Do hard things on purpose: training willpower like a muscle

The Short Version

Willpower is not a fixed trait you either have or lack. Four conversations point to the same conclusion: it is a capacity you build by choosing, on purpose, to do things you would rather avoid. David Goggins describes decades of daily fights with the voice that wants comfort [1]. Andrew Huberman points to a brain region, the anterior mid-cingulate cortex, that grows when people do hard things they don't want to do and shrinks when they stop [1][2]. Warren Buffett paid for a public-speaking course because speaking terrified him [3], and Sarah Jakes Roberts, in Mel Robbins' roundup, recommends "baby dares" that slowly build momentum [4]. The key is the friction: effort you enjoy doesn't count, and the gains fade unless you keep choosing discomfort [1][2].

Table of contents

What They Said

David Goggins: "Everything I've ever done in my life I didn't want to do"

Goggins is the most extreme voice here and the one who has lived the idea longest. In his conversation with Huberman he skips the highlight reel and describes the inner dialogue he says he still has to fight every day [1]. Huberman's introduction sets out where he started: a home that was abusive, a school environment that was abusive, and by his 20s he was "more than 300 pounds working a job he despised for minimal pay" [1]. In third grade his school's answer to his attention problems was to put him in a special school. He refused to be treated differently, never took medication, and taught himself to focus [1].

His main claim is that willpower is built, not given. He rejects the idea that he was simply "blessed with a strong mind" and says it came from decades of going back into the suffering [1]. His summary of the method is blunt: "Do it and do it and do it and do it. That's the hack." [1] He dismisses life hacks, catchphrases about getting out of bed, and the self-help talk of passion and motivation. Instead he describes the real argument everyone has in their head each morning, and says you have to fight it because there is no override button [1]. His most striking line: "Everything I've ever done in my life I didn't want to do." [1]

He is honest that none of this comes easily: "For me to be where I'm at today, it takes every bit of me." [1] He says people with learning problems often do not want "to go through the process of focus, of teaching yourself how to truly focus," though he admits some disabilities truly cannot be overcome [1]. His study habits show what that process looks like at 49, as he trains to become an advanced EMT and paramedic. He writes everything by hand, over and over, until the page is burned into his memory. He studies about four hours a day, even for exams he has already passed, and he wakes at two in the morning to check that he remembered a drug correctly [1].

All stick, no carrot. Huberman sums up Goggins's approach as all stick and no carrot, and Goggins agrees: "It's all stick." "There's never been a carrot." [1] What drives him is being haunted by who he was: the kid who couldn't read at 16 or 17, lied so people would like him, and played the clown because it was easier than facing a book [1]. He says the change is never permanent. If he switches it off, he goes right back to the old David Goggins. Even in a hard exam a voice tells him he is still the 300-pound kid, and he has to outwork it [1].

Confidence from unseen work. Goggins calls confidence the building block of everything and says it comes from "unseen work" [1]. He trained almost entirely alone, with nobody patting him on the back, and calls outside praise a false dopamine hit [1]. When things get hard he reminds himself that there was no team, no weight-loss program and no parents cheering him on: "You had nobody anyway" [1]. In the transcript he says: "You built belief when you had nothing." [1] Huberman calls this an inner medicine cabinet. Goggins takes no pre-workout and no coffee and says he has run for 70 hours without caffeine, because what he needs is stored from what he has already overcome [1].

Two voices, and learning to fail. Huberman suggests that Goggins has turned inner dialogue into a real two-way conversation. Goggins agrees: most people have only one voice, the comfortable one, and he built a second: "The winning voice is the second voice." [1] He says being kind to himself at 300 pounds would have sent him straight back to the convenience store [1]. He also trained himself for failure before success. As a 300-pound Black kid who couldn't swim trying to become a Navy SEAL, he knew years of failure were coming: "So I taught myself how to fail properly." [1]

Why he still runs. He runs on damaged knees and came back after heart and knee surgeries. He says it was never about running: he runs because he hates it, which Huberman notes is exactly why it still builds his willpower [1]. He limps for the first 20 minutes of a run [1]. He also says "I cap success" [1]. He spends three to five months a year as a smoke jumper, which he says costs him millions of dollars a year, because becoming a full-time speaker selling products would ruin what he built. He calls his willpower a "very, very, very, very perishable skill" [1]. In the transcript he says he needs "to make sure that that willpower is worked on" every day and night for the rest of his life, because "once that willpower is gone," the 300-pound David Goggins is still inside him [1].

