As an alcoholic who has been sober for seven years I’ve thought a lot about this topic. I’ve worked with dozens of people who are struggling to get sober.
I drank all day every day.
You are probably aware of that in 12 step programs the concept of a “higher power” and living a life based on spiritual principles is necessary to maintain sobriety.
For an alcoholic, the self control mechanism seems to have broken down and no amount of willpower is sufficient to break the cycle.
Part of this is due to a failure to imagine that the alternative could be better, but there is an obsessive element at work here too.
Now, the idea of God is the most important thing in my life today, but I’ve often thought that the “higher power” idea might just be some circuitry in the brain that somehow gives me the ability to have agency outside of the usual ego thought structures.
At one year sober, I was driving my sister around and she produced a liter of vodka from her purse (I didn’t know she had it) and cracked the lid. The only thought in my brain at that point was the sound of that bottle opening. Click click click. She handed the bottle to me and said, “do you want some?”
I still don’t know why I didn’t take that drink. It’s a mystery. I do know that it had nothing to do with weighing the pros and cons of my options.
All of my plans and defense strategies disappeared behind that clicking sound.
In my opinion Benjamin, the reason that the idea of God helps keep you sober, is because there’s a hope to this scenario, and one that other believers support for communal strength. So don’t let atheists (like me) ever deprive you of your faith! But as for your sister, wow! Do you think she was trying to give you a relapse?
I just think of God as the power that grows grass and makes dogs (among many other things). I’ve definitely gone through atheist periods.
One of those times I was suffering badly and saying to the air, “How do I even know you exist?”
The words that came to my mind were clear, quiet and gentle, “Hey dummy, what makes you think I’m not big enough to exist and not exist at the same time?”
My faith is strong enough (for now anyway) that no one can talk me out of it.
As for my sister, I’m pretty sure she just wasn’t thinking. Also, the whole misery loves company thing.
She died in November 2021 of complications due to alcoholism.
Really sorry to hear about your sister. Fortunately you seem to be figuring things out. I have several good school friends that didn’t make it, though at least one that seems about like you.
I think you’re interpreting the evidence correctly here Tommy. There is no true “willpower”. Unfortunately the field of psychology doesn’t yet have a model that makes sense of the evidence, but I’ve got one to consider. It’s that technically we only seek present satisfaction from moment to moment, though the reward of “hope” and punishment of “worry” affects our present state of satisfaction to suggest that some of us have “self control”, or an idea that I think you’re correctly dubious of. So in the marshmallow test some kids have enough present hope of getting another marshmallow that makes them feel satisfied enough to wait. And though this scenario may not display it as distinctly as others, there’s also the worry of not waiting and so losing the supposed coming reward. Maybe a better example of this element would be spending lots of money for home security measures rather than vacations if the thought of people breaking in is extra worrying? For those interested in the instantaneous nature of self, I wrote a short post on the matter.
I really enjoyed this piece. The idea that “willpower” might just be moment-to-moment value judgments really resonates. Maybe this is why mindfulness practice has helped me so much: by elevating some of those fast, emotionally driven under-conscious impulses into conscious view, thus making more rational value choices?
Thanks, Tommy. I'm a Sapolsky-ite, but I know basically no one else is. I find Tim Ferris' framing useful: Focus on systems, not willpower. Set things up to make what you want the default.
Is there a way to focus on both: shaping the system so the environment nudges our value judgments in the favorable direction, while also bringing more of those under-the-surface decisions into awareness, thus making better value judgement?
It seems like the notion of will power is being conflated here with things like decision making processes. Isn't will power simply following through on a decided course of action? Example: I decide to hold my hand up for thirty seconds (something I am certainly physically capable of). If I subsequently keep it up for thirty seconds, that is a successful application of will power. If not, then it's not.
Yep there are alternative task paradigms you can come up with like that. It's still a decision, though -- deciding between continuing to do the effortful thing or stopping. I don't think self control makes sense except in the context of decision making, so I don't think you can disentangle the two
You may not be able to completely disentangle them, but experimentation is about reducing confounding factors, not necessarily eliminating them completely. It's pretty much impossible to completely eliminate other factors in any experiment.
My example above reduces things to very neutral and arbitrary decisions, in a fixed and brief time frame. Personally, I find that satisfying enough, in terms of avoiding the problems that you outlined in your article.
