Willpower: Rediscovering Our Greatest Strength

Roy F. Baumeister · John Tierney

oct 2011 · Penguin UK

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Can you resist everything except temptation? In a hedonistic age full of distractions, it's hard to possess willpower - or in fact even understand why we should need it. Yet it's actually the most important factor in achieving success and a happy life, shown to be more significant than money, looks, background or intelligence. This book reveals the secrets of self-control.

For years the old-fashioned, even Victorian, value of willpower has been disparaged by psychologists who argued that we're largely driven by unconscious forces beyond our control. Here Roy Baumeister, one of the world's most esteemed and influential psychologists, and journalist John Tierney, turn this notion on its head. They show us that willpower is like a muscle that can be strengthened with practice and improved over time. The latest laboratory work shows that self-control has a physical basis to it and so is dramatically affected by simple things such as eating and sleeping - to the extent that a life-changing decision may go in different directions depending on whether it's made before or after lunch. You will discover how babies can be taught willpower, the joys of the to-don't list, the success of Alcoholics Anonymous, the pointlessness of diets and the secrets to David Blaine's stunts. There are also fascinating personal stories, from explorers, students, soldiers, ex-addicts and parents.

Based on years of psychological research and filled with practical advice, this book will teach you how to gain from self-control without pain, and discover the very real power in willpower. The results are nothing short of life-changing.

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Roy F Baumeister is one of the world's most prolific and influential psychologists. He received his PhD from Princeton in 1978 and currently is Francis Eppes Eminent Scholar and head of the psychology program at Florida State University. He has over 450 scientific publications, and this will be his 28th book.

John Tierney writes the Findings science column for the New York Times. His science writing has won awards from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Institute of Physics. He is the author of The Best-Case Scenario Handbook and the co-author, with Christopher Buckley, of the comic novel God Is My Broker. He is a frequent guest on US radio and television.