The Difference Between Personal Mastery and Self Help

Self-help. What is it, exactly? According to Psychology Today, “...self-help is associated with actions and interventions that a person can take on their own or with guided literature, as opposed to working with a clinician.” But how do you know what you’re looking for, or even where to begin? A search for “self-help” on Amazon yields over 100,000 results. Books, audio books, and videos on topics such as anxiety relief, stress relief, dieting, how to fix a relationship, how to communicate better, how to ask for that raise. Wealth building, productivity, positive thinking, anger management, and grit. It seems like you need a self-help book just to figure out which type of self-help you need. What if there was one system to address all of these categories and you didn’t need a library’s worth of books to do it?

At Inner Matrix Systems we call it Personal Mastery. Forbes describes personal mastery as “a set of strategies and tools to help you live and work at your peak” and “the ability to produce high quality results and understand and replicate the way you produce these results.” It is the essential trait of high achievers. At Inner Matrix Systems, we define a high achiever as anyone who wants to better their life and is willing to take action toward making that happen. Our program is designed as a training system for high achievers to rewire, train, and align the nervous system, emotions, and thought strategies to create real-life results. In other words, we teach the skill of personal mastery.

What exactly are the components of personal mastery? Let’s break them down:

1. Vision. Create a clear and vivid vision of the outcome you want to create. Define what it means for you personally. And set the benchmarks you need to hit along the way. Ask what opportunities are available to you as a result of hitting your marks? Maybe you can live a lifestyle that would not be possible for you otherwise. Improve your personal relationships. Take your career to the next level. At the very least, you can toss out that truck load of self-help books.
2. Necessities. Make sure you are caring for the needs required to function at your best, such as nutrition, rest, movement, and the mental and emotional training that you need. (We call that last part Internal Training.)
3. Balance. And we don’t mean being able to stand on one foot without falling over. Nor do we mean devoting an equal proportion of time and energy between work and the rest of your life. Rather, balance is whatever is required to meet the outcome and the vision you set for yourself.
4. Rewards. As you meet your benchmarks along the way to fulfilling your vision, be sure to treat yourself. Take a trip. Spend a day at the spa. Throw a dinner party, if that’s your thing. Whatever it is, make sure you have something to look forward to during periods of high intensity.
5. State Management. Manage your mental and emotional state while working toward your benchmarks. It can be easy to get so caught up in achieving our goals that we start having thoughts like, “I have no life,” or “I am missing out on things I enjoy.” But with internal training practice you will learn to recognize these types of thoughts and shift your mind to more positive thinking, such as, “This is what I choose to do.” You will learn to focus on the “why” you are doing this in order to fulfill the vision you have created for yourself.
   
   Now, looking at this list, laid out nice and neat, you may be thinking that you can nail this personal mastery thing lickety-split. But keep in mind that this is a process. Personal mastery occurs over time, with effort and dedication to the process. High achievers understand this is a marathon, not a sprint. (Although there may be some sprinting along the way to the finish line.) And that’s okay. Because once you have established your why, your vision, you will align yourself with passion and enthusiasm for what you want to create, and you will be able to drive yourself to extraordinary success.

At Inner Matrix Systems, we don’t offer “self-help”. IMS is a personal mastery training system for high achievers. We provide our proprietary method which involves training, aligning, and rewiring your emotions, thought strategies, and nervous system, so that you can create a life of your own design. Through in-person programs and one-on-one guidance from our certified Trainers, we show you how to recognize the patterns that are creating the results you DON'T want, and how to evolve those patterns to create the results you DO want. Our programs are not based on a one-off experience, or reliance on an individual, but a process designed to create self-reliance in your growth. The IM Method is a powerful synthesis of the art of mindfulness and the science of neurobiology.

So if your inner high achiever is ready to get to work, clear those self-help books off the shelf and click HERE to dive into personal mastery.