Do you ever feel like even the smallest challenge drains your energy, while others seem to power through effortlessly? Or maybe you’ve watched others not stick to their habits even when they really want to, while you effortlessly wake up early, exercise and stay consistently disciplined.
The difference isn’t just motivation or willpower. There is a possibility (apart from environmental, mental or physical causes) it comes down to a part of the brain called the anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC). This region determines how much effort feels doable and how you respond to discomfort. Some people have trained it to work in their favor, making persistence second nature. Others haven’t, so effort feels exhausting, and giving up feels like the only option.
The good news? The aMCC can be trained too. And by training it this discipline, resilience, and follow-through become effortless. How amazing is this?
The Difference Between a Strong and Weak aMCC
People with a well-trained aMCC:
✔ Push through discomfort without feeling overwhelmed.
✔ Stick to habits like exercise and healthy eating, even when motivation is low.
✔ See challenges as opportunities rather than threats.
✔ Stay calm under stress and bounce back quickly from setbacks.
People with a weaker aMCC:
✖ Struggle to follow through with commitments.
✖ Avoid discomfort, making it hard to build new habits.
✖ Feel mentally exhausted when facing effortful tasks.
✖ Get easily discouraged by failure or setbacks.
Essentially, if your aMCC is weak, hard things feel too hard, and you’re more likely to quit. If it’s strong, effort becomes just another part of life—something you handle with confidence.
How to Train Your aMCC
Building a strong aMCC doesn’t require extreme challenges. It’s about consistently practicing small behaviors that train your brain to push through effort and discomfort.
1. Start Small, Then Level Up
Your brain needs proof that effort leads to results. Start with easy wins and gradually increase the difficulty.
• Try a 30-second cold shower instead of jumping straight into ice baths.
• Add one more push-up or squat to your workout each day.
• Set a timer for 5 minutes to tackle a task you’ve been avoiding.
Over time, your aMCC learns that effort isn’t something to fear, it’s just part of the process.
2. Get Comfortable With Discomfort
The more you expose yourself to manageable discomfort, the stronger your aMCC becomes.
• Hold a plank until you want to drop, then hold it for five more seconds.
• Delay gratification, wait five extra minutes before checking your phone or eating dessert.
• Train focus by reading a book or sitting still for a few minutes without distraction.
These small discomforts rewire your brain to see effort as normal, making it easier to push through bigger challenges.
3. Reframe Struggle as Growth
Your brain resists effort when it thinks it’s a sign of failure. Shift your mindset:
• Instead of “This workout is too hard,” think “My brain is getting stronger by pushing through.”
• Instead of “I hate feeling uncomfortable,” think “This is my chance to train resilience.”
• Instead of “I’m bad at this,” think “Struggle means I’m improving.”
The way you interpret effort changes how your brain reacts to it.
4. Practice Mental Endurance
Training your aMCC isn’t just about physical effort—it’s also about strengthening mental persistence.
• Sit with boredom instead of reaching for entertainment.
• Challenge negative thoughts instead of letting them control you.
• Push past mental blocks when learning something new, instead of giving up when it feels hard.
The more you train persistence, the easier it becomes to stick with habits and long-term goals.
What Happens When You Train Your aMCC?
After a few weeks of training your aMCC, you’ll notice a shift:
-Hard things don’t feel as hard anymore.
-You stop relying on motivation and start following through automatically.
-You handle stress better and recover faster from setbacks.
-You feel more in control of your actions, habits, and mindset.
Your brain starts to see effort as normal. Challenges become exciting rather than exhausting. And most importantly, you build the ability to change your life, not just for a few weeks, but for good.
Start training today. Your future self will thank you.
NOTE: just like a muscle, the aMCC can weaken if it’s not regularly engaged. When you avoid effort, seek constant comfort, or give in to instant gratification, your brain learns that discomfort is something to be avoided rather than overcome. Over time, this can lead to:
• Lower tolerance for challenge – Tasks that once felt easy start to feel overwhelming.
• Less persistence – You give up more quickly when things get difficult.
• Increased stress response – Small obstacles feel bigger than they really are.
• Struggle with habit formation – Following through on goals feels exhausting.
This is why many people feel like they’ve “lost” their discipline over time, it’s not a lack of willpower; it’s a lack of training. Fortunately, just like building strength in a weak muscle, you can retrain your aMCC with the right approach.
Why Action Sports Are a Shortcut to a Stronger aMCC
1. High Effort with Immediate Feedback
• Action sports require intense focus, quick decision-making, and sustained effort, all of which activate the aMCC.
• The brain constantly evaluates risk vs. reward, reinforcing effort-based decision-making.
• Because mistakes have real consequences (e.g., falling, wiping out), the brain learns quickly and strengthens persistence.
2. Discomfort Becomes Normal
• Pushing through fear, physical strain, and mental hesitation conditions the brain to see effort as part of the process.
• Over time, what once felt scary or exhausting becomes second nature, proof that the aMCC adapts through exposure.
3. Dopamine and Endorphins Reinforce the Process
• Unlike traditional discipline-building (e.g., forcing yourself to wake up early or go to the gym), action sports come with an immediate reward:
• Dopamine: Released when you successfully execute a move, improving motivation and reinforcing effort.
