About willpower

What is a willpower

A lot of things were said about willpower in the past but topic wasn't explained really well. If our real Self is our Will, then the endurance of this Will is what willpower stands for. It's like a muscle strength for the muscle or a bullet for the gun.

Why is willpower important for Magicians

Willpower is a measure of affecting the world. Magician without willpower is like an artist without his tools or a musician without his equipment. Magician with stronger Will wins, same as a bodybuilder with stronger body can lift up more weight.

Willpower in history

You should have already heard some story of old shamans, going without food for months, keeping their bodies in cold water for days or even wounding their bodies in states of trance before doing their rites.
Reason is simple, willpower.
By specifying a task that is hard to achieve, and by achieving that task, you train your willpower, strength of your Will.

How to train your willpower

In modern society, we don't have time to go to wilderness for 40 days, we have to feed our families and ourselves, we have to pay taxes.
Fortunately, when you know that reason for being in cold water for a number of days is not about being in cold water for a number of days, but real reason is to do a difficult task, no matter what the task is, you can easily come up with your own training.

Do you smoke? Are you a chain smoker? Can you be without smoking for one day? That's very hard, but not impossible. But beware, make a task a difficult, but not impossible to maintain, if you fail, your willpower will go down, rapidly.

30 minutes rule

This is my favorite training method. Good old Czech Magick :).

1. Are you hungry? Wait 30 minutes before eating
2. Are you thirsty? Drink in 30 minutes
3. Are you tired and you want to go to sleep? Go for a 30 minutes long walk. During the walk you can remember all your good friends and old enemies and send positive thoughts in their directions.

Simple training way for very busy people

First of all, this is not a very effective way, it does have a minor benefits but compared to the 30 minutes rule or oppressing your habit for days, it is nothing.
Point is to simply specify what you are going to do before you do it.

Example:
I am going to brush my teeth in sake of increasing my willpower
And after brushing:
I have finished my task for increasing my willpower

I know it sounds retarded, but it works.