As long as we live in ignorance of our own role in creating our life experience, we can be easily controlled by others. Living life by thinking that it happens to us rather than through us leads to faulty conclusions about why we have or don’t have what we want in our lives. Yet it is our daily thoughts, words, and actions that create and drive our life experience. Everything stems from our mind and how aware we are of ourselves – our inner dialogue, beliefs, and perspectives. While it is tempting to think that one is very aware and knows themselves well, the truth is quite the opposite for the majority of our human population. This is what makes us prone to living under tyrannical conditions, where governments, organizations, and corporations dictate everything about how we should live and, in the process, restrict our human potential and our highest good.
One of the worst aspects of modern society is that too many people want to be told how to live. Giving away our own intelligence, critical thinking, and discerning faculties is one of the greatest tragedies of our time. The way to combat this loss of personal power is to take back sovereignty over ourselves, acknowledge our vast human abilities, and commit to mastering the self via the mind. Awareness of our mental patterns opens the door to personal change that moves us in a direction that is wholesome and healthy for us, and away from sociopathic influences that want to control us.
The State of Your Mind Dictates Your Choices
As we grow in awareness of our personal mental patterns, we begin to observe our thoughts and the actions they cause. The quality of our lives and well-being is highly dependent on the actions we take daily, which are shaped by our choices, whether conscious or unconscious. Every choice matters, even though this is not always evident or easy to see in the present moment. Over time, similar choices become strung together, like the beads of a necklace, to create themes, patterns, and outcomes in our lives. We then wear our “choice necklaces” that, more often than not, weigh us down because we made choices that were not for our highest good and that we end up regretting.
The positive part is that we are the artists who are continuously influencing this living, dynamic work of art we call our life. There is no getting it wrong. It is only a matter of how much we suffer due to our choices and thinking patterns, how well we learn from these experiences, and the continual evolution to keep refining our work — our choices — so that we keep reflecting the highest version of who we know ourselves to be at any given time.
Despite the influence of external factors, the amount of joy and happiness, inner peace and peace of mind, satisfaction and meaning that each of us experience is determined most by how we work with our thoughts and emotions within any set of life circumstances. It is never about what happens to us, but how we deal with what happens. The best or the worst of circumstances will be experienced in unique ways based on each of our inner states of being. There is no one-size-fits-all, nor is there a universal standard for what it means to “be happy” or “live a good life”. Each of these is a highly personal and subjective state, and it is up to each of us to define it. You have the power to define each moment, rather than have it define you. But again, you must be willing to take charge of your mind and take constant steps to master yourself so that external influences no longer control you or how you feel.
Your Choices Dictate the State of Your Life
It is a given in life that we will not always be able to choose what we desire. However, we will always have the choice of how we respond to the circumstance and the perspective we take. This is what makes all the difference to the quality of our life. The fastest path to depression, sadness, anxiety, anger, fear, and hopelessness is to focus on that which is outside of your control. Nature will do what nature will do. Governments will do what governments will do. Other humans will do what they will do. You cannot control external sources; you can only control the internal ones that exist within you.
If you want a higher quality of life with more freedom, inner peace, joy, and well-being, you need to focus on the workings of your mind and how it causes you to experience “what is” in better or worse ways. Your mind, via your beliefs and perspectives, dictates how empowered or disempowered you feel. The more you take back your personal power, the more you know what you need to do to make your life better and make our world better, meaning more peaceful, loving, and coherent. The more you focus on the external world and all that is “wrong” in it, according to your beliefs and perceptions, the more suffering you experience because things will never be exactly as you want them to be. It is one of the hardest things for us to do, but the more we shift the focus from the external to the internal and cultivate a positive internal state through self-mastery, the more harmonious our lives become and the less control anything outside of us has over us.
Often, when we are in the midst of change in our world or our lives, we cannot grasp the potential, the impact, and the purpose of it all. Normally, it isn’t until something is complete that we can look back and marvel at how it all came together and why things had to happen as they did. The difference comes from the perspective you took. Our life is a reflection of our choices and perspectives. We can live with as much beauty, joy, peace, and well-being as we are capable of creating and experiencing at any given time.