Yeah I agree a different task paradigm like you suggest can have value. But it depends a lot on what you're trying to do with the task paradigm. If you're looking for a measure of individual differences, your suggestion ends up conflating muscle endurance with self-control, which wouldn't be useful. If you're trying to get animals to do it, you have to motivate them with a reward, so there's some decision about the trade-off of the effort and reward (in humans the same thing is happening even without an explicit reward, between social/self-signaling and reducing muscle strain). Not to say a task like this can't be used in a useful way (people do these exact kinds of tasks, and I thought about using one at one point in grad school)
Really enjoyed reading this one. I was currently dealing with doom scrolling problem and when I brought it up with my therapist and I understood and accepted the why behind it, it just reduced drastically. So not sure, if the people who have beter self control/will power are the ones who have this undertanding of how to rewire their brain to ask their temptation the question what it seeks right now? whats the need and maybe that answer strengthens their muscle to have better control over desires. I am not sure if you considered that the muscle is not in will power but in building the stegth to pause and ask the question. Like writing is a muscle everyone says but what I have understood its not about writing everyday thats builds the muscle(that is part of it) but the larger part is to do is to have fixed time and sit with the discomfort of not writing at first and looking at the blank page and people who are better at staying with blank pages, have larger chances of being less stuck with writer's block.
I certainly think being able to reflect and change your behavior based on it not aligning with what you want is important -- I think this gets into the whole conscientiousness thing. My understanding from social psychologists is this is very hard to develop in a long-term fashion. It's easy to make a short change but getting people to make a long term change towards being more conscientious or stopping to reflect on their actions isnt something as simple as getting people to practice that skill, unfortunately. This doesn't mean individuals don't come up with strategies that work for them, just that we don't have a tool that works for everyone despite it being a sort of holy Grail for social psychologists
Much of what you're discussing here is "time preference" to economists. People who forego present consumption in order to invest in future production or even to merely save for later, have a low time preference (they don't need/want to consume right now). Lower time preference, when practiced by enough people, tends to lead to higher standards of living.
I’ve hated the concept of will/power since childhood, when no one could define it to my liking (yes, I’m autistic lol). It seems to me like we use the word to point a sort of epiphenomenon, which is actually a relationship between other things. Between what? Well I’m still pondering that, hah — that’s why I follow excellent blogs like this one to stir my mind. 😜
What if "self-control" was never a thing? What if the brain was always doing temporal regulation, not value arbitration? Drop the lens of impulse and rationality and what remains? Temporal optimization. Close loops faster, minimize drift, and maximize reward-per-time because the nervous system is built to avoid phase lag. The issue becomes a rhythmic conflict instead of a valuation conflict, a mismatch in the internal tempo of perception, action, and expectation.
Monkeys weren’t being rational or irrational; they were preserving tempo. Humans do the same thing. In this framing, the narrative flips from conceptual baggage (morality, discipline, valuation, ego, willpower) to fast-cycle vs. slow-cycle stability. Because phase lag is expensive. Because off-beat rhythms are unstable. Because the system can’t keep a slow plan alive when the internal clock is running fast.
This temporal constraint might be a deeper feature we share with monkeys than anything we usually call rationality. Rationality is a surface phenomenon. Timing stability is the underlying constraint. And the “shared ancestor” between monkeys and humans is not cognition. It’s the architecture of temporal coherence.
“Another study found that children’s economic background explained most of their willingness to wait—suggesting those from more prosperous backgrounds might have more stable, reliable home environments, fostering more trust in grown-ups bringing marshmallows.” Nobody who didn’t have a single mom working a part-time bs job to support three small children while going back to college to finally get an undergraduate degree will get it.
so pretty much you need to know the real values and why behind what task you're doing or which choice you pick regardless of the different advantages within the 2 choices?
Not sure if it's what you're asking here, but I think I'm many decisions, many unconscious factors are weighed that we don't have insight into, and behaviors we see as poor self control might actually be rational decisions even if they don't appear that way (even to the person making them)
Important research.
As an alcoholic who has been sober for seven years I’ve thought a lot about this topic. I’ve worked with dozens of people who are struggling to get sober.
I drank all day every day.
