Authors: Rudolph E. Tanzi
People who feel powerless, on the other hand, have trained themselves by absorbing negative experiences. The process remains the same so far as the brain is concerned. Neurons are neutral about messages of success or failure. In an ideal world, the title of this section would be “Five Ways to Feel More Powerful.” But as things stand, many people feel powerless, and the social trends that drain personal power only grow stronger. Whether you struggle due to the recession, a controlling spouse, or the anonymity of routine work, it’s crucial to find your power, all the more so when the world’s wisdom traditions keep repeating, age after age, that infinite power is hidden inside every individual.
We’d like to be systematic and clear up some basic mistakes. Before talking about personal power, let’s clarify what it isn’t. It isn’t force that you use like a weapon to get your own way. It isn’t suppressing what you don’t like about yourself and achieving a perfect ideal for the world to admire. It isn’t money, status, possessions, or any other material surrogate. There are heirs to fortunes, sitting in the lap of luxury, who feel more powerless than the average person. This is so because the issues of power are all “in here,” where you relate to yourself.
Now that we know what personal power isn’t, we can list the five steps that bring true power.
1. Stop giving away your power.
2. Examine why it’s “good” to be a victim.
3. Develop a mature self.
4. Align yourself with the flow of evolution, or personal growth.
5. Trust in a higher power that transcends everyday reality.
Each of these points depends on a single thread that ties them all together: the reality you see all around you has been constructed from invisible currents flowing in, around, and through you.
“In here” you are supported by the creativity and intelligence of
your body, with its innate wisdom. “Out there” you are supported by the evolutionary force that sustains the universe. To believe that you are disconnected from these powers, sitting alone and weak in a private bubble, is the fundamental mistake that leads to feeling powerless in everyday life.
Let’s look at each step for reconnecting to the source of personal power.
1. Stop giving away your power
Becoming powerless doesn’t happen in a single dramatic stroke, like the barbarian hordes breaking down your door and burning your house. It’s a process, and for most people, the process is so gradual that they don’t notice it. They are more than happy, in fact, to give away their power by degrees. Why? Because being powerless seems like an easy way to be popular, accepted, and protected.
You are giving away your power when you please others in order to fit in.
Or when you follow the opinions of the crowd.
Or when you decide that others matter more than you do.
Or when you let someone who seems to have more power take charge of you.
Or when you hold a grudge.
All of these actions occur at the psychological level, which is invisible. If a woman gives away her power without noticing, it then seems only right and proper for her to be modestly sitting in the background, holding accepted opinions, living for the children, and letting a controlling spouse run roughshod over her in order to keep the peace. In small and large ways, such sacrifices reduce her sense of self-worth, however, and without self-worth, she diminishes what her brain can do by giving it low expectations.
All hidden power is self power. If you chip away at your self-worth, what replaces it is a series of compromises, false gestures, habits, and conditioning. Your brain gets trained to view life as a
gradual decay in exciting challenges, and without such challenges, reality making becomes a routine affair. Low self-esteem serves as a filter that blocks the signals being constantly sent to you for being successful.
Breaking out:
To stop giving away your power, resist the urge to go along. Learn to speak up for yourself. Stop postponing the little things you dread doing. Give yourself a chance for a small success every day. Notice your successes, and let them register as moments of fulfillment. Stop equating self-denial with virtue. Getting less so that others get more is a rationale for lack of satisfaction. Stop holding grudges and wasting energy on sustained anger. The next time you feel a threat, ask how you can turn it into an opportunity.
2. Examine why it’s “good” to be a victim
Once you start chipping away at your self-worth, it’s only a short step to victimization. We define being a victim as “selfless pain.” By saying that you don’t really count, you can make the suffering you endure into a kind of virtue, as all martyrs do. It’s good to be a martyr when you serve a higher spiritual purpose—or so some religions believe—but what if there is no higher purpose? Most victims sacrifice themselves on the altar of worthless causes.
“GOOD” SUFFERING YOU DON’T NEED
Taking the blame for someone else’s mistakes.
Covering up abuse, physical or mental.
Allowing yourself to be belittled in public.
Letting your children disrespect you.
Not speaking your truth.
Denying yourself sexual fulfillment.
Pretending to love.
Working at a job you hate.
To indulge in even one of these pointless kinds of suffering makes you far more vulnerable to bad things in general, since victimization, once it becomes a habit in the brain, restricts your responses. Unconsciously, you decide in every situation that you are chosen to take the brunt of trouble. That’s a very dangerous and powerful expectation.
Victims always find “good” reasons for their plight. If they are forgiving an abusive spouse, forgiveness is spiritual, right? If they are enabling an addict, tolerance and acceptance of others is equally spiritual. But if you stand back, victims in such situations are deliberately bringing suffering upon themselves, and ultimately it comes down to powerlessness. A victim is always being done to. There are enough abusers, addicts, rage-aholics, control freaks, and petty tyrants to drain the power from anyone who volunteers to play the role of victim.
Breaking out: First and most important, realize that your role is voluntary
. You are not trapped by fate, destiny, or the will of God. The whole mindset that “good” suffering is holy may be true for saints, but in everyday life, to remain a victim is a bad choice. Turn your choices around. Recognize who you have hired to be your victimizer, and take steps to fire them. Don’t procrastinate, and don’t rationalize. If you feel abused, hurt, belittled, or done to in any way, face the truth and get out as quickly as possible.
