“Go directly to your subconscious and say: this is the thing I’m looking for”

In this episode, Nick explores the concepts of self-mastery, discipline, and personal growth. He emphasizes that self-mastery is not a destination but a continuous journey, highlighting the importance of understanding that goals, habits, and disciplines can vary greatly from person to person.

What to listen for:

• Self-mastery is a continuous journey, not a destination
• Goals and habits are unique to each individual
• Understanding the principles behind habits is crucial
• Finding what works for you is more important than following trends
• Small, consistent actions lead to significant changes
• Meditation and mindfulness can help reset the mind
• Self-awareness is key to personal growth
• It’s okay to start small and build from there
• Listen to your own needs rather than external pressures
• Embrace the chaos and beauty of your journey

“You don’t have to listen to what anybody else says. Listen to your heart, listen to your soul”

• Trust your inner guidance over outside noise
• External opinions aren’t always aligned with your truth
• You’re allowed to follow what feels right, not what’s popular
• Inner peace often comes from tuning into your soul’s voice

“Your mindset and the journey that you work through with your mental health is your journey”

• Everyone’s path to healing is personal
• There’s no “right way” to grow mentally or emotionally
• Honor your pace and your process
• Comparing your journey to others only creates resistance
• You have the power to define what mental wellness means to you

About Nick McGowan

I’m Nick McGowan, entrepreneur, podcaster, and mental health advocate, and I’ve been on a 20+ year journey of personal development, learning to master my mindset, emotions, and the art of living with purpose.

As a Mindset and Self-Mastery Mentor, I work with ambitious men and women who want to live their most authentic and joyous life, by helping them master their mindset, emotional awareness, and authentic communication. My mission is to empower people to lead lives that feel aligned, grounded, and truly their own.

Throughout my career, I’ve built teams, streamlined systems, and improved client experiences across SaaS, media, marketing, and personal development spaces. Whether I’m leading cross-functional projects, optimizing SEO, Podcasting, designing strategies, or guiding clients through transformation, I bring a hands-on, solution-focused approach to everything I do.

I’m also the host of The Mindset and Self-Mastery Show, where my guests and I unpack the stories that shape us, challenge us, and ultimately guide us back to who we are at our core. On this show, we uncover the secret gems others have discovered through trial, error, and breakthroughs so you can fast-track your growth, and master your mindset on your pursuit toward self-mastery. Check out the latest episode here.

With years of podcasting and two decades of marketing experience, I’ve mastered the storytelling, interview flow, strategy, and technical production that elevate a podcast from “just content” to something truly impactful. Whether you’re a leader looking to amplify your message, or a seasoned speaker and podcast host looking to sharpen your edge or even a beginner who is wondering how to share their message, I mentor thought leaders through every step of having the conversation they’re here to have on this planet.

So, what message are you here to share?!

Resources:

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Thank you for listening!

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Click To View The Episode Transcript

Nick McGowan (00:01.272)
There’s a lot to be said about goals, discipline, and a lot of people have a lot to say about it. I understand that this show is the mindset and self mastery show, which in my mind, self mastery is just a heightened level of discipline. And I’ve heard from different people saying, know, self mastery isn’t a destination. Like I totally get it. I don’t think there’s actually really any destinations. I think we’re just continuously moving and doing things.

But I want to talk about the discipline and the goals and habits and how all that stuff works. I’m sure you’ve read all the different books. You’ve listened to all the different things you’ve heard from all the different people. You’ve watched all the reels and Tik Toks and all this stuff about all these things. And there are great bits and pieces in all of it. And some of it may have spoke directly to you where you’re like, this is exactly it. This is what I needed. Mr. Clear, you know, from

the atomic habits or this is what I need, whatever it is. I want us all to understand selfishly that we are all different. And the reason why I say selfishly is because I would like for us all to understand that. You may not, somebody else may not, but I would really love for us all to be able to understand that goals, habits, disciplines, all of those things can look

and probably do look vastly different for every single person. There are principles to each of these though. Like yes, it can take X amount of time to form a habit. Some will say seven days, some will say 14, some will say 30, some will say six months. I think that kind of goes along with if you practice the wrong things, you’re never gonna get the right things. You gotta know what those right things are to be able to practice on.

And I want to give a little bit of an example. I’ve talked about journaling different times. You probably even heard me talk kind of poorly about it in different episodes and interviews that I’ve had with people because I’ve tried that and that’s not really my jam. However, I’m probably two or three days away from starting the artist way and writing out multiple pages per day and given that a shot and seeing

Nick McGowan (02:28.746)
if how I was doing something before wasn’t actually aligned with me, but that the act of can help me. The principle underneath of it, of being able to write and be able to have from your brain to your hand and doing the act of makes total sense to me. I think of that almost like music too. I’ll think about a thing, my hands will move and I’ll play guitar. I’ll think about a thing, my vocals will move and my vocal cords will move and I will sing a thing.

