Keep the outside out

So you have more willpower if you view it as an endless resource rather than thinking of it as something that gets used up. Interesting observation, but it's really just a question of whether you let your external world define your state of mind. Do you seek validation from people "liking" your posts or giving you helpful votes on your Amazon reviews? The more you seek those forms of validation, the more you surrender what you're really about. Pursuing likes or votes means that you've handed power over to the outside. You've sacrificed what you stand for, who your are, to get somebody else's approval. External validation leaves your state of mind, your well-being, to the whim and fancy of everybody else.

Patagonia ran an ad telling people not to buy one of their jackets on Black Friday a few years ago. The ad resulted in a big bump in sales. Why? The ad let everybody know what Patagonia stands for, what they're about. They told the world what they were and let people who shared that mission come to them. There was no grovelling or surrender. Patagonia was the alpha. People love an alpha. Alphas make people feel safe. 

Alphas don't let other people tell them what to think or how to feel. Likes and votes and every other form of approval come from an authentic assertion of who you are and what you stand for. The more you become what you think everybody else wants, the more those people will go away.