Willpower and me. Ways round my rule breaking habits.

I spend an awful lot of time coming up with ‘sensible’ ways to reward myself, my children and the family in general for the mundane nature of life these days. This is mainly because I have an awful lot of NOT SENSIBLE ways of rewarding that I really need to break as habits.

• I let myself have the odd bundle of diamonds on Hay Day for being a good girl and doing all my work – while conveniently forgetting I’m robbing my own real life farm savings pot while I play.
• I use up 3 balls of yarn and buy another 3 to finish the project but pretend I’m not actually buying more yarn at all because if I have to finish something I need it. This means the money I spend doesn’t count.
• I’ve stopped running because I ‘don”t have time’ and I make myself feel better about this by having a quick snooze’.
• I eat chocolate to make myself feel better about getting fatter. (Sigh).

I am, of course, much better at telling people (by which I mean the girls) how to live than living that way myself.

• Don’t play in app purchase games, play Animal Crossing.
• Find something to use instead of buying more and make it a design feature.
• Get off your bum and go for a run.
• Have a drink and a piece of fruit first and then have chocolate if you really need it.

Willpower can be a problem. I’m a natural good girl but a shocking ‘minor rule’ breaker and if someone sets me a rule, I have a tendency to break it for the sheer hell of it. So I have to set my own goals and rules and stick to them rigidly; once I’m off the plan, I’m off it like a ten tonne barrel rolling down a mountain.

So….

• I’m excellent at staying on a diet, but dreadful once I have a day off. Effectively, it’s over.
• I’m great at not buying yarn right up until I do. Then… buy more storage. Quickly.
• If I have a round number in a bank account, I keep it there. Use some, it all goes.
• Following a list? Brilliant. Miss a deadline? Disaster.
• Don’t know where to start? I just DON’T START.

I made the mistake recently of allowing Amelie to try to save up for a holiday by doing a certain number of jobs per month; she was brilliant for a few week and then collapsed and has had to be nagged ever since. It’s not arduous, vacuuming the house once a week and reading 3 books a month but MAN, is she lacking in willpower 🙁 She’s the same (like I am) in so many ways. Unless her room is perfect, it is a total mess. Unless she starts reading on the first of the month, she doesn’t start at all till the 22nd. Unless she is doing really well at gym with a goal to hit, she has to be dragged there. No amount of carrot or stick seems to work particularly well for either of us.

So, rather tongue in cheek, I’m considering a programme of reverse psychology on myself. I’m not entirely sure how well it will work, since I can only see it working if at least 50% of me has no idea what is going on, but it has to be worth a try. (And I’m usually so tired, that seems potentially achievable!)

My new to do list is going to be something like as follows (I take no responsibility for anyone following my advice):-

• Buy chocolate and eat it as soon as I’ve been for a run. I will get fitter, I shouldn’t get fatter.
• Stop playing app games but have a go at something like bingo sites with free sign up bonus; small advantage, I might even win something.
• Put my money into something I can’t take it out of without a fight with an admin centre far, far away but put a tiny amount each month into a reward pot and use it to….
• Buy yarn. Because I really can’t think of a way of curing myself of that particular problem. I’ve tried. I failed. C’est la vie.

Piece of cake.

Actually, yes; cake anyone?

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