Andrew Huberman: the brain region that grows with effort you don't want

Huberman brings the biology in two places: a tidbit he had been saving for Goggins [1], and a whole solo episode on willpower and tenacity [2].

The anterior mid-cingulate cortex (aMCC). He tells Goggins there is now a lot of human data showing that when people do things they don't want to do, such as adding exercise or resisting food while dieting, this region gets bigger [1]. His key line: "It's not about adding more work, it's about adding more work that you don't want to do." [1] The region is smaller in people with obesity, grows when they diet, is larger in athletes, and "grows larger in people that see themselves as challenge and overcome some challenge" [1]. In people who live a very long time it keeps its size, and some scientists think of it as perhaps "the seat of the will to live" [1]. He calls the finding "one of the most important discoveries that neuroscience has ever made, because it's that I don't want to do something, but do it anyway, that grows this area" [1].

In the solo episode he sets out the evidence more fully [2]. He credits Lisa Feldman Barrett for pointing him to the region and to a review she co-authored, The Tenacious Brain. He says more than two dozen studies link it to tenacity [2]. Among the lines of evidence he lists: activity rises during hard tasks compared with easy ones. High academic achievers show greater resting activity. Damage to the region is associated with apathy, depression and reduced tenacity. Successful dieters show higher activity, which rises further when they resist tempting food. People with clinical depression and learned helplessness show less activity. Super-agers keep a significantly larger aMCC than their peers, even though it normally shrinks between 60 and 90 [2].

The friction rule. Huberman's most practical point is that effort alone isn't enough. It has to be effort you resist. "Anything you like to do is not going to enhance this aspect of willpower," he tells Goggins, adding that "the friction is the critical ingredient" [1]. He uses himself as an example: he loves training with weights and even likes forced reps, so they "don't build" this capacity for him [1]. His ice bath example makes the same point. If you love the ice bath and go from one minute to ten, the region doesn't grow. If you hate cold water and do it anyway, it grows. If you stop, or start enjoying it, it shrinks again [1]. In the solo episode he says the same about cardio: if you already do plenty, three hours a week may not be a new stimulus, but someone doing one hour might benefit from adding more [2].

It shrinks as easily as it grows. Huberman says "all the data points to the fact that we can build this area up, but that as quickly as we build it up, if we don't continue to invest in things that are hard for us," it shrinks [1]. He compares this to a friend sober for 30 years who says "the amazing thing about addiction is there's a cure. The problem is it only works one day at a time." [1] That, he says, is the scientific reason behind Goggins's "no days off" mindset [1].

The ego depletion debate. Huberman's solo episode also covers the long psychology debate over whether willpower runs out [2]. Roy Baumeister's team found that people who resisted fresh cookies gave up sooner on an impossible puzzle than people who resisted radishes, and that a glucose drink of about 150 calories seemed to restore willpower between hard tasks [2]. Then in 2013 Carol Dweck's team published Beliefs about willpower determine the impact of glucose on self-control. Glucose helped mainly people who believed willpower is a limited resource. People who believed it was not limited could handle one hard task after another without a drop in performance, even without glucose [2]. Baumeister replied that when people face three or more hard challenges in a row, glucose did help, while agreeing that beliefs matter [2]. Huberman stresses that ego depletion hasn't been "debunked." His own reading is that willpower may sometimes be limited, but you can draw on it repeatedly if you are clear on your beliefs about it. He adds that his tools work whichever side you favor [2].

The foundation. Huberman insists that sleep, stress, pain, illness, hunger and distraction set the ceiling. If you are sleep deprived, in pain, sick, very hungry or distracted, your tenacity will be lower, and without good sleep and stress management none of the other tools will help much for long [2].

