Willpower

Willpower is a strange thing. There are times when it reveals its overwhelming presence and you find yourself able to feel its tangible yet nebulous texture. Such occasions are perhaps most common in the early hours of the breaking dawn where you emerge from the twilight of your dreams, trapped between the allure of one more minute of sleep and the need to be awake. Willpower will then creep upon your consciousness in a subtle fashion, and you can feel the strength in its vague body as you struggle to do what you need to but do not want.

Yet, at other times, willpower seems contented to be residing in the nether region of oblivion, staying out of our awareness and pretending to be non-existent. We are hardly bothered by its passivity and we usually do not exert too much effort in searching for the ephemeral entity.

And I wonder then: is it willpower that exerts influence over our actions, or is it we who subjugate it to our will?