Self-Mastery: The Antidote to Distraction, Regret & Uncertainty

For this 3rd edition of the Joyful Sovereignty Weekly, my intention is to share a primer on Self-Mastery to plant seeds of empowerment within you. In upcoming editions, we will dive into these areas deeper for more context and clarity.
Read The Previous Edition Here

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Many in the world suffer from "chronic distraction". Not being able to focus on anything for more than 2 minutes.

Social media, phone notifications and not setting healthy digital boundaries are the main causes.

Many in the world feel a tension in their bodies. They feel they should be doing something more "aligned" with their life, but aren't.

A feeling of regret creeps in and they wonder if they will have that feeling until the day they die.

Many in the world live in various states of fear, because they don't know what will happen in the world.

The feeling of uncertainty cripples their confidence to fully express themselves. Often leading to a feeling there's no way out.

There is an antidote.

Mastery is being highly skilled in one or more areas of life.

Self-Mastery is harmonizing Body, Mind (conscious and subconscious) and Soul.

Mastery of the body includes the physical aspects of health and wellness, as well as emotional regulation. Allowing all these aspects of yourself to support and complement each other.

If the body wants to push the limits, it communicates to the mind to develop a plan.

If the mind wants to create a specific goal, the body can develop chemical reactions to support that goal.

If your Soul wants to move towards a deep purpose, it communicates to both the mind and body to take action.

Self-Mastery is the ability to steer the ship of your life in the direction you intend.

Mastery is an eternal process of receiving life as it is, viewing it from your perspective and then creating a life based on your “flavor” of mastery.

You’re in a constant state of becoming and you have more control the further you journey towards Self-Mastery.

Begin your quest to Self-Mastery by expanding your Awareness. Loosening your identity and revealing truths that have been hiding in plain sight. There is a secret to unlocking this clarity.

The first half of the secret is asking the right questions.

Often times, we go through life and we get the same results. We ask the same damn questions all the time, leading to the same answers.

When we ask new and interesting questions, novel answers emerge.

The second half of the secret is to be Present and listen. When we do this, more truthful answers are revealed.

Here is the subtlety, see if you can catch it. I’ll reveal it in a short story.

Remember a day when you weren’t feeling all that great?

Someone asked you how you were doing. You replied “I’m alright.”

They said back to you, “Oh, that’s good.” They continued with what they wanted to talk about.

Did you catch it?

They heard you, but they weren’t listening.

If they were present and listening, they would have noticed the inflection and tone of your “I’m alright.”

Maybe they did hear it, but didn’t want to address the truth of it.

This journey of mastery is asking to navigate whatever truth comes up during the process.

By being Present and listening to ourselves, powerful answers emerge. Some of those answers will be uncomfortable and even scary at times.

That is likely your body reacting to a trauma from your past. It is your nervous system not feeling safe.

Take a deep breath, slow down and release tension.

We will discuss this a bit more below, read further.

The journey to know yourself can be chaotic. There is a lot to uncover and re-reveal.

What reveals itself is your natural curiosities. These excite you and open your path to deep purpose.

When this occurs, you have no need for strict discipline. Think about it: the things you’re most excited about, do you need to work hard to fit it in your schedule?

Most likely not. You’re more than likely beaming with energy to go do the thing you love to do. Especially if you begin to prioritize these activities in your life. Allowing them to be at the cutting edge of your life.

Take your time to ground this knowledge and truth into your body. There may be some things that make you feel uncomfortable. It’s perfectly fine to feel that.

This is the beginning of letting go of your old self. The self that is disempowered, uncertain, unfocused and unorganized.

Having these mental shifts within yourself will be powerful. When you begin to take action, you’ll be shedding in more visceral ways. More about that below.

This organizing of your life, your beliefs and stories will begin to clean your cluttered mind. Things become simple and clear. Obvious answers jump out at you.

With this knowledge and organization, you'll soon be ready to move forward.

A clear way forward will automatically reveal itself. Often times, the path has been there your whole life.

You’ll notice truths from your childhood that indicate your life’s purpose. You may even laugh at how obvious it was in hindsight.

Yet, you were blinded by the programming that society has smothered you with. Be easy on yourself, it happens to almost all of us.

You’ll also harmonize your own truths with guidance from those who have gone before you.