There are principles in place for a reason and there are ways that these things work. How we do it and the flavor that we do for all of this is really up to us. Now, if you talk to somebody or rather hear somebody on some podcast or social media clip and they talk about, they do meditations for three hours a day and they do all these other things and you think, that’s crazy. Maybe it is. Maybe it’s not. To those people, it’s clearly not. To the people that subscribe to that.

clearly not. For you it might be a little different. So if that automatically comes up then you can think well why do I think that? Well I think of the amount of time or I think of this or whatever it is but at least you’re on that journey thinking about it and you’re trying to figure out for yourself what actually makes sense for you. Meditation for me has been a thing that I have really really worked on for years and years and years and I am not close

to being able to meditate for hours at a clip. I don’t know if that is really in the cards for me, but maybe it is. Maybe it’s just not right now today, but down the road it may be. However, I do know that meditation and quieting my mind, helping me reset and be present with myself and with my creator, that actually really helps me. And I can think back to…

A few years ago where I was trying to just do the thing and I was trying to meditate and my brain would just go all over the place and I thought, well, this is part of it. And in some ways it is, but some ways it was also, I wasn’t actually rooted into it to be able to say, I’m going to do this thing and I’m just going to do it. However, it looks today is how it looks today and what it looks like tomorrow is kind of tomorrow’s problem and taking the small steps with that. So.

Nick McGowan (04:54.87)
I’ve had different times of meditations where I’ve gone 20 minutes, 30 minutes. I had a few hour long ones and I’m surprised I didn’t even fall asleep.

But for the most part, the consistency and the habit of meditating at least once or twice a day for even just a few minutes has taken me a long time to be able to get to. And sometimes it doesn’t happen all the time. There might be a few days or a week or a few weeks even where I don’t because I’ve gotten myself out of the habit of it. Now I find that sometimes it can be really difficult if you’re moving around a lot. We travel during the summers and…

travel at different times and we live in a tiny home so sometimes space and the volume of things can be a lot. But being able to find what that looks like for you, what’s that little space that you can take in that moment right then and there or something you can plan for that day, just that day though, not the next day or something I’m gonna do for 90 years. Just do the thing today and being able to start with that one thing.

I use an app called Insight Timer that a friend of mine from years and years ago told me about literally when I was struggling. I was like, man, I’m trying to meditate using these different YouTube videos. I think I was using some Joe Dispenza stuff. And if you know of Joe Dispenza stuff, those things are all long. They’re great. Absolutely great. But it can be a lot. And my buddy told me about an app that he uses. has a ton of different stuff in there. Things from a minute long to…

hours long and everything in between. And that’s been a great tool for me to use and also a great stepping stone to get into other means of doing it. So my challenge to you is if it’s meditating, if it’s journaling, if it’s waking up at a certain time, if it’s going to the gym, if it’s reading, it’s something that’s really important to you like music or some hobby.

Nick McGowan (07:05.311)
sit with yourself for just a moment or two and feel into what it is that you enjoy about that and ask yourself, what is it that I need to do to be a bit more disciplined in it? I promise you that you’ll start to hear, if not feel and hear something that’ll lean you in a direction of, well, if you do a little bit more of this or if you try this today, that’s not gonna come from the outside world, it’s gonna come from you.

might be flavored from things that you’ve seen. So you’ll have to use your intuition to be able to figure out what’s actually right for me and what’s not. But being able to actually lean into where are you right now? Where are you when you’re listening to this right now? Are you in your car? Are you at home? Are you sitting outside? Are you running? Are you on a treadmill or an elliptical or lifting some weights? No matter where you’re at.

My challenge is to just be calm for a moment. Think about that thing that you, that has come up as I’ve been talking about this, as the meditation, the journaling, the hobby, the work, whatever it is. And to be able to ask yourself, what do I really need to do to be disciplined within this? I would love to hear what comes up. I’d love to hear what happens after that, because I’m sure there are pieces of it that are like, well, some dude on Instagram.

told me that if I do this thing for 40 hours a day, then all this will be fine and I’ll make gazillions of dollars for whatever. Sure, that’ll probably come into your mind. But really your body knows and your being knows that, know, if you really just start off with a minute a day doing meditation, even just breathing, then that’ll be a great start. And if that’s the case, then just do that.

I know sometimes when I say stuff like that, can be really easier said than done and kind of flippant. I know personally, if somebody goes, just show up and do this thing, my initial response usually rhymes with truck and foo. There’s something to that though, where if we can go directly to our subconscious and say, this is the thing that I’m looking for. This is the question that I ask of you. Expect a response from that. Expect a feeling from that.

Nick McGowan (09:29.184)
Expect some sort of internal nudge from that to then be able to say, right, well, I’m going to take this and I’m going to do this little thing. Now take a little bit of step back and not be as ambiguous. I would like you to pick something. Pick meditation or journaling or stretching or drinking water in the morning or whatever it is. Pick something, something, and you’ll know what that thing is.

