WEBVTT - Brainhacking 101: New Year, New Habits 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.279 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuffworks 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:13.640 dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:13.640 --> 0:00:15.840 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas. And 0:00:16.000 --> 0:00:18.560 it is a new year, so it's time to build 0:00:18.600 --> 0:00:21.400 a new you, to change the way you interact with 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:24.280 the world and hack that brain. Right, that's right. That's 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:28.280 why we have an episode of all sorts of tweaks 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:31.400 that you can make. And before we launch into that, 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:34.080 I wanted to just let you guys know of a 0:00:34.280 --> 0:00:40.160 new quick and dirty hack, and it's chewing gum. Huh yeah. Uh. 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.880 Forbes has an interesting article called Chew Yourself a Better 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:46.519 Brain by David Dissolvo, and it really talks about increasing 0:00:46.680 --> 0:00:48.560 blood flow to the brain, which can have all sorts 0:00:48.600 --> 0:00:54.040 of consequences and uh. In the article, Dissolvo outlines these merits, 0:00:54.080 --> 0:00:57.520 these consequences of gum chewing. We're talking about boosting memory, mood, 0:00:57.600 --> 0:01:02.040 and decreasing anxiety. But it does have its drawbacks, and 0:01:02.520 --> 0:01:05.760 the drawbacks have to do with test taking, because it 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:07.880 turns out it's really important to chew that gum about 0:01:07.880 --> 0:01:10.680 twenty minutes before you take that test, but spit it 0:01:10.720 --> 0:01:13.560 out when you take the test because apparently the chewing 0:01:13.560 --> 0:01:15.360 of the gum and the thinking at the same time, 0:01:15.400 --> 0:01:18.200 it's too much of an energy drain. Interesting. You know, 0:01:18.200 --> 0:01:19.920 I used to chew gum all the time here at 0:01:19.959 --> 0:01:22.480 work while I was researching and writing and all. But 0:01:22.560 --> 0:01:24.880 then I kind of phased it out about it about 0:01:24.880 --> 0:01:29.120 two years ago. Yeah, come um, it just seemed it 0:01:29.280 --> 0:01:31.720 seemed like it was getting excessive, Like maybe I shouldn't 0:01:31.720 --> 0:01:34.120 be cheering gum all the time. And I think you 0:01:34.200 --> 0:01:37.040 gotta talking to you about all that gum underneath your desk, right, 0:01:37.360 --> 0:01:39.240 Oh yeah, I mean I couldn't fit my leg I 0:01:39.240 --> 0:01:41.479 can only fit my legs under my desk by putting 0:01:41.480 --> 0:01:45.720 them into two like tubes that were free of gums. Yeah. 0:01:45.760 --> 0:01:48.680 Well that's what happens when you choose bubblicious. Indeed. Indeed, 0:01:48.840 --> 0:01:50.800 all right, so here you go. Maybe you didn't have 0:01:50.960 --> 0:01:54.520 your brain last year, but here are the recommendations once more. 0:02:00.120 --> 0:02:04.120 You know, Julie, we are in a new year, essentially 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:07.680 a new studio, whole new set of rules. In a sense, 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.680 its new year. Everybody is talking about, uh, you know 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:12.400 what you're gonna change, How this year is going to 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:14.520 be different last year? We're just gonna go to write 0:02:14.520 --> 0:02:18.600 that one off. But this year, this is the year 0:02:18.639 --> 0:02:20.880 it's gonna happen, or this is the year it's not 0:02:20.919 --> 0:02:25.360 gonna happen. I swear, Okay, blank slate, folks, how are 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:26.680 you going to fill it in? What you're gonna do, 0:02:26.720 --> 0:02:29.760 what you're gonna change. Yeah, we have an artificial new 0:02:29.840 --> 0:02:35.000 starting virtue of the calendar. So so yeah, what what 0:02:35.080 --> 0:02:38.880 does it take to change behavior? That's the big question. 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:40.440 And a lot of people have put in another two 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:42.120 cents on this. A lot of people have sold their 0:02:42.120 --> 0:02:45.399 two cents on this to a public that is ever 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:50.200 interested in changing themselves for the better. Well, first of all, 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:54.680 there's that three week myth that persists, this idea that 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:57.280 in order to change a habit or make a new one, 0:02:57.639 --> 0:03:00.400 all you need is twenty one days consecutive of days 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:03.640 and boom, there you go. You are now going to 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:08.480 be a Mandarin expert or some other uh jiu jitsu 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.919 warrior of knowledge and something. Yeah, which, of course is 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:14.800 ridiculous when you pair it up with the with the 0:03:14.840 --> 0:03:17.799 other addedge, you hear a lot about ten thousand hours, 0:03:17.840 --> 0:03:20.760 