Have you ever wondered what willpower is, or tried to describe willpower? Doesn't it seem elusive. I mean, if I wanted to feel happy right now it's quite easy. All I have to do is to remember a happy moment in life, concentrate on it a bit and I will be happy. Same applies just about any emotion such as excitement, gratitude, grandeur, exhilaration, sorrow, enchantment, anger etc. This also applies to states of being such as peacefulness, kindness, humbleness, confusion etc. Have you ever tried to conjure up willpower like what I did with happiness? Were you successful, because I was certainly not.

This leads to the next question, is willpower an emotion or a state of being if we cannot stimulate it through memory? This is another question that seems to have an elusive answer. If it is not emotion or a state of being, then what is it?

I seem to be going in circles with all this questioning. One thing I know for sure is that willpower exists. I can safely say that all of us have also used it at some point in our lives.

All languages have a word for willpower. An english dictionary divides the desrcription of willpower as follows:

So then will is a faculty, like the intellect is a faculty of the mind. If this is the case why is not willpower as easily stimulated as thoughts are stimulated by the intellect. In fact it takes no effort to stimulate thinking. So back to another question, how to understand, isolate and deliberately stimulate willpower.

In this seminar and following two seminars we are going to dissect willpower so we have a clear picture of what this complex force is. This understanding and the practices elucidated in this seminar should empower you with conjuring willpower as and when you like and using this potent force wisely.

Lets try to explore willpower another way. Lets scan in our minds the lives of accomplished people in life. They can be anyone famous, infamous or someone you admire for their abilities. My role models are my guru, Swami Vivekananda, Ramana Maharishi, The Dalai Lama, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King and many, many others. All these people are famous or at least remembered by others because of their accomplishments.

They all certainly used willpower to achieve their ends. When I compare their lives, I find that one characteristic that they share that stands out above all else (this is when I specifically look at how they achieved their success). This is that they are all tenacious in upholding their principles and do not give up in the face of setbacks (aka failures) and adversities. A force within them we know as willpower goads them on until even if against all odds they achieve success.

So then is willpower, not-giving-up? That would be simple wouldn't it. Just decide no matter what happens, do not give up and we are on your way to success. Well I certainly wish so, unfortunately this is not the case, but we are getting closer to understanding the willpower.

Not-giving-up is a byproduct of willpower in action. It is not willpower itself, but willpower is the force behind not-giving-up. Now that we have a terse understanding of what willpower is, I will reveal the results of my meditation on willpower.

The reason why willpower is so seemingly elusive is because it is a not a 'one thing', so to say. It is actually made of three processes of the mind. These processes are desire, determination and discipline or as I know them the '3Ds'. The 3Ds are neither emotion, states of being nor faculties of the mind. I call them processes of the mind because they are the precursors (or the cause) of actions (or activity) in the mind that effect the successful implementation of a project or goal. The actions that the 3Ds stimulate in our mind are as follows:

Desire, determination and discipline make up a partnership (this is why I call them a conglomorate) that collectively gives rise to what we know as willpower. An unique aspect of willpower is that we only feel it when we are working on a goal. Otherwise we cannot conjure it in imagination like we do with other emotions, states or faculties of the mind. Even if we remembered the feeling of willpower when we were utilizing it for a past project, we cannot transfer it to another project vicariously, like we can say with happiness. Notice how if you remember happy memories it brightens up your present circumstances. Indeed willpower from one project is not transferable to another project. It is totally subjective to the project at hand.

My guru who as an advocated of cultivating willpower used to say,

"The more will you use, the more you have to use."

He explained that willpower is like a muscle in the mind. It has to be in constant use, and like any muscle the more you use it, the stronger it gets in ability and stamina. Vice versa if you do not exercise willpower and stop using it the muscle will shrivel and will need to be rebuilt to its former glory.