You are probably aware of that in 12 step programs the concept of a “higher power” and living a life based on spiritual principles is necessary to maintain sobriety.
For an alcoholic, the self control mechanism seems to have broken down and no amount of willpower is sufficient to break the cycle.
Part of this is due to a failure to imagine that the alternative could be better, but there is an obsessive element at work here too.
Now, the idea of God is the most important thing in my life today, but I’ve often thought that the “higher power” idea might just be some circuitry in the brain that somehow gives me the ability to have agency outside of the usual ego thought structures.
At one year sober, I was driving my sister around and she produced a liter of vodka from her purse (I didn’t know she had it) and cracked the lid. The only thought in my brain at that point was the sound of that bottle opening. Click click click. She handed the bottle to me and said, “do you want some?”
I still don’t know why I didn’t take that drink. It’s a mystery. I do know that it had nothing to do with weighing the pros and cons of my options.
All of my plans and defense strategies disappeared behind that clicking sound.
Thanks for what you’re doing.
In my opinion Benjamin, the reason that the idea of God helps keep you sober, is because there’s a hope to this scenario, and one that other believers support for communal strength. So don’t let atheists (like me) ever deprive you of your faith! But as for your sister, wow! Do you think she was trying to give you a relapse?
I just think of God as the power that grows grass and makes dogs (among many other things). I’ve definitely gone through atheist periods.
One of those times I was suffering badly and saying to the air, “How do I even know you exist?”
The words that came to my mind were clear, quiet and gentle, “Hey dummy, what makes you think I’m not big enough to exist and not exist at the same time?”
My faith is strong enough (for now anyway) that no one can talk me out of it.
As for my sister, I’m pretty sure she just wasn’t thinking. Also, the whole misery loves company thing.
She died in November 2021 of complications due to alcoholism.
Really sorry to hear about your sister. Fortunately you seem to be figuring things out. I have several good school friends that didn’t make it, though at least one that seems about like you.
I think you’re interpreting the evidence correctly here Tommy. There is no true “willpower”. Unfortunately the field of psychology doesn’t yet have a model that makes sense of the evidence, but I’ve got one to consider. It’s that technically we only seek present satisfaction from moment to moment, though the reward of “hope” and punishment of “worry” affects our present state of satisfaction to suggest that some of us have “self control”, or an idea that I think you’re correctly dubious of. So in the marshmallow test some kids have enough present hope of getting another marshmallow that makes them feel satisfied enough to wait. And though this scenario may not display it as distinctly as others, there’s also the worry of not waiting and so losing the supposed coming reward. Maybe a better example of this element would be spending lots of money for home security measures rather than vacations if the thought of people breaking in is extra worrying? For those interested in the instantaneous nature of self, I wrote a short post on the matter.
https://eborg760.substack.com/p/post-1-the-instantaneous-nature-of
I really enjoyed this piece. The idea that “willpower” might just be moment-to-moment value judgments really resonates. Maybe this is why mindfulness practice has helped me so much: by elevating some of those fast, emotionally driven under-conscious impulses into conscious view, thus making more rational value choices?
Seems plausible!
"But I know what it isn’t—it isn’t a simple, single ability to ward off temptation."
I'm singularly tempted to believe you...
Thanks, Tommy. I'm a Sapolsky-ite, but I know basically no one else is. I find Tim Ferris' framing useful: Focus on systems, not willpower. Set things up to make what you want the default.
Yep, it's good advice
Is there a way to focus on both: shaping the system so the environment nudges our value judgments in the favorable direction, while also bringing more of those under-the-surface decisions into awareness, thus making better value judgement?
It seems like the notion of will power is being conflated here with things like decision making processes. Isn't will power simply following through on a decided course of action? Example: I decide to hold my hand up for thirty seconds (something I am certainly physically capable of). If I subsequently keep it up for thirty seconds, that is a successful application of will power. If not, then it's not.
Yep there are alternative task paradigms you can come up with like that. It's still a decision, though -- deciding between continuing to do the effortful thing or stopping. I don't think self control makes sense except in the context of decision making, so I don't think you can disentangle the two
You may not be able to completely disentangle them, but experimentation is about reducing confounding factors, not necessarily eliminating them completely. It's pretty much impossible to completely eliminate other factors in any experiment.
