will power

Willpower is your ability to set a course of action and say, “Engage!”

Willpower provides an intensely powerful yet temporary boost. Think of it as a one-shot thruster. It burns out quickly, but if directed intelligently, it can provide the burst you need to overcome inertia and create momentum.

Willpower is the spearhead of self-discipline. To use a World War II analogy, willpower would be D-Day, the Normandy Invasion. It was the gigantic battle that turned the tide of the war and got things moving in a new direction, even though it took another year to reach VE Day (Victory in Europe). To make that kind of effort every day of the war would have been impossible.

Willpower is a concentration of force. You gather up all your energy and make a massive thrust forward. You attack your problems strategically at their weakest points until they crack, allowing you enough room to maneuver deeper into their territory and finish them off.

The application of willpower includes the following steps:

Choose your objective
Create a plan of attack
Execute the plan

With willpower you may take your time implementing steps 1 and 2, but when you get to step 3, you’ve got to hit it hard and fast.

Don’t try to tackle your problems and challenges in such a way that a high level of willpower is required every day. Willpower is unsustainable. If you attempt to use it for too long, you’ll burn out. It requires a level of energy that you can maintain only for a short period of time… in most cases the fuel is spent within a matter of days.

Use Willpower to Create Self-Sustaining Momentum

So if willpower can only be used in short, powerful bursts, then what’s the best way to apply it? How do you keep from slipping back into old patterns once the temporary willpower blast is over?

The best way to use willpower is to establish a beachhead, such that further progress can be made with far less effort than is required of the initial thrust. Remember D-Day — once the Allies had established a beachhead, the road ahead was much easier for them. It was still challenging to be sure, especially with the close quarters fighting among hedge rows in France before the Rhino Tanks began plowing through them, but it was a lot easier than trying to maintain the focus, energy, and coordination of a full scale beach invasion every single day for another year.

So the proper use of willpower is to establish that beachhead — to permanently change the territory itself such that it’s easier to continue moving on. Use willpower to reduce the ongoing need for such a high level of sustained force.

Don’t use willpower to attack your biggest problem directly. Use willpower to attack the environmental and social obstacles that perpetuate the problem. Establish a beachhead first, and then fortify your position (i.e. turn it into a habit, such as by doing a 30-Day Challenge). Habit puts action on autopilot, such that very little willpower is required for ongoing progress, allowing you to practically coast towards your goal.

[Skidmore]

Hey good anology for will power ,however i dont think it applies to recover and staying clean and sober.To me will power can get you clean but aftercare and a support group and good orderly direction will keep you clean.I know for myself, that my will alone will get me back out there,This is comming from a self directed ,self focust former jar head.Trust god,clean house, help others.One day at a time I believe,any body can get this program of not drinking or druging .But will power alone will bring you back to were you left off. Be well my brother

[hellc@mst]

willpower [ˈwɪlˌpaʊə]
n
1. the ability to control oneself and determine one's actions
2. firmness of will

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003

Hey there. What a fantastic post. I have long believed that ones ability to overcome addiction is contained within, self-determined. It is empowering to know that I have the ultimate power to determine my path in life and I am not a slave to the whims of inanimate substances. They (drugs) no longer have any power over me today.

I like what you said about using willpower strategically and in short bursts which is exactly what has transpired with regards to my own journey. I can count on 1 hand the times I needed to draw on a 'burst of willpower" to see me through a difficult situation. As you wrote, will power can be self sustaining, building upon itself indefinately so there is enough there when necessity requires it. It would be impossible to sustain a state of continued will-power but thankfully I dont have to. Your post descibed its frugal but definitive application brilliantly.

                 Excellent post. Thank you. Kind Regards Jeremy (ex addict)
                               3 years 6 months drug and alcohol free