isn't it ten thousand hours towards something and you'll be 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:23.120 you'll be, you'll be great at it. Ten thousand hours, 0:03:23.960 --> 0:03:25.839 a good bit longer than twenty one days. But where 0:03:25.840 --> 0:03:27.799 does the twenty one days thing come from? Well, you 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:30.040 start trying to track it down, you kind of lose 0:03:30.360 --> 0:03:33.520 your path in the in the history. But it seems 0:03:33.520 --> 0:03:36.880 to have grown increasingly popular back in the nineteen seventies 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:40.440 due to a self help book called psycho Cybernetics, which 0:03:40.440 --> 0:03:44.440 sounds like a good source. Who wouldn't trust the bettering 0:03:44.480 --> 0:03:47.520 of their their their, their, their humanity to a book 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:51.000 called psycho Cybernetics and from the seventies, from the seventies, 0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:53.400 which I'm just I haven't looked it up yet, but 0:03:53.440 --> 0:03:55.600 I can already imagine that the cover to that book, 0:03:55.600 --> 0:03:58.360 because I have looked at some nineteen seventies books on 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:01.720 self help. Yeah, and again that's where this idea came from. 0:04:01.720 --> 0:04:03.600 The self help boat said, Hey, just twenty one days, 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:06.040 that's all it takes. But as we're going to discuss, 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:09.080 it's much more complex than that, and we'll get to 0:04:09.640 --> 0:04:12.400 an idea of what it takes in terms of days, 0:04:12.480 --> 0:04:15.080 the consecutive amount of time. But before we do that, 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:18.599 let's talk about the habit loop and what's happening inside 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:22.239 of our brains. New York Times business writer Charles Doig says, 0:04:22.640 --> 0:04:27.200 habit loops they contain three parts. Okay, First, there's a 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:29.680 cue or a trigger that tells your brain to go 0:04:29.800 --> 0:04:34.920 into automatic mode and let a behavior unfold. Okay. Second, 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:38.560 he says, there's the routine, which is the behavior itself. 0:04:39.080 --> 0:04:41.599 And then the third step, he says, is the reward, 0:04:41.720 --> 0:04:44.159 something that your brain likes that helps it to remember 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:47.640 that habit loop in the future. So like an example 0:04:47.680 --> 0:04:50.920 of this would be the trigger. What's setting this off is, oh, 0:04:50.960 --> 0:04:52.640 I feel kind of low energy in the afternoon, and 0:04:52.640 --> 0:04:54.560 then what should I do? All Right, the automatic behavior 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:56.800 is I should go and have a soda. I'm gonna 0:04:56.800 --> 0:04:59.960 have the big sugary grape soda. And then the reward 0:05:00.000 --> 0:05:02.320 where it is I feel at least a temporary boost 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:05.000 due to all that sugar in my body. Right, And 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.640 if you keep doing that over and over again, eventually 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:10.640 those cues, those environmental cues will start to work on you. 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:14.039 You know, maybe it's three o'clock and you're tired and 0:05:14.120 --> 0:05:16.400 you need that break, and you get that you look 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:17.840 at the clock and you see that's three o'clock, and 0:05:17.880 --> 0:05:20.120 that becomes one of the cues that adds up in 0:05:20.120 --> 0:05:23.560 this database of I want the soda. Yeah, it's time 0:05:23.560 --> 0:05:25.640 for the soda. The soda. Time to to press the 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:28.520 hot key on soda behavior. Now, in part, we can 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:32.760 trace habit making back to the basil ganglia, which also 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:36.000 plays a key role in the development of emotions, memories, 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:40.000 and pattern recognition. So decisions meanwhile, though, they are made 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:43.200 in the prefrontal cortex. And this is really interesting. As 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:46.520 soon as a behavior becomes automatic, the decision making part 0:05:46.560 --> 0:05:50.080 of your brain goes into a kind of sleep mode. Yeah. 0:05:50.120 --> 0:05:52.960 And and in this the basil gangla is the essentially 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:55.279 it takes the behavior and turns it into an automatic routine. 0:05:55.320 --> 0:05:57.640 It's essentially a hot key, you know, like like when 0:05:57.640 --> 0:05:59.880 you're using Photoshop or any other program, you have that 0:06:00.040 --> 0:06:01.960 hot key, like you know, it's all control or whatever. 