Micro-sucks. For people who already exercise, he offers "micro-sucks": small, safe things you don't want to do, done deliberately. He gives examples: an extra set, 100 jumping jacks after a hard run, five minutes sitting still reviewing what you learned instead of reaching for your phone, ignoring texts during a workout, a cold shower you don't want, or waiting an extra 15 minutes before your first meal if you already fast safely [2]. If you are excited to do the jumping jacks, they won't help [2]. The point is not any one protocol but doing what you least want to do, or resisting what you most want, in a given moment [2].

Warren Buffett, via Mel Robbins: force yourself to do what scares you

In her episode on billionaire habits, Mel Robbins adds a bonus lesson from Warren Buffett: make a habit of doing things that scare you when you know they will improve you [3]. In a 2015 interview at Arizona State University, Buffett admits: "I was terrified of speaking in public when I was in high school." [3] He avoided any class that required it, then after college paid $100 for a Dale Carnegie course. He joked that he proposed to his wife during the course, so he really got his money's worth [3].

Robbins stresses that it is hard to believe now, given how relaxed Buffett seems, and that is the point: public speaking is a learnable skill [3]. In her recap she describes Buffett as "forcing himself to build the important life skill of public speaking" and tells listeners to "push yourself to do things that you're scared of so that you build skills in life that are important like public speaking. And you don't have to do this on your own." [3] Her practical advice is to speak up more with friends, family, roommates and at work, and if you are truly terrified, do what Buffett did and sign up for a class, because the class will make you do it [3].

Buffett's main habit in the same episode, reading five to six hours a day, adds a related idea: steady daily effort builds capacity over decades. He says he has "some filters in my mind," and Robbins explains that his fast decisions come from years of slowly gathered knowledge [3]. Her general rule: "Anything that you want to be better at, make it a daily practice." [3] Sara Blakely's story in the same episode, cold-calling Neiman Marcus and then demonstrating Spanx in a bathroom when the pitch was failing, is another example of acting despite the self-talk that says you aren't ready. Robbins's version is "You don't get what you don't ask for." [3]

Sarah Jakes Roberts and Mel Robbins: baby dares

In a roundup episode on three lies people tell themselves, Robbins calls "I can't change" the most dangerous one [4]. The truth she offers is that you are designed to grow and change biologically, physiologically and neurologically until the day you die, but you will never change if you keep telling yourself you can't [4].

She brings in pastor and author Sarah Jakes Roberts, whose approach is gentler than Goggins's but aims at the same thing. Roberts says: "When you have spent more time doubting yourself than believing in yourself, it's not an easy transition. And I cringe when I see people are like, just take the leap, take the jump." [4] Instead she describes it this way: "It is a dare. It is not something that comes easily, but it is something that gradually picks up momentum." [4] Her method is to "take a little dare, a baby dare," and eventually you look up and find you've changed [4]. She says to open the cupboard and ask "who is it that you believe you can become from here?" [4] Robbins pictures a kitchen cupboard with a can of kidney beans and some tomatoes: what can you make with what you have right now [4]?

Robbins gives examples of baby dares: skip the glass of wine tonight, admit you miss the art studio, roll out your yoga mat in the morning, or stop lying to yourself [4]. Roberts adds that you have to "start putting a down payment on who you are becoming" by telling the people close to you who you want to become [4].

The same episode adds two related ideas. Steven Bartlett describes running small experiments in your own life to build evidence about yourself, and says most of what we believe is "a bunch of social myths, bunch of doors that we just haven't tried pushing on yet" [4]. And Robbins pushes back on the idea that people are lazy: "You have no idea how to squeeze all the juice of focus and determination and willpower out of that incredible machine in your head." [4] She draws on Dr. Alok Kanojia (Dr. K), who says morning dopamine is like "a lemon that is full of juice," and that using technology first thing is a hard squeeze that drains it [4]. His encouragement for breaking that habit: "It'll be difficult for a while but then you will get good at it." [4]

Where They Agree, and Where They Don't

Where they agree

Willpower can be trained. Every source rejects the idea of willpower as a fixed trait. Goggins says his strength came from decades of going back into the suffering, not from a gifted mind [1]. Huberman calls tenacity a real, trainable capacity grounded in a brain region with the machinery to change [2]. Robbins says you are designed to change until the day you die [4], and Buffett's story shows a terrified teenager turning into a relaxed public speaker [3].

