Strong-willed qualities help a person succeed in life.
Thanks to the developed will power, you can achieve important goals, get rid of bad habits and form useful ones.
We will tell you what will power is, what personal qualities it includes in itself how to develop it.
Basic concepts
Personal qualities - what it is? This is a set of those qualities that are necessary to achieve the goals.
Some of the most famous: dedication, perseverance, discipline, strategic.
These qualities are based on willpower - a special state, the habit of the psyche. Willpower can be trained, successfully realizing the conceived goals, motivations, desires.
The will sphere of the personality consists of two parameters: willpower and fortitude of will.
Willpower - the ability to mobilize the body and psyche for the realization of goals. If a person is ready not to retreat for a long time, regularly strive for success - his will is developed.
If a person leaves the case halfway, does not finish it to the end or lowers his hands after the first or second failure, there is a problem with willpower.
Fortitude will - ability to keep the degree of volitional effort. It means to keep the will for a long time. To gather strength for the day - anyone can. Break months and years - not everyone.
In athletics, there are two types of runners: a sprinter (fast run for short distances) and a stayer (long-distance run, endurance). Persistence of will is just about the stayers.
Classification
Volitional qualities are divided into two main types: primary (extraordinary volitional qualities) and systemic (moral qualities).
The latter are based on the first ones: systemic ones are formed and developed on the basis of primary ones. Further we will tell about these two types.
Primary
Consider the basic primary qualities and give them a brief description:
- Energy. Charging with positive emotions on activities. The ability to adjust themselves to activity. When a person speaks of “lack of motivation,” he often has poorly developed willpower — and in particular, energy. If a given quality is developed well, a person is capable of mobilizing internal resources with a simple mental effort - into energy to achieve the goal.
It is important to distinguish vigor (as a parameter of willpower) from the overall vigor of a person, which depends on heredity and genetics (such as temperament).
- Patience. The polar property of the previous one. If energy is aimed at quick, decisive actions, then patience is the ability to go a long way towards the goal, the ability to wait and remain calm in the absence of visible results. The ability to wait, but not wait - do not confuse patience with passivity.
- Self-control. An important ability to maintain a cold mind in changing circumstances. When things are not going according to plan, a person is persistent in achieving his goal, his emotional background is stable. That is, emotions and attitudes do not fluctuate: not in the direction of aggression, not in the direction of panic, not in the direction of reflection / apathy (when the “hands fall”). Self-control is expressed in the ability to throw feelings into the background and continue to act.
- Courage. By courage is the process of overcoming rational fears. On the way to the goal, a person can expect trouble: a threat to life and damage to social status (condemnation, misunderstanding). Courage is the ability to meet and overcome fear. This is a conscious, mental process.
It should not be confused with folly, when a person risks his life or position without any rational reason.
Systemic
We now turn to systemic qualities based on primary ones. In a person who constantly pumps strength of will, the qualities described below constitute the foundation of character (these qualities often describe a person, give him a characteristic):
- Purposefulness. There are two types. Private commitment is perseverance in achieving the goal, despite the obstacles and failures. Common purposefulness is a property of the personality when a person outlines tasks and successfully solves them in life, in general.
- Perseverance. Manifested in a long unwavering attitude towards the goal. Without this quality, a person will give up immediately after the first attempt. An insistent person is capable of not abandoning a task for a very long time, working on it for months or even years. No obstacles in the way can influence his decision to come to the result.
- Principle. Means compliance with their principles, beliefs, worldview as a whole. This also includes upholding his point of view, if a person is absolutely sure of the objectivity of his arguments.
Principle is a discipline in the field of loyalty to their convictions and words.
- Initiative. Ability to offer non-standard solutions. The focus of man on the transformation of the surrounding world. Quality, the opposite of passivity, laziness. Initiative is not only a characteristic of the will, but also a quality inherent in the behavior of a leader.
- Determination. The essence of the property is in operational decision making. When a problem arises (or a goal is set), a person possessing this quality remains assembled and immediately looks for ways to solve the problem. Not to be confused with impulsiveness.
The difference is that an impulsive person is spontaneous, he is guided by emotions, instincts and momentary desires, when a determined person is guided by reason and logic. Decisiveness is not so much haste or speed as the speed of the transition from decision-making to action (they are said to be “a man of action”). - Strategy (sequence). The quality by which a person sees the ultimate goal, the result of their activities. And because each step compares with the intended result. This also includes the ability to prioritize and not only draw up a plan, but also adapt it to changing conditions and force majeure.
