We have already learned about the importance of will power not only to achieve difficult targets and feats in life but also in everyday life. Apart from the higher practices of yoga, pranayama, dhyana etc which automatically increase your will power if done in the right manner, there are few techniques which are very simple and you can try these too. Let us find out about few of these experiments

We will be dedicating a separate post on the details about the manner in which will power actually manifests itself and how the Universal or Divine Will just creates the entire universe and how connecting to that will can be extremely helpful in our lives.

Experiment 1

You think you want to control your mind but even your body is not in your control. You better begin by trying this simple thing. Find a time when you are free and nobody will disturb you. It is better if you have a separate room or place which you can lock yourself in.

Goto the room and remove all clothes and just lie down on the bed and be still. Try to be as calm as possible and slowly suggest in your mind to all your body parts starting from bottom to top to calm down and they should get into a total tranquil state.

Then just try to feel as if they are actually obeying your command and you are falling sleep. Over time if you practice this correctly you should be able to goto sleep in a few minutes and later even in matter of seconds.

Willpower Development

This just shows that finally your body is becoming “yours” in that it pays heed to what you want it to do. Congrats and let us move on to the next experiment

Note: people ask what is the concept of lying down naked and this could be done with clothes on. Well it is just another step to add bit of difficulty in this experiment as normally we relate lying down naked with lust and preparation for sexual activity, but this way you will learn to rise above these because if the mind remains stuck on this plane, you cannot progress. Remember that although sex is not bad, yet Brahamcharya has immense benefits. Brahamacharya does NOT mean abstaining from sex but basically its means only doing the activity at the right time and for the right purpose. You can learn about the benefits of celibacy at this post.

Experiment 2

Try to break the habit of the mind and for this choose a habit which is binding you. Just remember that there are good habits and bad habits in the worldly sense but from the Spiritual perspective all habits are “bad” in the sense that they give automatic behaviour to mind which is supposed to be free. Of course I do not mean to say that good habits should not be followed, it only means that you should have power to change habits at will too.

Do not start with a strong habit immediately as that might be too hard, but try a habit which is less strong. Just for example if you are in the habit of drinking whisky (over the limit) and you are also in the habit of smoking one cigarette in a week. If you want to get rid of these, try with the second habit first.

Just make a poster or posters which you put at places where you spend your time like say your office room, bed room etc. The poster should reflect your determination that you will not do that thing irrespective of the feeling or urge you have. You might seem helpless or weak at times but just keep  your determination strong and when you have managed not to do that thing for a sufficient period of time, its desire will also get lesser.

Then you can do this on your other habit and later on your determination will become stronger as you continue to do it.

Experiment 3

Start to do timed works in which you give yourself a timeframe to do some particular piece of work. Let us say for example you keep a short poem in front of you (not too short though) and commit to yourself that you will learn it by heart or memorize it within 15 minutes. Then actually try to memorize it in that time frame and when you are able to do that, start doing with different poems of more length.

Similarly you can increase the difficulty level and do the same task in noisy surroundings like in a public place or when some loud music or noise is going on in the background. Slowly and steadily this will improve your concentration and you will be able to focus your mind only on the thing you want.

Variations

There can be lot of variations in the above experiments like for example instead of learning lines of a poem you could do things like running so many meters in so many minutes, cycling so many kilometers in so many hours and so forth. Basically the purpose is not as much as to actually perform the task but to discipline the will to fulfill itself in smaller ways before it can be increased to higher levels.

You can compare it to doing exercise or dumbbells to build your muscles and you need to start with smaller weights before going for higher ones. It is likely that one has to face many difficulties and obstacles doing a task within a fixed time schedule. Whatever be the difficulties he must not give up.