Welcome back. This is episode 37 of the savvy psychologist. I'm Dr.

Ellen Hendrickson. I'll help you meet life's challenges with evidence-based

research, a sympathetic ear, and zero judgment.

We'll use the best of psychology to help you be happy, healthy, and most importantly, yourself.

Now whether you call it willpower, discipline, or self-control, squashing your own impulses,

particularly in the face of tempting diversions, is really hard to do.

It's also something I could stand to work on.

Perseverance, I have in spades. When I make up my mind to get something done, it will get done. But along

the way, I often find myself either standing in front of the open fridge or realizing

too late that I've lost half an hour of my life to YouTube again.

Other noble tasks that strain our self-control.

So according to comments from savvy listeners on Facebook or by email,

our self-control fails include keeping up with housework,

getting to bed at a decent hour, resisting that impulse by being nice to

difficult people, getting out the door on time and staying clean, sober or smoke-free.

So self-control is different from grit, which we covered on the podcast a few weeks ago.

Both self-control and grit fall under the umbrella trait of conscientiousness, but there's a distinct difference.

So grit is the ability to pursue long-term goals over years, whereas self-control is the ability to resist temptation in the moment.

And self-control is definitely a self-improvement project worth working on.

Research shows us that kids with greater self-control make more

friends, get higher grades, are protected against unhealthy weight gain and smoke and

binge drink less. Over time a kid to self-control emerges as more important than intelligence or how much money his family has.

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