I just don’t have the will power is a commonly heard phrase in fitness. Whether it’s a client, a fitness newbie, or someone who just explains why they refuse to even try getting fit.

Long ago, when we finished writing our book, FIT FOR COMBAT, my fitness co-author JD and I started cataloging what makes fitness, figure and bodybuilding competitors different from everyone else. Will power was at the top of the list.  Will Power leads to self-discipline. When you want something badly enough, you will for it. In fitness, it’s no different.  When you have the will for something, you CREATE the discipline to get what you want.  If  you want to be leaner, if you want to get into better shape, if you want to compete, or if you just want to be more active and feel more fit, will power is the doorway that leads you into manifestation of that goal.

It makes sense that self-discipline and will power would play a role in being able to stick to the diet and training program required to get into competition shape.  We initially thought it would be the real difference between those who succeed in mastering their bodies and everyone else.  As we studied what self-discipline really is, we realized that we had fallen into a common trap that social scientists call fundamental attribution error.

Every person has a reservoir of will power to draw on, like a will power battery, but the amount in that reservoir is not fixed at a set level.  Research, by Professor Roy Baumeister at Florida State University, shows that our will power battery can be depleted by repeated acts of self control and decision making.  Newer research by professors at the University of Chicago shows that our reservoir of will power is affected by whether we think there is a set amount of it or that it is unlimited.

The classic experiment by Baumeister, which has been replicated in hundreds of variations, asked student test subjects to eat radishes while being tempted with a plate of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.  Baumeister then asked the students to solve an impossible puzzle.  The students did not know the puzzle was impossible to solve.

The real purpose of the experiment was to see how long the students who had to overcome the temptation of the cookies would work at solving the puzzle when compared to students who sat down, ate some cookies and then worked on the puzzle and a control group who just worked on the puzzle with no cookies or radishes involved.  The results show that the students who had to overcome the cookie temptation gave up on the puzzle quickly.  Their battery of will power and resolve was depleted by fighting the temptation to eat the cookies.  The students who had to overcome the cookie temptation, used up their reservoir of will power, their reservoir of resolve, and gave up on the puzzle in less than half the time of the other two groups and made far fewer attempts to solve the puzzle.  Baumister calls this effect ego depletion. The experiment shows that when we use will power for one thing, overcoming the temptation of a cookie, it drains a little of that energy from the battery making it harder to exercise the will in totally unrelated things like trying to solve a puzzle.

Baumeister showed the energy depletion of decision making in an experiment where students, prior to working on the impossible puzzle, were either forced to make a decision about a task or were assigned a task.  The students who had to make the decision gave up on the puzzle faster and made fewer attempts to solve than the students who just carried out an assignment.

So, in fitness, we note that a general 9-5 lifestyle tends to lead to the attitude that “I just don’t have time” or “By the time I get home at night, I don’t want to eat a chicken breast and salad. I just want a quick snack, a TV and a bed.”

In our fitness data research, JD and I found that most people have a lot of power.  However, most people’s will power is just all used up with the demands of their jobs, running a household and raising two young girls.  Every act of will power, every decision, drains the battery a little bit more, but the battery is not fixed, it is rechargeable and we can have more will power if we want it, just by thinking we have it.

The point being that, Yes, You Do have the Will Power! You are just in need of a budget of your will power! It’s about management of your energy resources, and not about your lack of energy. For fitness, you do have the energy, yet, you have been lacking knowledge.  Gaining more fitness knowledge, working out to gain awareness of your body, and learning to listen to your body’s language in terms of what to feed it to stimulate energy is the only real way to go.  You can stop blaming your will power for your fitness disasters or your state of health and wellness. The key I have found as a mother, is that fit moms have just learned how to start managing the will power better.

When JD and I first thought will power was the difference between the physique competitors and everyone else, we were making a fundamental attribution error, an error that is endemic among humans.  Fundamental attribution error is when we use a psychological or personality based explanation for a behavior instead of the situational explanation.  We were too focused on the personality trait of will power and thought that the competitors must have larger reservoirs of mental energy—a bigger battery.  When we went back and studied Baumeister in depth, we found a better, situational, explanation for the seemingly large reservoirs of will power of the competitors.

Fitness, figure and bodybuilding competitors are cooler toters, especially when preparing for a contest.  Their meals are planned and timed and they carry them around with them.  They know what they are going to eat and when they are going to eat it.  It is all scheduled and becomes a routine.  When something becomes a routine it no longer involves a decision.  When it is no longer a decision, it does not require any mental energy.

The physique competitors did not have a larger battery of will power than everyone else, they just used less will power by making many decisions about eating a routine.  It was easier for them to stick to the diet because the decisions that take mental energy were removed.  The situation, the eating plan to get into contest shape, makes them just appear to have more will power.

When we started looking at the lives of successful physique competitors they nearly all had a structured daily or weekly routine.  The diet and training demands precision, the only way to be that precise is with a pre-determined structure.  Once the structure and routine is set, there were fewer decisions to be made leaving more in battery to handle temptations as the cropped up.

Most fit moms have figured out the secret. Women tend to be better planners, but that’s not limited to women only, just happens to be a general statistic.  What I see in fitness and in the general population of fitness enthusiasts is that fitness minded individuals plan what they’ll eat and make it a routine.  With those decisions removed, people are then expending less will power and found that they had more energy.  Most of these fitness people and fit moms have ready-made forms of protein around their house, in their car and at their office.  JD and I found that common possessions among the successful fitness enthusiasts included powdered whey protein,  shaker bottles, water gallons, tuna packs, and pre-cooked skinless/boneless chicken, among the most common possessions.  Even if routine is disrupted, there is always an automatic back-up that did not require a decision, like an apple and a can of tuna or a ready to drink protein shake.  And of course, every one of them owns some kind of fat-loss grill for their chicken and fish 

Removing will-power draining decisions is one way women figure competitors maintain their diet, another is the actual nutritional content of the diet.

A lot of people never even try to get into their best shape because they think they don’t have the will power to do it.  They make the fundamental attribution error and think the competitors have more will power than they do.  As the research shows, if you don’t think you have very much will power, then you will not have much will power.

The only true act of will power was taking the time up front to set the schedule and routine.  After repeating the routine it becomes automatic.  Women figure competitors don’t have a larger reservoir of will power than everyone else, they just expend less of it by having a structured routine and fuel their brain with ketones from fat.

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