Sometimes we get what we want, and sometimes we do not. Our level of self-awareness and self-mastery has the greatest influence on such outcomes. However, our perspective will ultimately determine how we move through all of these moments in our lives. We all have our personal dreams and goals. Pursue your own, but pursue them with grace, knowing that everything has not one, not two, but many sides to it and how it can be perceived. What is good at one point in our lives is not good at another; what is good for one person is not good for another. The most joy and well-being are achieved by those who allow themselves to perceive their reality with the most flexibility and least rigidity.
The 5 Hindrances That Sabotage Self-Mastery
Finally, on the journey to self-mastery, it is of great benefit to be aware of the five hindrances that can block our progress and destroy the quality of our lives. These signposts originate from the Buddhist tradition and are identified as mental factors that hinder progress in our daily life.
1. DESIRE: — comes from the fixation on sensory pleasures
The more you fall prey to your desires, the harder it will be for you to control your mind and the easier it will be for others to control you. Desires come in the form of material items, like clothes, cars, and food, as well as non-material items, like sexual acts, weather states, regimes, and ideas. Think about all of the advertising in the world. It only works because of desire. By desiring all the various material things marketed to us, we become easy to control. We move away from what is actually good for us and move toward consumption that consumes our lives. The more things we want, the more money we need. To get money, we have to work, and this is one of the pitfalls why so many people work in jobs they dislike, jobs that are destroying their physical, mental, and social health. Often, people get used to a certain lifestyle and do not want to give it up for a more satisfying but lower-paying job.
Now, this does not mean that we should not or cannot ever want things. What it means is that as long as desires control you rather than you controlling your desires, you are not in charge of yourself or your life. You are prone to manipulation and external control at the risk of your own well-being. Personal mastery allows us to have a sober relationship with our desires, identifying where they come from, whether they are good for us, and whether we should act on them.
2. AVERSION: — comes from fighting against what is, and ill-will towards what we do not like or desire
There is no easier way to lose control and fall prey to aversion than to check the mainstream media news or social media feeds. There, you can find an abundance of things, all vying to tell you what is wrong with our world and the people who run it. The clickbait, half-truths, out-of-context clips, and flat-out lies are all intended to manipulate your perception and leave you in a state of outrage and fear. It takes a strong, trained mind to observe such content without an emotional reaction. As you take steps on your journey to personal mastery, you learn to respond, rather than react to the stimuli all around you. This puts you in an empowered state of awareness and control.
Trying to fight against and change “what is” has been the challenge of human societies as far as we can see historically. In all these millennia, we have yet to learn that effective change comes from creating rather than destroying. If we want different governments, monetary systems, health systems, and what have you, we need to work together to create new systems and stop supporting the ones that are not serving us. But therein lies the challenge: we need to cooperate, and as things stand, with that majority of Earth’s population living in states of fear, outrage, and distraction, cooperating together seems impossible. Nonetheless, as long as we keep trying to fight against “what is” and live from mental states of aversion, we are essentially banging our heads against the wall. There is no solution to such an action, only suffering. Turning things around and living from a state of personal mastery requires that we shift our focus from fighting against what is, including complaining or blaming, to a focus on creating new solutions. Ignore what should be ignored, don’t give your attention to what does not deserve your attention and is only present to suck your life energy and focus, and structure your daily life choices to reflect the kind of world you wish to live in without imposing your will on others.
3. DULLNESS of MIND / HEAVINESS OF BODY (SLOTH & TORPOR): — comes from passive content acquisition and sedentary living
The modern lifestyle feeds this hindrance perfectly and squarely stands in the way of personal mastery. The duller our mind is, the easier it is for us to be manipulated and controlled. Dull minds are not mindful or critical thinking minds. They absorb everything like a sponge and are only capable of reactivity and repetition. Nothing has dulled the human mind in the history of humanity, as far as we know, as much as social media has. The addictively curated feeds, the endless scrolling mechanism, and the amount of sheer nonsense that is only meant to numb and dumb the human mind are beyond staggering. The path to freedom and self-mastery is to develop a sharp mind capable of critical thinking, reasoning, self-reflection, and mindfulness.