Because if it comes up and you’re like, oh, journaling, I don’t really do that now, but dude said things. So maybe I should do something. Stop. the thing that you actually want to do and you feel that it can help you. Even if just to use meditation as an example, even if you’re not like, look, I want to meditate for 95 billion hours a week, but you know, you do actually want to calm your mind. You want to be less reactive. You want to have a bit of self-control.

just by understanding that you’re rooted and you can trust yourself, then start there. Start with a minute. Start with breathing. It could even be the box breathing or for an aid or whatever it is. Just start with one of those things and then start stacking those things up. So again, with this show being about your mindset, about self mastery and discipline, it’s about those topics that relate to all of us.

but how we relate to those specific topics within ourselves. Your mindset and the journey that you work through with your mental health is yours. I’m here as a resource and amuse in some sort of ways and to be able to share the things that I go through. I hope this stuff can make you laugh a little bit at times, make you think, challenge you a bit, but also understand that you’re not going through this stuff alone. So if you take those little things,

and just do one of them today and whatever works for you. If you want to write it down and say, I’m going to do this today, or if you know I’m going to do it or you want to put it in your calendar or whatever it is, start with that thing and don’t do it because some random dude from the internet told you to do it. Don’t do it because

Nick McGowan (11:43.49)
You feel like you should finally do the thing. Sit inside to yourself, into the soul and go, what am I, what am I feeling here? Yeah, I do want some more calm. Yeah, I do want to be a bit more relaxed and I do want to feel like the world just not collapsing. Granted, there may be other things. may be chemical things. may be subconscious things. There may be

loads of different traumas and all that stuff that tie into that. But this one act, whatever that thing is, the journaling, the meditation, the walking, whatever it is, if you know that that’s a thing that you feel can actually help you and be a benefit to you in some sort of way, or you’re at least open to exploring that, then my challenge is to explore it and be okay with that being where it is, the exploration of.

I meditated for an hour today is possibly not a thing you’re going to say tomorrow. But it might be to say I meditated for a minute or I just calmed myself down, breathe, tossed up a prayer or just thought about what I’m happy about. Then great, do those little things. I want to leave you with this though. If you’ve listened to this show or you know me at all,

you know that I can say what’s on my mind and I’m really not hesitant to be able to talk about things that don’t make sense to me and how I want to understand them and whatnot. Just because different people tell you, should meditate, you should journal, you should do this, you should do that. And these are the frameworks that they use and they push them. Don’t let that affect you. Those people are gonna push whatever they’re gonna push. And my hope is that there’s

a positivity to it where they’re pushing those things and pushing is probably even too much of a, I don’t know, violent word in a sense where they’re trying to get somebody else to do the thing they did because it really worked for them. I’m not trying to totally set myself apart here, but I’m trying to align directly with you with all of that is great. Anything that I say, it’s all just words and these are just ideas. It’s up to you to do something with

Nick McGowan (14:09.686)
So if today you say, I want to do whatever this thing is and I’m going to do it for a minute. I’m going to go to the gym and I’m just going to walk around the gym or I’m going to go to the gym and I’m actually going to do that 350 bench press or whatever it is. Great. As with other things in life, I’m sure you’ve noticed like once you actually start walking, you’ll not only get there because you’re already on that path toward it.

But also when you think about and you go, I should go back. Most times I’m sure it pops up where you go, well, fuck, I’m already here. Like I’m doing it. So just keep moving along. It’s like taking those little steps of it, but being okay with those little steps. Nevermind what anybody else says. Social media wise, guru wise, even me, especially me. If this makes any sense, then I encourage you to be able to do something with it. Take some sort of action on

If it doesn’t make sense, then I encourage you to look to what would make sense for you. If you’re listening to what I’m saying, you’re like, no, that doesn’t make any sense to me. I want to go this total direction. And least have the self-awareness to be able to understand why that doesn’t make sense. What you feel you would want to make sense for you and why you want to do these other things. Or maybe this just isn’t the right show for you to listen to. Either way, all of it is totally fine because this is your life. Show grace to yourself.

Be able to embrace the discipline, be able to embrace the hecticness, the chaos, the changes, the beauty of it all, and just take some sort of action on what that thing is. And I’ve reiterated this a number of times. So think about what that thing is and let it come up to you and then do something with it. Even if it’s like, shut up, Nick McGowan , I’m gonna spend a minute doing this one thing. Beautiful.

Go do it. You can stop listening now and just go do it. So I really appreciate you being on listening to this and sponging in this. you have questions, if you have thoughts or you want to bounce some things off of me, feel free to reach out. If this is a challenge for you that feels too challenging because there are other roadblocks or things that are inside of you that are holding you back from doing these things, there’s certainly professionals and people that can help.

Nick McGowan (16:33.814)
I can help in different ways. can point you to different resources that I have and different people that may be able to help you. Take that action though, some sort of action, that meditation for a minute, the reaching out about a question, or just some sort of action with that. You don’t have to listen to what anybody else says. Listen to your heart, listen to your soul, and couple some sort of action with that. So thank you for being with me today. I hope this helps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuox0N81KNM