Paradigms, concepts, principles, models and systems can support the clarity for your own game of life. You have your own style of life, take ownership of it and set your course.

After you gather your guidance, it’s time to plan your trajectory. Decide on the self-authorized path forward for yourself. Clarify your life's purpose and vision for yourself. Articulate the 1-5 year outcomes you are creating. Developing “Mastery Quests” to explore yourself deeper.

Develop a daily and weekly systems to ensure alignment with your highest outcomes.

Strategically harmonize all aspects of yourself and find the sweet spot you’re creating for yourself. Create an "Arena of Mastery", 8-10 areas of your life that make you feel alive.

Ensure every area of life complements each other, so you aren't “pulled off course” by misaligned trajectories.

This process may feel rigid and systematic, only because you are making massive adjustments.

Humans have been programmed a very specific way, much from their environment as a child. Up until the age of around 7, you were a sponge soaking up anything you could. This created the foundation to your life and your core belief systems.

Over time, this updated trajectory and who you are becoming will be second nature to you.
Once you align your trajectory, the next step is to take action.

Actually stepping out into the unknown and doing the thing. Time to be courageous and take the step you know you need to take. Find ways to motivate yourself to keep taking consistent action.

You begin to tap into flow and experiment with the dance of life. You are not good at it in the beginning. It takes time, but you are now on the Path.

During this period, there will be both high moments and lulls on your journey. Your commitment is what will keep the momentum going.

Every incremental growth will be important, even when you don’t see the tangible results in the beginning.

Often times exponential growth takes a while for it to “warm up” and see the big results. But when you do see the results, you see them big time.

Don’t give up, keep going, keep taking action. When you do see the results, don’t stop the behaviors of what got you there. Many make this mistake.

As you sink into your most curious and exciting trajectory, you are waking up the playful kid within you. You will have a lot of fun. You will also un-learn insecurities, self-worth issues, traumas and much more. Don’t worry, its all good. We ALL have that stuff to let go of.

Many refer this to the shadow.

The shadow is the “dark side” of something. For instance, perhaps while you were a child, you "learned" that you weren’t good enough. As a result, you worked hard to “prove your worth” to yourself and others.

This hard work got you places. It allowed you to achieve. You got what you wanted.

But there is a dark side to hard work. It becomes a belief that you MUST work hard to get what you want. That simply isn't true.

This shadow side is revealed and you have the opportunity to surrender it to “play the next level of life”.

We learn to master ourselves by getting out of our own way. We strip away what we are not to realize who and what we really are.

Self-Mastery isn’t about controlling those shadowy parts within us.

It’s about accepting and embracing these parts, then transcending them.

Your actions allow the neural pathways of disempowerment, internal criticism and negativity to “die off”. Because they aren’t being used anymore. 

As you move forward on your path to Self-Mastery, you begin to master flow. You set forth on your quests, projects and journey and things become easier. Your actions reflect your craft. Your craft is a mirror to yourself. It is a continuous cycle.

You become continuously Present in the moment and attuned to what you need. Your mind, body, Soul and everything else that is apart of you gets nourished. You become the active curator of your experience, experiencing true peace, fulfillment and joy.

The perceived rigidity we spoke of before, will begin to soften and life will flow in beautiful waves.

This isn't some pie in the sky ideal, you are literally training your brain to operate in a state of flow and mastery.

This single process depicted here, becomes THE PROCESS.

You harmoniously flow from one chapter of your life to the next. A constant evolution of self.

With more practice, you get better at being yourself. You get better at learning. You get better at mastery. Eventually, having the universal skill of mastery and can apply it to anything you desire.

As you move forward on this journey, you take the risks and go after what excites you. You move towards your life's purpose and guess what?

You live with no regrets.

You continuously expand on your path and with each day, you enjoy the process more and more.

Yes, there will be challenges and uncomfortable-ness. Yet you have taught yourself how to navigate challenge and discomfort.

You know what to do with it.

And once you FEEL great on this path, then you can support others on their journey.

Self-Mastery is "required" to lead authentically. No not absolutely required, but if you want to lead your family and your community, this is a sure way for others to listen to your guidance.

What many approaches to Self-Mastery de-emphasize is the happenings within the body. It's usually a "mental only" approach.