• Endorphins: Reduce pain and increase pleasure, making hard work feel enjoyable.
• Norepinephrine: Heightens focus and reaction speed, keeping you engaged.
• This chemical mix helps the brain associate effort with positive emotions, making it easier to sustain in other areas of life.
4. Fear Management Strengthens Resilience
• Many action sports involve an element of fear (e.g., dropping into a big wave, jumping a gap on a skateboard).
• Learning to override hesitation rewires the aMCC to stay engaged under pressure, reducing avoidance behaviors in everyday life.
How This Translates Beyond Sports
People who engage in action sports often:
✔ Handle high-pressure situations better.
✔ Persist through challenges without feeling drained.
✔ Adapt quickly to setbacks and failures.
✔ Find effort-based tasks (e.g., work, fitness, problem-solving) less intimidating.
By combining mental endurance, physical challenge, and an instant neurochemical reward, action sports create the perfect environment for strengthening the aMCC, without the grind of traditional “discipline training.”
Background Info aMCC
The aMCC: How the Anterior Midcingulate Cortex Shapes Health and Habit Formation
The anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC) is a fascinating and often overlooked brain region that plays a critical role in motivation, effort-based decision-making, and habit formation. While much of the public discussion around health habits focuses on dopamine, willpower, and discipline, research suggests that the aMCC may be a key player in how we sustain effort, respond to challenges, and maintain long-term well-being.
What Is the aMCC and What Does It Do?
The aMCC is part of the cingulate cortex, a brain structure involved in cognitive control, emotion regulation, and goal-directed behavior. Functionally, it is positioned at the intersection of motivation and cognitive effort, integrating signals from the prefrontal cortex (which governs rational decision-making) and the limbic system (which processes emotions and reward).
Neuroscientists have identified the aMCC as central to:
• Effort-based decision-making: It determines whether a task is “worth it” based on perceived reward and difficulty.
• Resilience and persistence: It helps sustain effort despite fatigue, stress, or obstacles.
• Pain processing: It influences how we experience and react to discomfort, including physical and psychological pain.
• Habit formation: It works alongside the basal ganglia to transition behaviors from deliberate actions into automatic routines.
How the aMCC Affects Health and Behaviour
1. Motivation for Healthy Habits
• The aMCC is critical for sustained effort, meaning that it helps determine whether someone sticks to an exercise routine, maintains a healthy diet, or continues meditation practices.
• Studies suggest that when the aMCC is more active, people are more willing to exert effort, even when rewards are delayed (Holroyd & Yeung, 2012).
2. Pain Tolerance and Discomfort in Change
• Developing healthy habits often involves temporary discomfort, exercise-induced soreness, the mental challenge of breaking old patterns, or resisting cravings.
• The aMCC helps regulate pain perception and influences whether discomfort is interpreted as a signal to stop or as part of a meaningful process (Shackman et al., 2011).
• This means that people with a more engaged aMCC may be better at pushing through initial struggles in habit formation.
3. Self-Control and Emotional Regulation
• The aMCC is tightly connected to self-control regions in the prefrontal cortex.
• Research shows that individuals with greater aMCC activity demonstrate stronger impulse control, helping them resist short-term temptations in favor of long-term benefits (Apps, Lockwood, & Balsters, 2013).
• This is crucial for avoiding habits like emotional eating, procrastination, or giving up on health goals too soon.
4. Resilience and Stress Response
• Chronic stress can impair the aMCC, making people more prone to avoidance behaviors and less willing to exert effort (Etkin et al., 2011).
• On the other hand, strengthening the aMCC through mindfulness, breathwork, and structured challenges can improve resilience and one’s ability to maintain healthy behaviors even under pressure.
5. The Effort-Reward Balance in Habit Formation
• The aMCC is involved in evaluating whether an action is “worth the effort.”
• If a person’s perception of effort outweighs the perceived reward (e.g., exercising feels exhausting with no immediate benefit), the aMCC may contribute to disengagement.
• This highlights the importance of making small, achievable habit changes that reinforce reward pathways early on.
Can You Strengthen Your aMCC?
Yes. Just like muscles adapt to training, the aMCC can be strengthened through specific practices:
• Progressive challenge exposure: Engaging in slightly uncomfortable but manageable tasks helps recalibrate the brain’s effort-reward system.
• Meditation and breath control: These practices improve cognitive control and emotional resilience, reducing stress-related impairments of the aMCC.
• Cold exposure and endurance training: Studies suggest that these activities activate the aMCC and enhance one’s ability to persist through discomfort.
• Reframing discomfort: Seeing struggle as a sign of growth rather than failure can change how the aMCC interprets effort and reward.
Conclusion
The aMCC is a crucial but underappreciated brain region in health, resilience, and habit formation. It helps us push through effort, regulate stress, and determine whether challenges are worth enduring. Understanding its role offers a more neuroscientific approach to sustaining healthy habits—one that goes beyond willpower alone. Strengthening the aMCC through progressive challenges, mindfulness, and controlled stress exposure can lead to greater resilience and long-term well-being.
Action sports can be a fast track to training your aMCC because they combine high effort, controlled risk, and a powerful neurochemical reward system.
Like to know more or incorporate this into your life? This action Sports fanatic coach can help! Just contact me and we talk.