3. Develop a mature self
Human beings are the only creatures who do not mature automatically. The world is full of people stuck in childhood and adolescence, no matter how old they happen to be. To mature is a choice; to
reach adulthood is an achievement. Bombarded by mass media, it’s easy to mistake youth for the prime of life, when in fact the young (from around thirteen to twenty-two) are going through the most troubling, insecure, and stressful phase of life. No project is more decisive for personal power—and happiness—than the project of becoming a mature adult.
The whole project takes decades, but satisfaction increases as you pass every signpost and turning point along the way. There is a sharp divide between seniors who have aged to be regretful, unfulfilled, and depressed and seniors who look back with contentment and inner satisfaction. By age seventy the die is cast. But the maturing process starts with a vision of the goal. To us, the goal is embodied in the phrase
core self
. This is the part of you that shapes your reality, placing you at the center of experiences you personally create.
HOW IT FEELS TO HAVE A CORE SELF
You know that you are real.
You don’t feel controlled by others.
You don’t live for approval; you aren’t crushed by disapproval.
You have long-range goals to work toward.
You work through difficult situations for your own sense of dignity and self-worth.
You give respect and receive it from others.
You understand your own emotional life. You are not swayed by other people’s emotions.
You feel safe in the world and like where you belong.
Life has brought a certain wisdom.
To have a core self is to be the author of your own story; it is the exact opposite of being a victim, who must live a life authored by others. Because it sets goals, your core self walks ahead of you. You cannot expect to capture it today, any more than a kindergarten child can capture being a college freshman. The reason we use
core self
instead of simply saying
mature self
is that maturity has a bad name; it tends to connote someone whose life is boring and staid. In truth, your life journey becomes far more exciting if you are following a vision that inspires you year after year. Visions create the opportunity for fulfillment; therefore the core self is the source of enormous power, from which your future grows.
Breaking out:
To begin, shift your allegiance away from superficial activity and toward the deep project of becoming a completely authentic, mature person. Sit down and write out your personal vision. Aim for the highest goals you can imagine that would bring fulfillment. Seek out people who share the same vision and are achieving success. Once you know where you are headed, the path unfolds with its own inner guidance. Allow this to happen; your unfolding potential needs reinforcement day by day.
4. Align yourself with the flow of evolution, or personal growth
This chapter on the evolving brain has made the point that future evolution is a choice. Your brain is not bound by Darwinian evolution. Your survival isn’t at stake; your fulfillment is. Choosing to grow automatically means that you are facing into the unknown. Guidance on the path is wobbly at first. Everyone contains some kind of insecurity that gradually gives way to elements of self-possession and true knowledge.
But without evolution there would be no path, only aimless wandering. Evolution is a cosmic force. It’s the reason that drifting clouds of stardust led to life on Earth. It’s the source of all creativity
and intelligence. Every good idea you’ve ever had, every moment of insight or
aha!
proves that evolution is invisibly at work, guiding life from behind the scenes.
We strongly believe that the universe supports everyone’s evolution, but at the same time you can guide your own growth. Desire is the key. We all desire more and better things for ourselves. If those more and better things are good for your growth, then you are guiding your own evolution. If what you desire is likely to help others, the odds are higher it will be attained.
WHAT MAKES A DESIRE EVOLUTIONARY?
It doesn’t repeat the past but feels fresh and new.
It helps more people than just you.
It brings a glow of contentment.
It fulfills a deep wish.
You don’t regret it.
It opens easily and naturally.
You aren’t fighting with yourself or with outside forces.
Fulfilling it will serve others as well as yourself.
It opens a greater field of action.
It expands your awareness as fulfillment grows.
Desire is an untrustworthy guide if all you think about is what feels good at the moment and what feels bad. You need a larger frame of reference. Indian culture makes a distinction between
Dharma
and
Adharma
. Dharma includes whatever naturally upholds life: happiness, truth, duty, virtue, wonder, worship, reverence, appreciation,
nonviolence, love, self-respect. For the individual, the flow of evolution supports all these qualities, but you must choose them first.
On the other hand, there are bad choices,
Adharma
, that do not support life naturally: anger, violence, fear, control, dogmatism, harsh skepticism, unvirtuous acts, self-indulgence, the conditioning of habit, prejudice, addiction, intolerance, and unconsciousness in general. What unites the world’s wisdom traditions, East and West, is knowing what is dharmic and what is adharmic. One leads to enlightenment and freedom; the other leads to greater suffering and bondage.
Breaking out:
Follow the dharmic path. Dharma is the ultimate power, because if evolution is supporting all of creation, it easily supports you, a single individual. Honestly look at your everyday life and the choices you are making. Ask yourself how to increase the dharmic choices and decrease the adharmic ones. Step by step, follow up your conviction to evolve.
5. Trust in a higher power that transcends everyday reality
Nothing that we’ve described so far will come true without a higher vision of reality. For the moment, let’s leave aside religion and any reference to God. Far more important is the chance to go beyond a passive role in order to embrace the role of reality maker. Whatever is holding you in a powerless state, if you are destined to be stuck there, you aren’t going to regain power.