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:04.400 I used to have a zillion of a memorize when 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:06.760 I was using in design for a living. And uh, 0:06:06.760 --> 0:06:08.880 and so you just go to this automatic behavior, all right, 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:10.839 just push these these quick keys and we'll do some 0:06:10.880 --> 0:06:13.800 sort of automatic function on the page you're working on. Uh. 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:15.880 And we do that in our lives. We do that 0:06:15.920 --> 0:06:18.440 when because we're driving to work, as we're trying to 0:06:18.560 --> 0:06:21.200 navigate the hallways of our house without you know, busting 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:24.640 our elbow and something. Well, Andrewig says that there's a 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:27.719 real um boon to us when we do that, because 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:30.240 in a sense, your brain starts working less and less, 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:32.800 and he says, the brain can almost completely shut down. 0:06:32.839 --> 0:06:34.680 And this is an advantage because it means that you 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:37.719 have all of this mental activity that you can devote 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:40.479 to something else. It's why you can listen to stuff 0:06:40.520 --> 0:06:43.920 about your mind while walking to the bus station, while 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:47.000 driving to work, or while doing you know, data entry 0:06:47.040 --> 0:06:50.599 in an Excel spreadsheet. Right, So because it's all this 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:54.360 has become habituated and wrote and routinized, and we need 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:57.320 all this stuff, right, we need this kind of predictability. 0:06:57.440 --> 0:06:59.400 But of course the problem becomes when we want to 0:06:59.480 --> 0:07:01.760 change that Hagar and he says that if you want 0:07:01.800 --> 0:07:03.960 to change it or create a new one, you have 0:07:04.080 --> 0:07:06.960 to game those three aspects. So you have to gain 0:07:07.080 --> 0:07:10.120 that trigger or that queue and know that it could 0:07:10.160 --> 0:07:13.080 be boredom or that you're tired, and acknowledge that that 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:15.520 is the reason, not just that it's three o'clock and 0:07:15.560 --> 0:07:17.320 it's time for that soda. You kind of have to 0:07:17.360 --> 0:07:20.320 break it down and kind of go slow mo with 0:07:20.400 --> 0:07:22.400 your thinking. Um. He also said that you have to 0:07:22.440 --> 0:07:27.120 disrupt the routine and the reward. You have to figure 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:30.360 that out too. You have to say, Okay, fine, this 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:33.760 might give me a temporary lift, but how gross am 0:07:33.760 --> 0:07:35.640 I going to feel a half hour later when all 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:38.320 that sugar is sitting in my belly? Um. And then 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:40.600 he also said that you can replace that reward, so 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:43.239 instead of having that soda, you could take a walk. 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:47.440 And this was really helpful to me when I quit drinking, actually, 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:50.280 because I had noticed that between the hours of six 0:07:50.280 --> 0:07:51.840 and eight pm at nine that were sort of my 0:07:51.880 --> 0:07:55.040 witching hours, and I would go and work out instead 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:58.080 of reaching for a glass of wine. Uh. And that's 0:07:58.200 --> 0:08:01.080 replaced that reward for me, and it disrupted the routine, 0:08:01.080 --> 0:08:03.400 So it was really helpful. Yeah. I mean, he stresses 0:08:03.440 --> 0:08:05.720 that with a lot of things are related to behavior. 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:08.360 A lot of it is just realizing the patterns of behavior, 0:08:08.480 --> 0:08:10.640 being able to look in the mirror and and be 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:13.480 self aware of what's going on. And you have to remember, 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:15.320 we've talked about this a lot before. That these are 0:08:15.360 --> 0:08:18.000 neural pathways that once you just have it over and 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:22.280 over again, they become really grooved in your brain. Okay, 0:08:22.320 --> 0:08:26.200 so that is a pathway that's easy for those signals 0:08:26.200 --> 0:08:28.600 to trot upon. So if you do it less, then 0:08:28.600 --> 0:08:31.960 it becomes you know, the strength of those pathways decreases. 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:35.200 It will always be there because you created the pathway. Yeah, 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:38.880 and and ultimately it's creating new behaviors. Forging new pathways, 0:08:38.880 --> 0:08:41.520 it's easier as opposed to getting rid of old ones. 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:42.920 I mean, you can think of a think of it 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:45.559 in terms of art. You have a road between two cities. 