Peter Senge

Personal Mastery

Peter Senge says, “Personal mastery goes beyond competence and skills…it means approaching one’s life as a creative work, living life from a creative as opposed to a reactive viewpoint.”

Personal mastery is about creating what one wants in life and in work. Continually expanding personal mastery is a discipline based on a number of key principles and practices: personal vision, personal purpose, holding creative tension between vision and current reality, mitigating the impact of deeply rooted beliefs that are contrary to personal mastery, commitment to truth, and understanding the subconscious.

Practitioners of personal mastery exhibit the following characteristics



They have a sense of purpose that lies behind their goals
Their vision is more like a calling than a good idea
They see current reality as an ally, not an enemy
They are committed to seeing reality increasingly accurately
They are extremely inquisitive
They do not resist, but work with, the forces of change
They feel connected to others and to life itself
They feel that they are part of a larger creative process that they can influence but cannot unilaterally control

Senge links personal mastery to effective leadership stating, “The core leadership strategy is simple: be a model. Commit yourself to your own personal mastery.”