Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness Podcast

Self-control the ability resolve a conflict between two competing desires

is frequently touted as the golden key to success. But many of the most popular

ideas about self-control are actually at odds with how it really operates.

Here to impact some of the lesser understood and counterintuitive ideas around discipline and

willpower is Michael Enzlich.

Professor of Psychology who has studied the nature's self-regulation in depth. In the first part of a

conversation Michael impacts the popular ego depletion model of willpower and how it

hasn't held up to scientific scrutiny. We then turn to the surprising fact that the people who seem to exhibit a lot of self-control

don't actually exercise a lot of discipline and restraint in their lives, that the achievement of

goals is more a function of having virtuous desires and what contributes to having those desires.

After shows over check at our show notes at Awim.IS slash control. All right Michael Inzelik, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me on.

So you are a professor of psychology. Michael Inslyke, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me on.

So you are a professor of psychology

and you've done a lot of research on self-regulation

and self-control.

And a lot of your research has provided some counterintuitive insights about how we can get better at achieving our goals in life.

So in a paper you wrote with some colleagues you kind of went through the various

models to explain how people go about in self-regulating and going about achieving

their goals in life whether that's saving money, losing weight, being a better

father, being a better professor. The best known model I think people are likely familiar

with is the resource model of self-control.

...