- Self sufficiency (independence). An important quality by which a person carefully filters the goals. He does not allow himself to impose other people's desires on himself, he looks at the world around him in accordance with his convictions, principles based on personal experience. Also, autonomy is the ability to act without the help of others, to work autonomously.
The difference is that an impulsive person is spontaneous, he is guided by emotions, instincts and momentary desires, when a determined person is guided by reason and logic. Decisiveness is not so much haste or speed as the speed of the transition from decision-making to action (they are said to be “a man of action”).Formation brief
Will is formed and developed in the process of human life.
The willful qualities are laid in childhood, and their further progress largely depends on how the child treats the obstacles and how he copes with them.
In early childhood, the child is largely guided. survival instincts. The main role in his behavior is played by the need for food, safety (which parents must provide).
After 4 years, the child is able to make more informed decisions, since his behavior is now controlled not only instincts, but also education.
At this age, moral qualities also develop.
If a child tries to actively overcome obstaclesHe achieves even small goals, but the higher the likelihood that, as an adult, he will show willpower.
About how to strengthen the will and discipline, we will describe in detail in the section on the development of volitional personality traits.
Research methodology volitional organization
To analyze the level of development of your will, you can take the test N.Е. Istanbul. A test participant can evaluate each quality of will (such as self-control, initiative, perseverance, etc.).
The test asks questions that can be answered “no”, “yes”, and also with a more blurred degree of confidence: “rather yes”, “maybe”, etc. Each will quality is given to 20 questions. To find Istanbul's test can be in the vast web.
Development
The first steps to strengthen the will occur in childhood. Parenting plays a huge role parents.
If they do their best to please the child, he grows passive, stubborn, capricious.
It is dangerous because, after entering adulthood, a person will expect similar behavior from others (the syndrome "everyone should be with me").
Accordingly, if the parents make serious demands on the child (serious but not despotic / totalitarian), then from an early age he learns to achieve goals. One of the most effective ways to develop willpower in a child is define it in a circle / section.
Moreover, he should choose, no need to impose any hobby, because the opposite reaction will follow. When a baby understands what he likes to do, what his talents are realized in, it is important to monitor progress.
For example, a child likes to draw. So such a factor as dedication is already present. The second factor - discipline, a sufficient degree of perseverance - should be formed.
Parents can give the child daily drawing tasks, celebrate the growth of his skills, praise according to his success, and reward him for productive work.
You can develop the will and in adulthood. But it is much more difficult to do it yourself, if in childhood the habit of self-discipline was not developed. Nevertheless, the technique is:
- Decide on a tool. The tool in this context is the place of application of forces. Field of activity: craft, hobby, profession, in which a person will solve problems (achieve goals). This can be both work and personal development (gym, reading, cooking). The main thing is to enjoy the lesson itself. The best option is to study a completely new field, the experience in which is zero. So it will be better seen growth.
- Set small tasks. We give a vivid example: a man comes to the gym. And takes up a 200 kg barbell. Naturally, the bar is not given, resists as they can. An example is clear, with physical objects. But when the same person is taken to draw no worse than Michelangelo, he forgets about this example. "The level of drawing by Michelangelo", "the level of programming of Bill Gates" - the same rod.
What is the risk of taking on challenging tasks? There is a risk that a person, and especially one whose will is poorly developed, will abandon the initiative.
For it will not work to draw a masterpiece, the first time holding a pencil. Therefore, it is necessary to set small tasks that can be solved.
- The transition from simple to complex. When you confidently lift the barbell at 10 kilograms - time to increase weight. Since there is a danger to remain at the same level. Here, as in the game - they learned to complete quests of the first level, time to pass to the second.
- Success record and failure analysis. The one who is just starting to develop the will, usually has a problem with motivation. One of the additional sources of motivation is the list of achievements. Therefore, any success should be recorded on paper. In a stressful situation, such a list will help not to give up and continue to move towards the goal. Failures also need to fix - but in a different way. The task is to make work on the mistakes, to understand why the failure occurred. In the future, the experience will not allow to blunder a second time. It is important to make out the situation - and forget about it as such, since self-flagellation, constant reflection only harm and distract from the goal.
Willpower is not a static property of the individual. If it is not developed, degradation will occur, leading to passivity, laziness, and depression.
It is possible to improve the strength of will at any age, but the sooner this is done, the better. Anyway, everyone can become an ace in achieving goals!
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