My example above reduces things to very neutral and arbitrary decisions, in a fixed and brief time frame. Personally, I find that satisfying enough, in terms of avoiding the problems that you outlined in your article.
Yeah I agree a different task paradigm like you suggest can have value. But it depends a lot on what you're trying to do with the task paradigm. If you're looking for a measure of individual differences, your suggestion ends up conflating muscle endurance with self-control, which wouldn't be useful. If you're trying to get animals to do it, you have to motivate them with a reward, so there's some decision about the trade-off of the effort and reward (in humans the same thing is happening even without an explicit reward, between social/self-signaling and reducing muscle strain). Not to say a task like this can't be used in a useful way (people do these exact kinds of tasks, and I thought about using one at one point in grad school)
Really enjoyed reading this one. I was currently dealing with doom scrolling problem and when I brought it up with my therapist and I understood and accepted the why behind it, it just reduced drastically. So not sure, if the people who have beter self control/will power are the ones who have this undertanding of how to rewire their brain to ask their temptation the question what it seeks right now? whats the need and maybe that answer strengthens their muscle to have better control over desires. I am not sure if you considered that the muscle is not in will power but in building the stegth to pause and ask the question. Like writing is a muscle everyone says but what I have understood its not about writing everyday thats builds the muscle(that is part of it) but the larger part is to do is to have fixed time and sit with the discomfort of not writing at first and looking at the blank page and people who are better at staying with blank pages, have larger chances of being less stuck with writer's block.
I certainly think being able to reflect and change your behavior based on it not aligning with what you want is important -- I think this gets into the whole conscientiousness thing. My understanding from social psychologists is this is very hard to develop in a long-term fashion. It's easy to make a short change but getting people to make a long term change towards being more conscientious or stopping to reflect on their actions isnt something as simple as getting people to practice that skill, unfortunately. This doesn't mean individuals don't come up with strategies that work for them, just that we don't have a tool that works for everyone despite it being a sort of holy Grail for social psychologists
Much of what you're discussing here is "time preference" to economists. People who forego present consumption in order to invest in future production or even to merely save for later, have a low time preference (they don't need/want to consume right now). Lower time preference, when practiced by enough people, tends to lead to higher standards of living.
https://quickonomics.com/terms/time-preference/
Yep
I’ve hated the concept of will/power since childhood, when no one could define it to my liking (yes, I’m autistic lol). It seems to me like we use the word to point a sort of epiphenomenon, which is actually a relationship between other things. Between what? Well I’m still pondering that, hah — that’s why I follow excellent blogs like this one to stir my mind. 😜
Insightful. Nice!
Thank you!
What if "self-control" was never a thing? What if the brain was always doing temporal regulation, not value arbitration? Drop the lens of impulse and rationality and what remains? Temporal optimization. Close loops faster, minimize drift, and maximize reward-per-time because the nervous system is built to avoid phase lag. The issue becomes a rhythmic conflict instead of a valuation conflict, a mismatch in the internal tempo of perception, action, and expectation.
Monkeys weren’t being rational or irrational; they were preserving tempo. Humans do the same thing. In this framing, the narrative flips from conceptual baggage (morality, discipline, valuation, ego, willpower) to fast-cycle vs. slow-cycle stability. Because phase lag is expensive. Because off-beat rhythms are unstable. Because the system can’t keep a slow plan alive when the internal clock is running fast.
This temporal constraint might be a deeper feature we share with monkeys than anything we usually call rationality. Rationality is a surface phenomenon. Timing stability is the underlying constraint. And the “shared ancestor” between monkeys and humans is not cognition. It’s the architecture of temporal coherence.
“Another study found that children’s economic background explained most of their willingness to wait—suggesting those from more prosperous backgrounds might have more stable, reliable home environments, fostering more trust in grown-ups bringing marshmallows.” Nobody who didn’t have a single mom working a part-time bs job to support three small children while going back to college to finally get an undergraduate degree will get it.
so pretty much you need to know the real values and why behind what task you're doing or which choice you pick regardless of the different advantages within the 2 choices?
Not sure if it's what you're asking here, but I think I'm many decisions, many unconscious factors are weighed that we don't have insight into, and behaviors we see as poor self control might actually be rational decisions even if they don't appear that way (even to the person making them)
makes sense