Why think about the consequences fails

It is the most common advice given and it is not stupid advice. It just arrives at the wrong address.

Thinking about consequences needs the slow, comparing part of you, and that is exactly the part that goes offline as arousal climbs. So the advice is available at eleven in the morning when you are calm, and it is gone at the moment it is needed. People conclude from this that they lack self control. What they lack is a cue early enough to use anything at all.

That is why five of the six lessons here are about what happens before, and only one is about the moment itself.