The discomfort has to be real. Huberman's friction rule, that "Anything you like to do is not going to enhance this aspect of willpower" [1], matches Goggins running because he hates it [1], Buffett choosing the thing he feared most [3], and Roberts calling each step "a dare" [4]. Robbins frames Buffett's lesson as doing what scares you [3].

It has to keep happening. Goggins calls willpower a perishable skill that he has to work on every day [1]. Huberman says the region shrinks if you stop, or once you start enjoying the challenge [1][2]. Robbins's rule is to make anything you want to be better at "a daily practice" [3]. Roberts describes change as momentum that builds gradually, not a single leap [4].

Self-talk matters. Goggins built a "second voice" to beat the comfortable one [1]. Robbins argues that what you say to yourself becomes what you do and who you become [4]. Dweck's study, as Huberman describes it, shows that your beliefs about willpower changed whether it seemed to run out [2].

Where they don't

How big the steps should be. This is the clearest split. Goggins describes an extreme path: 70-hour runs, running on damaged knees, giving up sleep at times, and studying four hours a day [1]. Roberts says she cringes at "just take the leap" advice and prefers baby dares [4], and Huberman's micro-sucks are small by design: one extra set, 100 jumping jacks, 15 minutes [2]. The biology may connect the two. Huberman says the region grows from doing what you don't want to do, not from how extreme the task is [1][2]. A baby dare that truly scares you may count for more than a big effort you enjoy. Goggins is extreme partly because he has adapted: to him, many things no longer feel hard.

Rewards. Goggins says "There's never been a carrot" and calls outside praise a false dopamine hit [1]. Huberman, citing a recent preclinical study on stress relief, suggests occasionally rewarding yourself with something healthy after a hard thing, though not every time [2]. They also disagree on what powers the effort: Goggins draws from what he has overcome [1], while Huberman says pain itself releases dopamine [1] and cites Sapolsky's point that testosterone works "to make effort feel good" [2].

Balance and recovery. Goggins says there is no balance in his life. He admits sleep, recovery and nutrition matter but says something has to go, and he gave up sleep at times [1]. Huberman says sleep and stress set the ceiling on willpower, and even the most tenacious people need to come off the gas [2]. Robbins, in the billionaire episode, calls sleep a "free superpower habit," using LeBron James as the example [3].

Going alone or with help. Goggins trained almost entirely alone and treats the need for a training partner or accountability coach as something people have been trained to believe they need [1]. Robbins says of Buffett's lesson, "you don't have to do this on your own," and recommends a class that will make you do the scary thing [3]. Roberts suggests telling people close to you and inviting them along [4].

Kindness to yourself. Goggins says being kind to himself at 300 pounds would have sent him back to the convenience store [1]. Robbins positions herself as the friend who calls out your negative self-talk but also tells you "You don't give yourself enough credit" [4]. These may not conflict as much as they seem. Both reject the comfortable story, whether it is I'll grab a snack or "I'm lazy," and both replace it with a harder truth.

Whether willpower runs out. Baumeister's ego depletion work suggests a limited resource that glucose can help restore. Dweck's work suggests that belief drives much of the effect [2]. Huberman does not pick a winner. He says the dispute is mostly about interpretation and that his tools work either way [2]. Goggins's life, with daily efforts stacked on top of each other, looks more like Dweck's picture, but no source tests him directly.

Why It Works

A hub that allocates effort

Huberman describes the anterior mid-cingulate cortex as sitting in the frontal lobes, about a third of the way back from the forehead, one on each side, just above the corpus callosum [2]. He frames willpower as two expressions: "I absolutely will" and "I absolutely won't." [2] A single region handling both must work like a dimmer, not an on-off switch, and needs access to context and reward information [2]. The anatomy fits. The region connects to centers controlling heart rate and breathing, indirectly to the immune and endocrine systems, to premotor areas that organize or suppress actions, to dopamine reward pathways, and to areas handling how we feel inside and what is around us [2].

