Often, you’ve heard about self-mastery. Its one of those things that we all think we have, but we never sit down to actually self-evaluate.

It’s easy to see when other people have it, though depending on the focus of their mastery, it might look different and be completely subjective. For instance, someone might have great financial self-mastery, and be able to keep their spending under control, while they have terrible self-mastery over the junk food they consume.

But learning to master yourself is an inner strength that can lead to strong results, and continued improvement in many areas of your life.

Begin With A Single Goal

I think my journey of self-mastery, started at a very young age. I was in Junior high school, we had a student who had been caught masturbating in the mostly empty halls of the school, and in class. Granted, the boy had some issues, but when I told my mother about the incident later that day, she made it clear, in a very unassuming way that she hoped I would never debase myself with pornography and the like. I resolved then and there, that I would live a chaste life. Regardless of youthful temptations, I was able to keep my values that my mother and my God had instilled in me from childhood. This was my first experience with controlling my appetites and desires, and I strongly believe that it blessed me in so many ways. I’m now married, have children, and a very healthy relationship with my wife, a relationship that I don’t think I could have had, if I’d lived below my values growing up.

As I grew up, I learned the value of sacrificing my wants for now, for my goals in the future. I always wanted to serve a proselyting mission for my church when I turned 19 years old. So I worked hard and saved, and was able to pay my way to serve for two years, preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ in the Philippines. That was an incredibly enriching experience for me, and a place where I learned to love God more, love the people with all my heart, and learn valuable life lessons along the way.

In college, I had similar experiences of working hard so that I could pay for my apartments, tuition, and dates without going into debt. I would work hard all summer long, and part time during school in the construction industry to get all my expenses paid in advance. When I finally graduated with my bachelor’s degree, I had a new truck, a work trailer, and no financial obligations.

I didn’t kick back and relax though, no, I worked hard for two more years, bought and remodeled a condo, got my MBA, and found my wife. Shortly after being married, I had my cheap ghetto condo, paid off, schooling done without any debt, and a good job paying $45k a year (that was around 2012)

How did I do that on such a meager budget? Self-Mastery. I’d learned to control what I wanted now, with what I wanted later. For a guy who loved food, loved cooking, I survived most of my college life on rice and eggs, two of the cheapest foods available. Every penny I made, went into owning my condo free and clear, and making sure that I could live debt free.

Here’s the thing you might be wondering, if you’ve seen some of my other content, “Brent, don’t you use debt?” The answer is yes, I do. In fact, I went into some debt to buy and fix up my condo. In my work, I go into debt there also, but I view debt in a different way than many. I’ll explain that in another article. For now, you need to understand that by exercising mastery over my wants and my goals, I was able to achieve every goal I set out to accomplish, and that has carried through my whole life thus far.

Goals Without Self-Mastery Are Pointless Wishes

I know somebody that was struggling financially. They came to me and asked for help figuring things out. After looking at their finances and their goals, it was easy to see the disconnect. They were making 3 or 4 times the money that I was, but they were living paycheck to paycheck. There was no reason they should have been struggling they way they were. I was saving and investing, while they couldn’t even qualify for a mortgage.

When I showed them their credit card bill, and we walked through all the silly stupid expenses they were accruing every week, one of them got it. The other one, the one who was responsible for most of the reckless spending, clammed up. Not only did that person refuse to accept the hard truth of their destructive habit, but they refused to even talk to me for days following it. And guess what, that person did not make the changes needed to move forward. If anything, the problem got worse.

When we find ourselves in the clutches of a personal flaw that needs to be corrected to achieve our goals, it can be one of the hardest things to overcome. But overcome it, we can.

One of the hardest things to overcome, is not personal choices, like the examples above, but cultural choices, as those are the choices that have been made by us and for us for multiple generations and geographies. In those instances, you not only have to buck your personal habits, but also the social norms that are holding you back.

This is why honestly sitting down with yourself and meditating on your goals and what in your life is holding you back from those goals is so important. It’s the first step to achievement.

The next step is not to just change your habits, because that can be herculean. What you need to do is to see yourself as the new and improved version of you first. This in itself is tough. In the book, “The Richest Man In Babylon,” one of my all-time favorite books, there is a story about a rich man who started out as a slave. He had tried to escape his captivity, but failed. The reason he failed, and was easily caught, was because he did not see himself as his own master, he always saw himself as a slave, even if for a short time, when he’d escaped slavery, he had a slave mentality that was self-defeating. It wasn’t until he started seeing himself as a free man, a master of his own destiny, a rich and powerful leader, that he was able to find his freedom.

Once you see yourself as your own master, and not as a slave to the self-destructive habits that hold you back, then its time to go to work. Itemize all the good qualities you have as your best self, and here’s the trick, LIVE THEM!

By seeing yourself as the end goal before you start the journey, you can make the journey possible, no matter where you’re starting.

I’ve had to do this myself, multiple times. Growing up, I always saw me and my family as poor, and that we’d never be anything but poor. It wasn’t till I saw myself with a higher financial potential, than I made myself into that sort of person.

When I found out that I had heart and digestive problems, I had terrible eating and exercising habits. Not only that, but I prided myself in those destructive lifestyles. It wasn’t until I saw myself as a person who goes to the gym and has a mostly high-raw vegan diet, that I was able to turn my life around and start living a much healthier me.

Our circumstances in life may have put us in the places we are now, but there is nothing but your own self that is keeping you there. Learn to see yourself as the person you want to be, then go out there, and be that person.