The word Self-Control comes from the Greek word enkrateia (en-kray-tee-uh), which literally means “controlled by power or strength from within.” It suggests the control or restraint of our passions, appetites, and desires.
Self-control isn’t simply knowing what you should or shouldn’t do. Most of us, generally speaking, have a good idea of what we should or shouldn’t do. The problem isn’t knowing what is good; the problem is doing the good which we have determined to do. Obviously, we don’t have the power to completely control ourselves, or else there would be no need for a fruit of self-control. Perhaps the issue would be easier to understand if we referred to the fruit of temperance in a more definitive term such as “passion-control.”