Lisa Feldman Barrett's idea of allostasis, as Huberman explains it, is that the aMCC acts like a dial for how much fuel different brain and body systems get, depending on goals [2]. In a careful visual task it might favor visual areas. In a foot race it might quiet everything except what keeps you running [2]. That also explains why tenacious people still need rest: constant resistance isn't useful in most of life [2].

It grows through use, and carries over

Huberman says the aMCC doesn't only send commands; it receives input. Moving the body activates it, and forcing yourself to move activates it more. Reading, listening and learning activate it too, but far more strongly when you are overcoming resistance [2]. In non-human primates, and to a limited extent in humans, it is packed with molecules linked to synaptic plasticity (CaM kinase II, neurotrophin receptors and NMDA receptors) [2]. That means it can be built up, and because one structure serves every domain, building it through one challenge should carry over to others [2]. This is the biological basis for the idea that small uncomfortable tasks build a general tenacity that later habits can draw on.

The exercise study

The clearest evidence of growth is a 2006 study by Colcombe and colleagues, "Aerobic exercise training increases brain volume in aging humans" [2]. Previously sedentary adults aged 60 to 79 did either aerobic exercise or calisthenics and stretching, one hour three times a week for six months. The aerobic group moved from about 50% to around 60 to 75% of maximum heart rate, and compliance was 85% [2]. The main region that kept or even increased its volume in the aerobic group was the aMCC, along with white matter tracts connecting the two sides of the frontal lobes. The stretching group showed no comparable change [2]. The researchers weren't looking for this result. Huberman's reading is that the benefit came from what it took to show up: getting off the couch, saying no to other things, and pushing into effort people weren't used to [2]. That is his interpretation, not something the study proved.

Stimulation and the "storm"

The most striking evidence comes from Huberman's Stanford colleague Josef Parvizi's 2013 paper, The Will to Persevere Induced by Electrical Stimulation of the Human Cingulate Gyrus [2]. In patients having brain surgery for other reasons, stimulating the aMCC produced a feeling that something hard was coming and that they would push through it [2]. Huberman tells Goggins patients said "I feel like there's a storm coming", yet they wanted to go through it [1]. Sham stimulation produced nothing, and stimulating nearby areas didn't produce the effect [2].

A loop that feeds itself

Drawing on Alia Crum's work on mindset, Huberman describes a closed loop: using tenacity strengthens the aMCC, which makes tenacity easier to reach next time [2]. A preclinical study he cites found that relief from stress is itself rewarding and reinforces the tenacity that got an animal through it, and that adding a reward afterward increased the capacity to handle future stress [2]. Goggins describes the human version of the loop: confidence has to be rebuilt every day, and what he has already overcome becomes the fuel for the next thing [1]. Roberts describes the same pattern: a dare that "gradually picks up momentum" [4].

Beliefs shape the effect

Dweck's finding that people who believed willpower was unlimited didn't tire across tasks [2] suggests part of the mechanism is psychological. That fits Robbins's chain from thought to words to action [4] and Doty's point, in the same episode, that once you tell yourself it is not possible. I cannot. That becomes truth, [4]

Where It Applies, and Where It Doesn't

It applies to any domain, not just exercise. Huberman says learning an instrument or a new language as an adult, if it's hard for you and you've been avoiding it, should engage the aMCC [2]. Goggins used studying and focus [1]. Buffett used public speaking [3]. Roberts's baby dares range from skipping a glass of wine to rolling out a yoga mat to telling people what you really want [4].

It doesn't apply to things you enjoy. Huberman is clear that easy tasks and reflexive habits don't engage the region, and neither does something you have come to love [1][2]. Habits, in his definition, run on circuits you already have and take little effort [2]. That is useful, but it is a different thing. Once a hard thing becomes easy or fun, you need a new one.

It doesn't work without the foundation. Sleep deprivation, pain, illness, hunger and distraction all lower willpower, whatever else you do [2]. Goggins's willingness to give up sleep reflects his own path [1]; Huberman's guidance is the safer default for most people [2].