0:08:46.040 --> 0:08:48.080 At what are you gonna do? Are you gonna shut 0:08:48.080 --> 0:08:50.520 down one road completely and then build another one that 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:52.960 you're gonna You're gonna build an additional road and then 0:08:53.000 --> 0:08:55.120 you're gonna sort of and then then that new road 0:08:55.200 --> 0:08:57.440 is going to replace the old one. If you just 0:08:57.520 --> 0:08:58.840 cut off the road, then how are we gonna get 0:08:58.840 --> 0:09:00.800 where we're going? How am I going to deal with 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:03.800 the the trigger effect of needing that soda in the afternoon. 0:09:03.920 --> 0:09:06.880 I like that idea that there are parallel paths and 0:09:06.920 --> 0:09:09.760 that's how you replace the one after a while, and 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:12.199 you kind of put those detour signs. On the other one, 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:14.880 it always exists with the detour signs. Yeah. Um. And 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:17.679 that's one of the problems with any sort of habit 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:20.040 that you pick up again a bad habit, is that 0:09:20.240 --> 0:09:22.760 as soon as you you engage in that behavior, those 0:09:22.760 --> 0:09:25.680 pathways go, oh, I remember this road. I haven't taken 0:09:25.720 --> 0:09:27.880 it in a long time. And like you said, the 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:30.160 environment is a big thing. I like if I if I, 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:31.959 I don't know why I chose the soda habit. I 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:33.679 haven't actually had a soda in forever, but it's a 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:35.080 good good model because I know a lot of people 0:09:35.120 --> 0:09:38.040 have this temptation. Uh So in this case, in this example, 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:40.120 I'm drinking sodas in the office. So the office is 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:43.920 the environment in which this behavior has become ingrained. So 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:47.239 one thing that actually helps is stepping outside of the environment. 0:09:47.520 --> 0:09:51.800 That that that that makes this behavior acceptable. Now, changing 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:54.680 your environment is not a cure all, but it can 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:57.959 disrupt some some of that that routine. And that's why 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:00.320 going on a vacation is often side. It is a 0:10:00.320 --> 0:10:02.560 good example of a of a time to to try 0:10:02.600 --> 0:10:04.800 to break away from a routine. And it's also whining. 0:10:04.880 --> 0:10:08.439 Vacations are often really comforting because we're breaking away from 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:11.320 a number of routines, even if they're not necessarily you know, 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:13.439 bad for us. Maybe they're just you know, you're you're 0:10:13.440 --> 0:10:15.640 free from some of the change you weren't even aware of. 0:10:15.920 --> 0:10:18.240 It was so much easier to slow down in that 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:21.320 automated behavior, look at it and say, oh, why am 0:10:21.360 --> 0:10:23.440 I reaching for this? Why am I doing this? You're right, 0:10:23.480 --> 0:10:27.240 because you don't have those environmental triggers. Now, there is 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.880 a kind of average of days, at least in one 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:35.120 study that shows that there are certain habits that you 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:40.240 can pick up good habits. Let's say and sixty six days. Now, 0:10:40.280 --> 0:10:43.080 this is the average of days that it took participants 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:46.920 to have a behavior become automatic. This is a study 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:51.160 led by Philippa Lally and she's a psychologist at University 0:10:51.200 --> 0:10:55.480 College London. So we are talking about this length of 0:10:55.559 --> 0:10:59.319 time varying anywhere from eighteen days to two hundred and 0:10:59.400 --> 0:11:02.719 fifty four. Sixty six was just the average. And some 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:05.680 habits we're talking about, drinking a bottle of water after 0:11:05.760 --> 0:11:08.360 lunch turned out to be a lot stickier, only took 0:11:08.400 --> 0:11:10.640 fifty nine days on the average. Because that's I mean, 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:13.520 how difficult is that you're just tipping the bottle. But 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:17.920 what about doing fifty sit ups each morning? Much harder 0:11:18.000 --> 0:11:21.800 to do nine one days. So other findings were that 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:24.000 missing a single day did not reduce the chance of 0:11:24.040 --> 0:11:28.240 forming habits. That's good news. And a subgroup, it turns out, 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:30.720 took a lot longer than the others to form their habits, 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:34.559 and this suggests that some people are habit resistant. And 0:11:34.760 --> 0:11:37.400 of course