The same goes for the human body and how much the modern lifestyle has destroyed its amazing potential. The body and mind are always influencing each other. A heavy body dulls the mind, and a dull mind weighs down the body. The way to escape this vicious cycle is to train the mind and the body. The more we create a fit, strong, and healthy body, the more power we have to strengthen the mind. The more diseased the body is, the harder it is to develop a sharp and controlled mind. Pains, aches, and other physical symptoms are difficult to ignore and occupy the mind, causing it to fixate on bodily discomfort. This makes it very hard to master the mind in such a state. This is why daily movement, in the form of healthy, not excessive or abusive, exercise, helps train the body to be fit and strong and is one of the pillars of good health. In turn, a healthy body that feels “light” as we go about our daily tasks allows the mind to work at its best and take charge of our overall well-being.
4. RESTLESSNESS / WORRY: — comes from fear, lack of self-control, lack of discipline, inauthentic living, desires, and aversions.
This hindrance ties in to all of the above-mentioned ones. Desires, especially unmet desires, give rise to restlessness. Aversion to “what is” makes us restless, as we are not at peace or accepting of what is. Dullness of the mind and heaviness of the body create states of restlessness and worry stemming from health problems, lack of motivation, and feelings of disempowerment. Our destructive lifestyles, disconnected living, and digitally overwhelmed societies are all precursors to feelings of restlessness and worry. The news makes sure that we constantly hear about all the negative sides of humanity, our society, the economy, etc. The only way to have some respite and mental clarity is to turn off these fear-propagating and mind-dulling sources.
Living in states of restlessness and worry makes us easy targets for control and manipulation, as fear is at the root of such states. Nothing is easier to control than a fearful mind because, in the process of being hijacked by fear, it relinquishes its own sense of control. This is one of the reasons why people in states of fear abandon their own sovereignty and flock to others to tell them what to do. Consider what happened during the Covid narrative where an external trigger caused a strong fear reaction in the majority of people. This led them to readily give up personal sovereignty and control over their well-being in exchange for a false sense of security, driven by fear that kept them in a fixed state of restlessness and worry. This did not happen to everyone. The more personal mastery one has over themselves and the more they are in charge of their own mind, the less prone they are to external manipulation or to doing things against their own will and wellbeing. Fear always makes us feel forced to do something. By dissolving fear using a sharp mind, not falling prey to desires or aversions, and working with a fit and healthy body, we can overcome anything and, more importantly, we know what is aligned with our highest good and what is not.
5. DOUBT: — comes from having disconnected thoughts and actions
The biggest source of doubt is in ourselves. We have forgotten who we are and how powerful we are. On this topic, I am often reminded of the words of author David Icke — “Human race get off your knees”. We settle for so little today and have dropped our standards of living below what should be admissible for such a technologically-advanced society. Like the frog in boiling water, over time, we have accepted living in environments of polluted air, drinking polluted water, eating fake, nutrient-deficient food, consuming fake news, being influenced by idiotic personalities, and being controlled by completely incompetent people and utterly sociopathic organizations. This is “what is”. The answer is not to fight it but to stop doubting ourselves and take charge of ourselves. We must create new systems and standards of living if we are to truly advance as a human civilization. It is unthinkable that we are aiming for the Moon and Mars, while most people on Earth do not have access to basic standards necessary for human health and well-being.
The only way to turn this around effectively is through the Self. The more you invest in knowing yourself and aligning your thoughts and actions, the more you dissolve doubt and prevent it from hindering your personal mastery. As long as you doubt yourself, you do not know what the right thing for your mind or body is. In such a state, you are prone to listening to and taking directions from others who rarely have your best interests in mind. Self-doubt destroys our human potential and makes us easy to control and manipulate. It is only when you know with strength and certainty what is right for you at any given time that you allow yourself to take back your power.
Concluding Thoughts
Our life is a reflection of our thoughts, words, feelings, actions, choices, and perspectives. Our world is a reflection of our collective thoughts and actions. We are creating our lives and our world through all of these interactions, moment by moment. We cannot live as free, awakened, and empowered individuals until we seize the power within us - the power of our mind - and take charge of it.
Personal mastery comes from mastering our own mind, which is the only place both heaven and hell exist. The place you reside in depends on the state of your mind — how you respond to all the triggers around you and who you allow to control your mind. Take care of your mind, because no one else will. Be cautious and strict about what you allow into your mind to penetrate your thoughts and shape your perspectives. Your life, literally, depends on it.
May you fill your life with all that nurtures your body, heart, mind, and soul and share the resulting love, joy, and gratitude abundantly with others to create a more coherent, harmonious, free, and peaceful human society.