It can go too far. Huberman repeatedly warns against sliding into unhealthy stoicism or eating disorders [2]. He notes that people with anorexia nervosa, which he calls the deadliest psychiatric condition, show heightened aMCC activity at rest and when presented with food, with reward pathways seemingly activated by avoiding food [2]. Being able to turn the drive off matters as much as turning it on [2]. Micro-sucks should be safe: he frames fasting longer only for people who already fast safely [2]. If you have a history of disordered eating, a heart condition or an injury, talk with a doctor or therapist before adding deliberate discomfort around food, cold or hard exercise.

Nobody can supply the first spark. When Huberman asks about a friend for whom life already feels too hard, Goggins says nobody can light the flame for you; if there isn't even a small one, no book, podcast or seminar will help [1]. Huberman also places willpower on a line running from apathy and depression to grit [2]. People with clinical depression show reduced aMCC activity [2], so for someone in that state, just push harder may not be the right first step, and professional help matters.

The extreme path has costs. Goggins is open about them: there is no balance in his life, relationships have sometimes failed, and the process is lonely [1]. He tells partners up front that there will be late nights, early mornings and time alone [1]. He also says the reality looks like a nightmare rather than an inspiring montage, and doesn't want a documentary about him [1]. Readers can take the principle without copying the scale.

The evidence has limits. Much of the aMCC data is correlation: athletes, dieters and super-agers have larger or more active regions [2]. The exercise study was in older adults and wasn't designed to test willpower [2]. The ego depletion question is still contested [2]. And the Buffett and Roberts examples are stories, not studies [3][4]. The sources agree strongly, but they are one neuroscientist's reading of the research plus lived experience.

What To Do With It

1. Protect the foundation first. Before adding discomfort, get your sleep and stress under control. Huberman says without them none of the other tools will help much for long [2].

2. Pick one thing you are avoiding, not one you enjoy. Test it honestly: if you are looking forward to it, it won't build willpower [1][2]. A cold shower counts only if you dread it. An extra workout counts only if you would rather skip it.

3. Add one daily micro-suck. Choose something small and safe from Huberman's list: an extra set, 100 jumping jacks after a run, five minutes sitting still reviewing what you learned before reaching for your phone, or no texts during a workout [2]. Do it on purpose, at the moment you least want to.

4. Take one baby dare this week. Use Roberts's question: "who is it that you believe you can become from here?" [4] Then pick a step you can take with what you have now, like skipping tonight's glass of wine or rolling out your yoga mat in the morning [4].

5. Face one fear the Buffett way. Name a skill you avoid because it scares you, public speaking being the classic. Start by speaking up more with friends, family and at work, and if you are truly terrified, sign up for a class, because the class will make you do it [3].

6. Keep raising the bar as things get easy. The region shrinks if you stop, or once you start enjoying the challenge [1][2]. When a hard thing becomes routine, swap it for a new one. Super-agers, Huberman notes, keep doing things that are hard for them, like learning pottery or music, with a sense of playfulness [2].

7. Try a hard thing with no finish line. Learn an instrument or a language you've been avoiding [2]. Huberman values tasks where you have to keep going even when there is no clear end, like his graduate qualifying exams [2].

8. Build a second voice. When the comfortable voice says skip it, answer it, as Goggins does [1]. Replace stories like "I'm lazy" or "I can't change" with the truth, as Robbins urges [4]. And watch your beliefs about willpower itself: in Dweck's study, people who believed it was unlimited didn't tire across tasks [2].

9. Reward yourself sometimes, not every time. After getting through something hard, occasionally give yourself something healthy you enjoy. Huberman warns against rewarding every win [2]. Goggins goes without rewards entirely [1], so treat this as optional.

10. Plan tomorrow tonight and save your morning. Goggins plans his next day before he sleeps [1]. Dr. K recommends no phone or technology for the first hour of the day so you don't drain your motivation before you reach the hard thing [4].

Sources

1. David Goggins: How to Build Immense Inner Strength · Huberman Lab
2. How to Increase Your Willpower & Tenacity | Huberman Lab Podcast · Huberman Lab
3. Simple Life Hacks That Will Change Your Future (Steal These Habits From Billionaires) · The Mel Robbins Podcast
4. 3 Truths You Need to Hear: The Best Expert Advice to Unlock Your Potential · The Mel Robbins Podcast