70% of my training with him consisted of developing my willpower. This is because willpower plays a significant role in the spiritual evolution of the soul. My guru's main method of helping us monks in developing our willpower is to put us in situations where we were most unaccustomed, totally out of our comfort zone and made us do projects that were totally out of our realm of interest or ability. He will then demand results in a timely fashion. We had to dig deep within ourselves to overcome a host of uncertainties and worries many times and learn to cultivate willpower where there seemed to be none to go around.

It is by this training that I discovered that developing willpower had to do with cultivating its parts and not the whole. That is if I cultivated desire, determination and discipline separately–Presto! Willpower appears. There is formulae that I use to cultivate willpower, which I will reveal in this and following seminars.

Since the cultivating willpower lies in its parts, this seminar the the next two will be dedicated to the deeper understanding and methods of cultivation of each part. We start with the first D, which is desire.

Desire is the is the source of all animation in life. Life itself in its purest state is a calm but potent form of spiritual energy that issues forth directly from God. As my guru often quipped, God is the Life of our life. If we were to tap into our life energy, we will be in a state of complete calm and equanimity. In this state there would be no compulsion to do anything. However God also created desire and wrought it into the nature of all our external and spiritual bodies. Desire creates the urge in our awareness to want to explore this amazing mosaic of worlds that God has created for us. We want to try new things, get this and that; and do this and that.

You may perhaps be wondering where I am going with this commentary on desire. It would seem that I am painting desire in a negative light, when this seminar is in fact about cultivating desire.

This is the reason. Many people generally equate desire as 'anti-spiritual'. This would make complete sense especially if you have read what I wrote above. However, the goal of spiritual life is not reach the state of desire-less-ness, instead, it is the reach the peaceful state of God Consciousness within us. It is true that this state is a desire-less state, but God has structured spiritual evolution in such a way that desire is in fact the key to reaching God within ourselves. Spiritual evolution actually starts with the soul's desire for realizing its inherent unity with God.

I need to qualify this fact since this is after all a 'Yogic Seminar' and it is not unusual if you are wondering what cultivating desire has to do with yoga. However like all other getting, 'getting God' too is spurred by the anti-thesis to God's Consciousness which is desire-less-ness. Thus gurus espouse the concept of right desire and wasteful desires. This is a whole topic in itself and will be discussed more in detail in a later seminar in this series. Suffice to say cultivating desire is an essential element in accomplishing or achieving success in any of our endeavours be they spiritual or worldly pursuits.

Desire by is a process of the mind. It comes into action as inspiration. Inspiration is a form of potent energy which manifests as powerful feelings and visions of future manifestation of the fruition of the desire. In its role as the key element of willpower in the conglomerate of the 3Ds (Desire, Determination and Discipline), it is the main generator of energy. Desire releases a cache of spiritual energy from within ourselves that we first experience as the feeling of inspiration.

To get a little spiritually technical this energy is released into our intellect and emotional faculties from the fourth chakra or the anahatha chakra which is located around the area of our heart. The energy from this chakra is pure and spiritual. It really doesn't matter what the nature of the desire is, even the energy for negative desires comes from this source. This why we say that God is ever giving. He provides us with all the energy we need for whatever reason and leaves it up how we wisely or unwisely use it. (God also created that disclaimer called karma, which will teach us a lesson or two if we choose to go negative with our desires!)

I emphasize again that the base energy of willpower is spiritual and not physical. In fact there is very little energy that is contributed by physical sustenance in the generation of willpower. If anything food, water and air's role in willpower is just to keep the physical functions of the body and mind fit and healthy. This means eating more food does not contribute to willpower's potency. It also means that practicing spiritual disciplines in life that enhance our spiritual consciousness does contribute to willpower. It contributes because our mind has easier access to spiritual part of ourselves as a result of constant spiritual practices. Therefore allowing more energy to be released by desire into the anahatha chakra.

Maintaining a daily spiritual practice routine, such as prayers, doing hatha yoga or meditation for instance contributes to the generation and maintenance of strong willpower.

