The Willpower Instinct Quotes

“We don’t just cling to guns and God when we’re scared; many of us also cling to credit cards, cupcakes, and cigarettes. Studies show that being reminded of our mortality makes us more susceptible to all sorts of temptations, as we look for hope and security in the things that promise reward and relief.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“so we forget about these strategies not because they don’t work, but because when we’re stressed, our brains persistently mis-predict what will make us happy. This means that we’ll often talk ourselves out of doing the very thing that will actually make us feel better.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Rather than releasing dopamine and relying on the promise of reward, the real stress relievers boost mood-enhancing brain chemicals like serotonin and GABA, as well as the feel-good hormone oxytocin. They also help shut down the brain’s stress response, reduce stress hormones in the body, and induce the healing relaxation response.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Procrastinators who are stressed out about how behind they are on a project will put it off even longer to avoid having to think about it.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“one-two punch of stress and dopamine: We are drawn back again and again to coping strategies that don’t work, but that our primitive brains persistently believe are the gateway to bliss.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“stress—including negative emotions like anger, sadness, self-doubt, and anxiety—shifts the brain into a reward-seeking state. You end up craving whatever substance or activity your brain associates with the promise of reward, and you become convinced that the “reward” is the only way to feel better.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“If we want to avoid such stress-induced willpower failures, we’ll need to find a way to feel better that doesn’t require turning to temptation. We’ll also need to give up the self-control strategies—like guilt and self-criticism—that only make us feel worse.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“The promise of reward—as we’ve seen—does not always mean that we will feel good. More often, the things we turn to for relief end up turning on us.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Our brains mistake the promise of reward for a guarantee of happiness, so we chase satisfaction from things that do not deliver.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“desire is neither good nor bad—what matters is where we let it point us, and whether we have the wisdom to know when to follow.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“When dopamine points us to temptation, we must distinguish wanting from happiness.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“we need to separate the real rewards that give our lives meaning from the false rewards that keep us distracted and addicted.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Listen to the promise of reward, and we give in to temptation. Without the promise of reward, we have no motivation.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“The promise of reward doesn’t guarantee happiness, but no promise of reward guarantees unhappiness.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“When our reward system is quiet, the result isn’t so much total contentment as it is apathy.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“When we free ourselves from the false promise of reward, we often find that the thing we were seeking happiness from was the main source of our misery.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“promise of reward: We search. And we search. And we search some more, clicking that mouse like—well, like a rat in a cage seeking another “hit,”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“moral worth, being good gives us permission to be bad.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Thinking in terms of “right” and “wrong” instead of remembering what we really want will trigger competing impulses and license self-sabotaging behavior.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Moving beyond the traps of moral licensing requires knowing that who we are is the self that wants the best for us—and the self that wants to live in line with our core values.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“We need to feel like the kind of person who wants to do the right thing.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“If we want to motivate green behavior in others, we would be wise to focus more on strengthening a person’s identity as someone who cares about the environment, and less on giving people the opportunity to buy the right to melt the polar ice caps.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“the halo effect. This form of moral licensing looks for any reason to say “yes” to temptation.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“The limits of self-control present a paradox: We cannot control everything, and yet the only way to increase our self-control is to stretch our limits. Like a muscle, our willpower follows the rule of“Use it or lose it.” If we try to save our energy by becoming willpower coach potatoes, we will lose the strength we have. But if we try to run a willpower marathon every day, we set ourselves up for total collapse. Our challenge is to train like an intelligent athlete, pushing our limits but also pacing ourselves. And while we can find strength in our motivation when we feel weak, we can also look for ways to help our tired selves make good choices.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It

“We are not going to solve national or global crises like economic growth, health care, human rights, and climate change if we are exhausted by grocery shopping and dealing with difficult coworkers.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It

“The widely observed scientific finding that self-control is limited may reflect people’s beliefs about willpower, not their true physical and mental limits. The research on this idea is just beginning, and no one is claiming that humans have an unlimited capacity for self-control. But it is appealing to think that we often have more willpower than we believe we do. It also raises the possibility that we can, like athletes, push past the feeling of willpower exhaustion to make it to the finish line of our own willpower challenges.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It

“Ask your brain to do math every day, and it gets better at math. Ask your brain to worry, and it gets better at worrying. Ask your brain to concentrate, and it gets better at concentrating”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“Low-glycemic foods include lean proteins, nuts and beans, high-fiber grains and cereals, and most fruits and vegetables—basically, food that looks like its natural state and doesn’t have a ton of added sugar, fat, and chemicals.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“A better plan is to make sure that your body is well-fueled with food that gives you lasting energy. Most psychologists and nutritionists recommend a low-glycemic diet—that is, one that helps you keep your blood sugar steady.”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It

“During stressful times, it’s especially tempting to turn to highly processed, high-fat, and high-sugar “comfort” food. Doing so, however, will lead to a self-control crash and burn. In the long term, blood sugar spikes and crashes can interfere with the body’s and brain’s ability to use sugar—meaning that you could end up with high blood sugar, but low energy (as is the case for the millions of Americans with type 2 diabetes9).”
― Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do To Get More of It