other types of habits may take much longer 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:40.880 than make you know, two four days for instance, for me, 0:11:41.080 --> 0:11:43.000 the sit ups that would that would be like three 0:11:43.360 --> 0:11:45.720 sixty five days for me. So what about you? What 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:48.040 would be the easiest thing and the hardest thing? Like 0:11:48.120 --> 0:11:49.679 what would take you eighteen days? And what would take 0:11:49.679 --> 0:11:54.040 you well, I guess obviously something I enjoy doing. Um, 0:11:54.280 --> 0:11:56.560 A lot of people who who right are aware of 0:11:56.600 --> 0:11:58.839 this hundred words a day thing where the idea is 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:02.000 all right, life busy, but you really want to work 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:04.280 on you know, that novel or work on short stories, 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:06.440 to write a little poetry. So you just make sure 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:08.280 you take out time, just carve with just a sliver 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:10.880 of time to do one hundred words, just you know, 0:12:10.920 --> 0:12:12.960 open up your your word document, you know, grab a 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:15.920 notebook on words and then you can move on. So 0:12:16.080 --> 0:12:19.240 that would probably be easier for me, just because obviously 0:12:19.320 --> 0:12:22.280 the reward, the reward is also in doing it. It's 0:12:22.280 --> 0:12:24.480 something that I enjoy doing, and so that would be 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:26.120 something would be easier for me to do. And you 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:30.640 already have a huge writing muscle, yeah, exactly, so that 0:12:31.040 --> 0:12:32.480 one would be easy. Also I'll have to do is 0:12:32.520 --> 0:12:35.400 open a document or or grab a pet. But uh, 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:37.280 one of the would be much harder, and one that 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:39.160 I also would very much like to do would be, 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:41.880 you know, to do yoga on a much more regular 0:12:41.920 --> 0:12:44.960 basis these days. But for that, obviously I've got to 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:47.800 carve out a much larger piece of time, like you know, 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:50.920 at least twenty minutes ideally like an hour. I need 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:53.440 to either go to a space where I can do 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:57.480 the yoga or find a space both uh, both physical 0:12:57.480 --> 0:12:59.880 and mental in which to do it every day or 0:12:59.880 --> 0:13:02.679 a few days a week, and it becomes increasingly complex. 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:06.000 I read that if then statements help with us because 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:07.520 a lot of times we'll say we want to do this, 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:09.440 but when we find reasons not to do things, and 0:13:09.480 --> 0:13:11.800 the idea is that instead of finding those reasons not 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:15.160 to do it. You say to yourself, if it's Monday 0:13:15.240 --> 0:13:18.600 and it's noon and I have thirty minutes, I'm going 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:21.960 to go to X space and do yoga, and that 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:24.360 that becomes more of an action item in your brain 0:13:24.840 --> 0:13:27.839 as opposed to a plan. Really well, it's like a program, 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:30.439 you know, because it reminds me like the settings and 0:13:30.559 --> 0:13:32.080 email if you've ever looked at that, where you can 0:13:32.120 --> 0:13:35.920 set things like if this, then that then X. So yeah, 0:13:35.960 --> 0:13:38.640 it's like and essentially that's what we're talking about, reprogramming 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:42.679 the self to incorporate new actions or to in some 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:45.560 cases eliminate other actions or choose one action over another. 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:48.560 Of course, all of this requires self control and will power. 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:50.560 And we'll take a quick break and when we get back, 0:13:50.559 --> 0:13:53.280 we're gonna talk about this muscle of self control that 0:13:53.320 --> 0:14:03.559 we can cultivate for ourselves. Okay, we're back, and we're 0:14:03.600 --> 0:14:05.679 going to talk about the role of self control and 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:09.600 willpower because of course, you can't just have this um 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:12.240 then like moment with your brain where you slow everything 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:15.240 down and you examine how and why you're doing things. 