

Happy New Year!