Let's dig a few inches to gain some depth and context of how the body plays a critical role in our journey to Self-Mastery.

Our body is a series of inter-relating biological systems. All these systems have a way of operating and relating to other systems.

We spoke of neural pathways, which are highways in the brain that we travel frequently.

Every time you make a decision, you are either strengthening a neural pathway that is frequently traveled on, or you are creating a new pathway.

On a chemical-level, your brain is creating complex "cocktails" that offer you biological support.

Here's a few examples of these:

1. Dopamine = amplifies focus & attention
2. Norepinephrine = drives excitement & attention
3. Endorphins = maternal bonding
4. Serotonin = social security / satisfaction
5. Anandamide = openness to experience / others
6. Oxytocin = trust (tribalism)

The beauty is that you don't have to "think" about doing these things. Your body automatically does them for you. Doing so in the right mix for your intended purpose.

So how do these chemical cocktails relate to Self-Mastery?

When you're excited about something, dopamine and norepinephrine support you with those feelings. That ah-ha moment? A biological support.

Research has shown that things like passion, purpose, curiosity and even mastery have a chemical cocktail in the brain.

There is so much more to this, but we will continue on this deep topic some other time.

Why I love to dig into this topic has evolved. Originally, it was to understand more of the body and how it connects with this journey of Self-Mastery.

Then something happened. I began to appreciate my body and what it has been doing on my behalf my entire life. It has been doing it even though I didn't understand it at all.

A deep feeling of gratitude overcame me.

Before we get to the action steps, let's discuss what happens in the mind on this journey.

When you sincerely begin your journey to Self-Mastery, something strange will begin to happen.

You will notice you are not your body, mind or even Soul.

You are something much more allusive to describe.

We won't go into that today. What we will dive into is that during this process, you begin to master your mind, instead of it mastering you.

When you align your focus on a coherent trajectory, things will become much simpler in your life.

Your conscious mind will be able to focus on what's right in front of you so much easier. This requires work for sure, but it is a beautiful "side effect."

You will be able to direct your mind at will. Allowing anxiety, uncertainty and tension to fade away.

Peace, clarity and joy will fade in.

Let's talk about the subconscious mind.

When you set goals and have daily prompts for your journey of Self-Mastery, your subconscious mind is taking note.

You are surrounding yourself with exciting things that propel you forward.

Your subconscious mind is becoming a trusted ally to support and complement your path.

Ever notice when you're having fun and some insightful idea comes out of nowhere?

You weren't "thinking" about that topic at all. Yet, a solution was brought to you effortlessly.
That is your subconscious mind at play.

When you aren't focused on your work, answers and insights are delivered to you on a golden platter.

Your life becomes a continuous flow of creativity, joy, passion, fun, purpose and meaning.

To be clear, your conscious and subconscious mind have always been available to you. You have been misaligned within yourself and not reaping the reward of your brilliant minds.

You can change that starting today.

So here we are, action time. Below are a few steps you can take to get started on your journey to Self-Mastery.

Take a few minutes and answer the following questions. Remember what we said in the Know Thyself section.

1. What makes you unique and special? What would someone who truly sees your genius say about you?
2. Looking back at your entire life, what 3-5 challenges have shaped you the most?
3. If you could break down your entire life into “mini careers” you’ve had, what would they be? Pick out 5-10.
4. How could these “mini careers” connect in unique and uncommon ways that could be at the cutting edge of your life’s work?

These can be powerful revealers to you. If you are looking for some more depth, implementation and a complete breakdown, look out for my Self-Mastery System coming out soon.

That’s it for this edition of the Joyful Sovereignty Weekly!

Wish you a great rest of your day!

Best,

Lane

P.S. If you enjoyed this edition, share this edition on social media or with a friend who you think would enjoy reading this.

P.P.S. Check out the Harmonious Manifestation Meditation here.

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We will be diving deeper and into some interesting topics surrounding Self-Mastery. If you have any questions about this edition, shoot me an email and I will do my best to clarify in the next edition. If you haven't yet, sign up and get the next edition delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning by clicking here.

If you’re looking to create an ecosystem towards Joyful Sovereignty with accountability, join the waitlist for my upcoming Self-Mastery System by clicking here. What we discussed here is only the foundation of this complete, yet intuitive system.