There are no specific yogic practices that is defined to enhance the faculty of desire, since desire in general, does not need to be cultivated. It occurs naturally for one reason or another. When we are interested in something or want to get something the inspiration to seek out the information or to get the object of desire is what urges us on.

While don't need to cultivate desire, there are aspects of desire that we can enhance. These are the quality of the desire, the energy released for a desire and stimulation of desire where there is none.

The quality of desire refers to the content of the desire. Is this desire positive and beneficial to you and your community? Does achieving this desire conform to accepted standards of ethics in your community? To put is very simply, is the desire good or bad. Willpower itself is a nuetral force. It does not discriminate on the quality of desire.

It is of course important for our future and that of our family and community to rein in negative desires, where even if we have them, we do not act on them. Unleashing the potentcy of willpower into these desires will take us on a path of collision with bad karmas that will in due course unravel our effort either after or if we are lucky before its fruition.

There is no special technique to weed out bad desires. Our common sense and conscience are the best tools for this. Maintaining spiritual practices and faith in God or a higher cause in life will also help us make the right decisions on which desires to pursue and which to ignore.

There is a simple meditation that can be done to feel the pure power of desire. My guru used to call it 'the power of the spine'. Whenever any of his devotees became dejected by failures or challenges while pursuing a task he would advise "lean on your spine" and quip, "I can, I will and I am able to accomplish my plans" – an affirmation.

This meditation technique is about identifying and feeling this 'power of the spine', which is a spiritual energy called the sushumna in sanskrit that courses as a current of shakti from the base of the spine to the crown of the head and back downwards. This shakti connects all the chakras which are located within our spiritual spiritual spine and head, energizing and enlivening the chakras and their functions. Below are the steps of this meditation:

1. Prepare yourself for the meditation by having a bath so you feel fresh and enlivened. You may also do other spiritual practices such as prayers or hatha yoga to set yourself in the righ frame of mind.

2. You will need to sit up with the spine erect to do this meditation effectively. You may sit cross-legged on the floor. If this is not possible you can sit on a chair with a flat back. If sitting on a chair, use a pillow to prop the lower back between your back and the chair. You should not be leaning on the back support of the chair.

3. Once seated comfortably, take a few slow and relaxed breaths and begin to reign in your awareness from distractions to the moment, the now, as it is know. Do not allow awareness to drift to the past or future, keep it focused with the moment. You may use music or other meditation aids to help maintain focus in the moment. You may do this meditation with eyes closed or open, it is up to you. Whichever that best aids your concentration.

4. After about a couple of minutes of slow and relaxed breathing do the Nadi Suddhi Pranayama. This is a breath control technique and instructions for it is given in the previous seminar. Click this link go to the concentration seminar. Nadi Suddhi is in the content index - 1.3.2 Pranayama.

5. As you are doing the nadi suddhi pranayama, concentrate on the length of your spine. Visualize a tube running this length from the base of your spine to the crown of your head. In this tube a bright yellow colored energy courses.

6. While doing the nadi suddhi pranayama, as you breathe in, visualize this energy moving from the base of your spine to the crown of your head. As you breathe out, visualize it moving from the crown to the base of the spine.

7. Do this for about five minutes, and with practice you will be able to feel this scintillating energy coursing through the spine. Your mind will feel bright and body will be filled with zest for life.

8. After doing the nadi suddhi, go back to the relaxed normal breathing you started with initially and enjoy the feeling of the sushumna.

With practice feeling the power of the spine will be second nature to you. You will not even need to be in meditation, just think of the spine and you will feel the sushumna. This ability will come in handy if ever you need to stimulate your body and mind and also to clear confusion in the mind.

It also can be used to strengthen willpower. To do this all you have to do is get into the sushumna and simultaneously hold your goals you are working towards in your mind. Then just direct the sushumna shakti into the goal through visualization. You vision will brighten until it disappears into a bright white light. The next time you get down to the task of working to your goal you will find that you have greater energy and stronger inspiration toward achieving your ends.

