This is Odin, also known as the All-father. He will become the wisest and most powerful
of the Norse gods, but not yet. For now, he hangs from Yggdrasil, the world
tree that holds all nine worlds together, with a spear lodged in his chest. He will hang there for nine days, and nine
nights, on the border between life and death. All the while, he peers down into the magical
waters of the well below, calling out for the godly knowledge of the runes. Satisfied with his sacrifice, they emerge,
revealing to him their wisdom and bestowing him with great power. Odin had given himself to himself. Or, more specifically, he sacrificed his present-self
for his future-self. It's no coincidence that he had to perform
the greatest sacrifice for the greatest reward. This story is, at the least, a metaphor for
self-sacrifice or self-discipline. And, it's one that we have been telling for
generations.

Humanity has held the virtue of self-control
in such high regards that it's a staple in most religions, and the moral of many myths. In Christianity, the first sin - eating the
forbidden fruit - was a lapse in self-control. In Greek mythology, evil entered the world
when Pandora could not control her curiosity and opened the box. This myth, in particular, has even entered
our everyday language. If I want you to avoid a temptation, for fear
of causing disastrous consequences, I might warn you against opening Pandora's box. The elevation of this virtue to religious
and mythic proportions highlights a commonly held belief: self-discipline plays a huge
role in leading you to your best future, as in the case of Odin, or your worst one, as
with Pandora. If this is true, it seems like it would be
great if we could all have some more self-discipline. But, what is self-discipline? People often use the term to describe someone
who makes good long-term decisions by overcoming

short-term temptations, and that's reasonable. But when you ask them how they overcome these
short-term temptations, they often invoke some sort of *will* or *willpower*. What *will* actually means isn't really obvious. But before we get to that, let's start at
the beginning: the decision. At any point in time, you're making a decision
on how to act. The difficulty arises when you have to make
a decision between what's immediately gratifying versus what is not gratifying now, but will
be in the future. In other words, the difficulty lies in delaying
gratification. But what causes you to not act impulsively? The reason for any single decision you make
is multivariate: genes, hormones, evolution, social environment, physical environment,
past experience, context of the situation, and a multitude of other factors all play
a role. But the most immediate cause of any of your
actions can be traced back to your brain activity.

When discussing self-discipline, one of the best places to start is with the neurotransmitter dopamine. In his book *Behave*, Robert Sapolsky puts forth an example that clarifies at least one of the primary roles of dopamine in our brains. Let's say that I take a monkey and stick him in a cage. Now, I put a lever in there that, if he pushes it 10 times, rewards him with a raisin. Next, I turn on a light that comes on before the lever enters the cage. In other words, the light signals that the lever will be entering the cage, which, in turn, signals that the monkey will be able to get a raisin. As a result, the monkey learns to associate the cue (a light) with the reward (a raisin). Interestingly, the monkey will begin to release more dopamine in response to the light than he does when consuming his reward. Contrary to popular belief, *dopamine is about anticipation more than it is about reward.

Certain cues in our environment hint at a potential reward, and dopamine starts to rise in anticipation. Dopamine is what gets us to take action with respect to a goal. So, how does this relate to self-discipline? Let's say that you're deciding between an immediate reward and a delayed reward. When you think about the immediate reward, dopamine is sent to certain parts of the brain known as limbic targets. When you think of the delayed reward, dopamine is sent to a different part of the brain known as frontocortical targets. If the part of the brain associated with delayed reward is more stimulated, you're more likely to delay gratification. Again, dopamine plays a role in driving our action. So, how does your brain decide how much dopamine is sent to each part? Again, this comes down to several complex factors such as past experiences, genes, hormones.

social environment, physical environment,
the context of the situation, and so on. But, pragmatically, the brain's decision is
affected by how pleasurable the reward is and how much time it takes to get that reward
[8]. Here's an example to help you understand it
intuitively. Let's say that I make you an offer: you can
have $100 today or $100 tomorrow. The reward is the same, but the time delay
is greater in the second scenario. You'll probably take the $100 today because
there's no point in waiting until tomorrow. But, what if I said that you could get $100
today or $200 tomorrow? It's more likely that you'll be willing to
wait if an extra $100 is pleasurable enough. But, what if I said that if you wait until
tomorrow, you could get $101. You'll probably revert back to taking the
$100 today. Your brain does multiple calculations like
this every time you decide.

