How to Have More Mind Control

Who’s in charge of deciding what your brain thinks about? Many factors are involved, but you have more control than you might think.

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Everyone has some degree of self-control that affects their beliefs, desires, thoughts, goals, plans, and feelings. Humans are unique in their capacity for self-control, which is generally assumed to arise from the relatively large frontal cortex in the brain. The neocortex even has a series of linked circuits that constitute an executive control system. Lack of self-control underlies many social and mental health problems. Failing at self-regulation can lead to obesity, addiction, poverty, sexual promiscuity, and other ill-advised behaviors. On the other hand, people with superior self-control are more likely to be "healthy, wealthy, and wise."

How do we learn such control? I identify three factors here:

1. Motivation

We are motivated by the brain's positive reinforcement mechanisms and our mental ability to adjust the set point for the level of reinforcement that satisfies us. Like a heater thermostat, if the setting is low, it doesn't take much heat to meet the demand. If the setting is high, we need more heat and for longer periods. How does one adjust the personal hedonistic set point?

One way to increase self-control is to have many alternative positive reinforcers that allow one to substitute "good" reinforcers for bad ones. Another way is to structure goals consciously so that achievement requires "good" reinforcers. You can seek the company of fellow beings who wish to share those same values and guidelines. Incentives matter.

2. Mental Fatigue

Resisting temptation can be hard work. In secular life, we get refreshment from taking a vacation. Taking a vacation from resisting temptation is hardly the righteous choice. What then, do we do to refresh the self-control required for resisting temptation?

Capacity for self-control is apparently a "limited resource" that can be depleted. Replenishment takes time in which there are fewer demands. Maybe this is one advantage of vacations or retreats. Escape from tempting situations is akin to taking a vacation.

Our own negative thoughts wear us out. Distressing thoughts make it all too easy to obsess to the point of emotional exhaustion. Think of all the times you have lost sleep over something that troubles you. When awake, such obsession diminishes our productivity. How do we inhibit such obsessive thought? Mental discipline is required. There are ways to train the brain to be more disciplined at screening out intrusive thoughts. One method, strangely enough, involves working-memory training tasks; these train the brain to focus and screen out distracting thoughts. [1] Habitual intense prayer or meditation may do the same thing.

3. Age

Young people usually have less self-control than adults. Educators assert that self-control in preschool-aged children is more associated with school success than is IQ. [2] Brain dysfunctions that alter self-control will increase impulsivity and often lead to anti-social and even violent behavior. Brain scans show that impulsive people have an abnormally small hippocampus and prefrontal cortex. [3] We don’t know if they were born that way or got that way by a lifetime of indulging their impulses.

Executive control capability may decline in the elderly, who may become less able to take care of their needs and control their life. A study of seniors (average age of 75) revealed a tendency for the elderly to withdraw from social interactions, along with an associated tendency to become depressed. [4] Stress, which may well have a cumulative effect over the years, is compounded by the current stresses of old age. The adrenal-pituitary stress axis may be more active, resulting in high blood pressure from adrenalin release and shriveling of neural synapses from excessive cortisol release.

Biochemical markers of inflammation increase with age. The cumulative stresses of a lifetime can cause increased anxiety, confusion, further stress, and depression. Thus, a vicious cycle of mental deterioration may ensue. In such a state, executive control fails, and the person may become helpless and dependent.