At times we find ourselves in situations where we have to do tasks that we are not naturally inclined to do, but have no choice in the matter. For instance, a person is in a occupation to make money, but actually has no real interest in the task at hand. This makes for frustrated living. Of course a possible solution for this is to look for something that you are more naturally inclined to and do that instead. However if you have no choice but to stay in the present situation, then creating the desire for what you are doing is another solution. Having the desire will naturally create and affinity to your work and take away the frustration of working against the grain of your nature.

Affirmations is one way to achieve this. Using affirmations you can 'programme' your subconscious to like what you are doing. When embedded deeply enough in the subconscious the affirmations will result in a desire for the subject of the affirmation and the inspiration to do well. Instructions on how to create and rules of recitation for affirmations can be found in the concentration seminar. Click here to go to the seminar and click on - 1.3.3 Pratyahara Affirmations - in the content index in the top of the page.

Along with affirmations do the 'power of the spine' meditation practice outlined above to enhance the power that the desire stimulates. You will find that you will have tremendous willpower and a new zest towards your tasks at hand.

Desire generates a cache of energy we call inspiration that we can use to further our progress towards our intended goals. However, this cache of energy can easily fizzle if we fall into the pitfalls of desire. The pitfalls of desire are infatuations and day dreaming.

If the energy arising from inspiration is not successfully transformed into determination we can easily dissipate or spend this energy into some other desire that has nothing to do with our original intentions, but are just distractions. You may have experienced this before. Lets look at a simple example.

I have a major exam to pass some months down the road. I desire to pass with flying colours no less. I am naturally inspired to accomplish this. I can see in my mind just how jubilant I and my family are when the result comes out that I have passed with all A's. I am filled with a flush of inspired energy to work towards my goal. The next step should be either to draw up a plan of action or if I already have a plan, to put it to work. Instead either because of procrastination or that the amount of work I have to do today seems small and easy to manage, I do something else that I would rather do at the time. I am filled with this energy to do something and I divert it by calling my friend and arrange to watch a movie that I intended to watch tomorrow, today and that too in the next viewing a short while away (thats will power in action for you). Or, I plop myself infront of the TV and watch some programme or I while away the time speaking over the phone with a friend about this and that. The result of this is that I have not only wasted time but wasted the cache of energy that was initially generated my inspiration. After fulfilling the infatuation, I feel tired or bored and just look for another infatuation to fulfill.

Infatuations are about very short term goals. They are easily fulfilled. It is not wrong to fulfill some of them, but they must be reigned in with wisdom and not be used as distraction that disrupt our longer and greater plans of life.

Day dreaming, the other pitfall is also an easy way to waste the cache inspired energy that desire generates. Day dreaming is taking our future visions too far, indulging in all sorts of 'sub-dreams' that arise from our initial vision of the future. Lets look at the same example above and turn it into falling into the pit of day dreaming.

So I see myself passing and sharing the jubilation with my family. It is a potent vision, concise and to the point. Now instead of using the accompanying flush of energy to do work, I continue that vision into a whole drama. I see myself receiving a schlarship, I am giving a speech to inspire my juniors and advise them on my techniques, the drama goes on to another exam that I will most definitely pass all the way to becoming the owner of great company that rakes in millions a month, and how I use that money to do a lot of charity and even start to change the world......and so the day dream goes. Amazing all the things we can accomplish as far as day dreaming goes.

Unfortunately after the day dream, we will lose the inspiration. That is because the ultimate end of the dream seems either to far away or too big to accomplish, that the task at hand that we are supposed to do seems too small or too inconsequential to the 'greatest picture possible'. The day dreaming also drains the energy of inspiration so we have none or little to use when we need it.

Day dreaming is an easier pitfall to fall into compared to infatuations as it happens entirely in our mind without lifting a finger. Thus we must guard against this waste of resource and time with discipline. If you catch yourself day dreaming, realize that you are wasting away your life and get back to work, before all the energy has been dissipated altogether.