It creates a sense of wanting or reward-seeking
based on the speed and size of a reward. So, how do you end up determining what rewards
to seek? To live life is to have desires. The world fills you up with needs and wants,
inviting you to come and interact with it. Every time you satisfy a desire, you receive
an internal reward, and a belief forms about how you did it. When that desire re-emerges, your brain activates
the corresponding belief circuitry, and dopamine releases in anticipation of the reward, which
motivates you to repeat the same action as before. In other words, you begin to form a habit. With each repetition, the neural pathway strengthens,
and you solidify the habit's role as the solution to your desire. Here's the punchline: habits mediate the relationship
between an individual’s desires and their environment. To change the habit, the individual, the environment,
or both have to change, and that's why self-discipline

is so hard. We have little control over the biology that
determines our desires. According to Sapolsky, individuals with ADHD
have abnormal dopamine responses when thinking about immediate rewards vs. delayed ones: they're
biased towards impulsive action [8]. Individuals who experience childhood adversity
are more likely to have an underdeveloped frontal cortex, making delayed gratification
more difficult [8]. Eventually, we may be able to change an individual's
biology using science, but the morality and long-term consequences of this are questionable. There is a part of our biology that *is* more
malleable: the brain. An individual can be changed with education. As people learn more about the world, they
can test out new beliefs and reinforce new behaviors. But this leads me to the heart of the issue. Self-discipline is much more of an environmental
problem than it is an individual one. While an individual can change their beliefs
and behaviors through education, the resources

available for education are presented by the
environment. Furthermore, the habits an individual builds
to meet their desires are, in large part, a product of what's available in the environment. A study done by neuroscientist Carl Hart found
that when meth addicts were given a choice between $5 and 50mg of meth, the addicts took
the $5 half of the time [11]. When he increased the value of the cash reward
to $20, they almost never took the drug [11]. He found similar results with crack cocaine
addicts [11]. Hart suggests that addicts are actually rational
decision makers, and will choose not to take a drug when there are alternative reinforcers
[11]. It seems that drug habits are more likely
to be formed when individuals are in an environment that offers no alternative or competing ways
to meet their desires. Bruce Alexander found similar results when
he conducted his now-famous study: *Rat Park*

[12]. Prior to Alexander's study, it was commonly
believed that addiction was caused primarily by drugs. When you take a drug, you get addicted. That's how the story went. But, Alexander noticed that most drug-related
studies occurring at the time placed rats in isolation. He wondered if this played a role in the rats
deciding to take the drug. It turns out that it did [12]. When rats were in isolation, it wouldn't be
a surprise to see them consume a drug until they died. But, when Alexander constructed a Rat Park
complete with friends, sexual partners, toys, and so on, rats were much less likely to take
the drugs. Both of these studies present an interesting
idea: addiction is much less likely to occur when you have greater access to alternative
ways to meet your own desires. In his *Meditations,* Marcus Aurelius said
that, We were born to work together like feet, hands
and eyes, like the two rows of teeth, upper

and lower. To obstruct each other is unnatural. To feel anger at someone, to turn your back
on him: these are unnatural. People are a product of their environments
a lot more than we like to think. By acknowledging this, we can have more compassion
for one another, but more importantly, we can begin helping one another. By providing people with as many opportunities
as possible for learning and alternative ways to meet their needs, we can eradicate the
problem of self-discipline.

Why Self-Discipline is so Hard

Why Self-Discipline is so Hard

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