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:18.840 You also have to have the will to change that habit. Yes, 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:21.960 and we've we've podcasted exclusively on will in some past 0:14:21.960 --> 0:14:25.400 episodes before and it's, uh, it's a fascinating topic because it's, 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:27.480 like most things in life, it's not quite what you 0:14:27.480 --> 0:14:30.760 think it is when you actually stop and examine. Willpower 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:33.680 is not a a set level. It's not like you know, 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:36.400 playing Dungeons and Dragons where you you roll the dice 0:14:36.400 --> 0:14:38.720 and you have that that set number that that you 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:42.320 may modify with some magical spells here and there. It's 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:45.320 it's something that that fluctuates throughout the day based on 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:47.280 where we are, where our attention is at, what our 0:14:47.320 --> 0:14:51.120 diet consists of, what kind of UH stimuli we're exposed to. 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:54.000 And the good news is that it is a behavior 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:56.760 and not something that's hardwired, so it can be changed. 0:14:57.280 --> 0:15:00.000 In fact, in a two thousand meta study of self control, 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:03.920 Mark Moravin and Roy F. Baumeister we've heard from him before, 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:06.320 they set out to answer the question does self control 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:09.640 resemble a muscle? And yes, they say if willpower is 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:12.760 like a muscle, and muscles can get stronger over time training, 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:16.840 will power similar can be trained and strengthened. And they 0:15:16.880 --> 0:15:20.360 found this and that meta study. In addition, Australian researchers 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:23.880 Megan Otan and Ken Chang looked at this question and 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:26.560 they took a group of people through a customized two 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:29.160 month exercise program. What do they find. Well, of course 0:15:29.160 --> 0:15:32.760 the people get stronger, um they developed more muscles, but 0:15:32.840 --> 0:15:36.800 they also found that their behaviors, their their self control, 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:42.440 their willpower changed with the addition of the actual physical muscles. Yeah, 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:45.720 this is pretty amazing, and that they threw out the example. 0:15:45.760 --> 0:15:47.520 There's like a like a pebble in a lake, there's 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:50.640 this ripple effect. You start in stelling willpower into one 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:54.320 area of your life, and it actually bleeds over into 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:58.400 other areas of your life because the overall willpower level increases. 0:15:59.000 --> 0:16:01.760 I was thinking about us in the context of the 0:16:02.080 --> 0:16:05.680 bit we found out about how a full bladder can 0:16:05.720 --> 0:16:09.400 actually help with will power at least, you know, temporarily, 0:16:09.400 --> 0:16:12.400 because if you have a full bladder, your brain is 0:16:12.440 --> 0:16:16.800 suppressing the urge to p on yourself essentially, and as 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:20.720 a result, it is suppressing everything else. So not just 0:16:20.880 --> 0:16:24.680 you over eating at the buffet, but controlling your bladder 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:27.720 and perhaps not having a cigarette at that very moment. 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:31.760 It's why drinking more water is such a no brainer 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:35.680 for for New Year's resolutions, because more water good for 0:16:35.720 --> 0:16:38.080 your body. You're mostly water anyway, right, you can you 0:16:38.080 --> 0:16:39.560 can line up all the health and if it's there, 0:16:39.600 --> 0:16:42.160 but your bladder is going to be more full more 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:45.280 of the time, thus allowing you to better suppress other 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:48.240 temptations in your life. There you go. That's a tip 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:50.720 right there. More water. All right. So let's talk about 0:16:50.760 --> 0:16:53.280 the specifics of the study. We're talking about again. A 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:56.040 two month period in which the participants hit the gym 0:16:56.080 --> 0:16:59.160 three times a week, and before, during, and after the 0:16:59.240 --> 0:17:01.840 exercise that grew group was tested on a visual task 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:06.000 that measured willpower via distraction and thought suppression. Now, after 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:08.240 two months, the air rate went down for the group 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:11.600 from tree to twelve percent, So in other words, they 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:15.280 were able to not pay attention to those distractions to 0:17:15.320 --> 0:17:19.680 be more focused, and they had that decrease in their 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:22.840 brain just sort of going willy nilly about things. Yeah. 