Essentially willpower is all about energy mangament. Lets analyze the the word literally, its will + power. Will is intention and power is energy. Intention and energy coming together, to put it very basically, creates willpower. Indeed much of 'willpower' is about managing or directing energy.

Desire the first of the 3Ds is the essential source of energy for willpower, its battery. However if left just at desire, we will go nowhere. We would feel inspired and have a great mental picture of the accomplishment that is yet to come, but we are still at the starting line but we will also have a cache of spiritual energy to put to use.

Enter determination, the second 'D' of the 3Ds. For willpower to arise desire must transform to determination. Determination and Discipline are the work horses of willpower. It puts into motion the inspired energy of inspiration derived from desire.

Basically determination involves creating a viable plan, deliberately concentrating the mind and reigning in distractions. The result of determination is a good plan and the feeling, 'Yes I (or we) can.'

We will get into the intricacies of the determination aspect of willpower in the next seminar. Before we get into that, lets look more closely into the partnership of the 3Ds.

The 3Ds composition to create willpower is an unique partnership. I call this partnership a conglomerate because while these three different aspects of willpower come together they do not mix to form a single entity. Desire, determination and discipline maintain their separate roles as willpower comes into action. However for this conglomerate to work or willpower to be strong enough to make things happen, neither of the three can falter. Even if one falters and the other two are maintained, willpower will not be felt, nor will goals come into fruition. It will feel as if we are in an uphill climb, even if we are super inspired. In such a case one will eventually give up the effort.

Apart from one or more of the 3Ds faltering, willpower is sometimes not felt because of misplaced emphasis. To understand this better I am going to break the composition of the roles of the conglomerates from the points of view of energy generation, time and effort.

From the point of view of energy generation (this energy is required to fuel willpower with whatever needs to be accomplished) the role of the partnership will look like this:

60% Desire, 30% Determination, 10% Discipline.

From the point of view of time required to maintain these three aspects of willpower (not to be confused with time it takes to do tasks–which is called effort in the context of this article) the partnership will look like this:

20% Desire, 60% Determination, 20% Discipline.

From the point of view of effort, which is the amount of time and energy it takes to get tasks done, the numbers head higher toward discipline as follows:

10% Desire, 20% Determination, 70% Discipline.

These numbers can come in very handy to help you with how to manage your resources before you start a project and also if you are analyzing why willpower seems lackluster despite the 3Ds being maintained.

If I was doing a project, based on the numbers above, it is obvious that most of the energy that I need to accomplish my project comes from desire, but desire requires the least amount of time and effort to be maintained. So if I while away time and energy in day dreams willpower will not arise strongly despite maintaining determination and discipline. In the usage of energy, discipline is the biggest guzzler followed by determination. If this emphasis of energy usage is wasted in desire, a symptom of this is a nagging feeling in the back of the mind that the goals will not come to pass despite the time and energy spent on it.

If the symptom is lack of will or inspiration while doing the tasks that need to be done, the problem lies in not spending enough time and energy in maintaing determination. Determination includes drawing well thought out plans and doing spiritual disciplines such as meditation, affirmations, prayers etc. as well as maintaing the health of the body. Even if the desire is strong and we are putting in the necessary time and energy on the work we should do, we will find that the drive or the zest toward success is just not there. This is why determination takes the bulk of time when it comes maintaining the 3Ds.

Lack of energy to do the legwork required to accomplish our goals is because the balance of energy has shifted away from discipline and is being squandered by either desire in its pitfalls or determination. In other words, even if we spent a lot of time doing spiritual practices and praying to God ardently for the fruition of our goals, it would be wasted time and effort if we don't spend the necessary time and energy doing the legwork that needs to be done. The saying God helps those who help themselves, lends very well to this scenario.

So as you can see for willpower to arise naturally within us the 3Ds of desire, determination and discipline need to play their appropriate roles. These roles are not equally balanced as in equal measure, but the appropriate amount so that when the three work in tandem the powerful force know as willpower is felt.