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:24.640 And the crazy thing too, is that when I first 0:17:24.640 --> 0:17:26.760 started reading some of those thinking, all right, the other 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:28.480 areas they're going to be affecting their life. It's going 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:29.840 to be like, oh, well they ate a little more 0:17:29.840 --> 0:17:32.600 broccoli or something easy like that. But now the the 0:17:32.640 --> 0:17:35.480 improvements that they saw related to stuff like cigarette smoking, 0:17:35.520 --> 0:17:39.040 alcohol consumption, held be eating, exercise, and household chore. So 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:42.560 I mean the fact that cigarettes and alcohol were also 0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:45.600 affected things that you often think. I was having their 0:17:45.640 --> 0:17:49.159 talents a little deeper into the psyche um to see 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.160 to see those areas affected as well by this ripple 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:55.360 effect is really encouraged. Yeah, and the behavior was all 0:17:55.359 --> 0:17:57.600 over the place. It might be that someone missed appointments 0:17:57.640 --> 0:17:59.920 a lot, in which case they found that a purse 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:02.480 and went from missing an appointment every day to like 0:18:02.600 --> 0:18:04.800 once a week, or in the case of the cigarettes, 0:18:05.240 --> 0:18:07.760 down from fourteen cigarettes a day to just three. That 0:18:08.000 --> 0:18:11.320 is amazing. Yeah. Alright, So coming back to the old 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:13.520 idea that we talked about at the beginning of the episode, 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:16.960 the idea that I apply X amount of time towards something, 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:20.040 towards a new skill, a new discipline, a new subject. 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:23.160 I can become an expert. I can make this my own, 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:27.680 I can own this content. So yes and no. Alright, 0:18:27.720 --> 0:18:30.359 Because if you think about someone being a master of 0:18:30.400 --> 0:18:33.879 their universe, you typically think of like then Franklin or 0:18:33.960 --> 0:18:37.120 Leonardo Adventure. These are people who were true polymus who 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:41.879 could attack new topics, consume them and by habit they 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:45.200 could do this right now. Some people would say that 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:47.320 that was the hundreds of the world was much smaller. 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:51.200 There are fewer tones to go through and become an expert. 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:53.439 Now we have so much more knowledge, so it's a 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:56.320 lot more difficult, and you could say that in some 0:18:56.400 --> 0:18:59.840 senses are our willpower, our ability to really concentrate has 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:04.160 been deluded by all of this knowledge. But it remains 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:08.160 that if you do something, namely repetition, that you can 0:19:08.240 --> 0:19:11.840 still learn new things, and you may even become an 0:19:11.840 --> 0:19:14.919 expert on you know that ten thousand hours that Malcolm 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:17.600 Cloud will always talked about. That's a possibility in there too. 0:19:17.960 --> 0:19:20.000 But if you just want to sort of pick up 0:19:20.040 --> 0:19:24.160 guitar or you know, stop smoking, drinking, all of these 0:19:24.200 --> 0:19:27.960 things are available to you. You just need to document 0:19:28.040 --> 0:19:33.680 it and uh repeat wash repeat, yeah, making making a 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:36.639 pattern of it, regularly consuming it. Be at a hundred 0:19:36.680 --> 0:19:39.800 words a day, be a guitar lessons, or be it. Hey, 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:41.600 here's a good one. You can listen to a new 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:44.000 episode of stuff to blow your mind every day for 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:46.920 a year. I think we have enough now, oh dear, yeah, yeah, 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:48.760 And you have to document it. This is the important part, 0:19:49.480 --> 0:19:53.080 and this is where we bring up Karen x Chang. Okay, 0:19:53.160 --> 0:19:55.280 she is kind of then, I think the best example 0:19:55.320 --> 0:19:59.119 of this kind of muscle flexing of self control. Now, 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:02.399 she not only was a program manager of Microsoft Excel. 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:04.480 At the same time that she was doing this full 0:20:04.520 --> 0:20:06.360 time job, she decided, oh, hey, I think I want 0:20:06.359 --> 0:20:09.440