Balance Layer #1 - Power in Choice

 

I have divided the topic of Balance into several different layers, all intertwining into one great whole. Each layer consists of something most people seek to experience in life, but unknowingly, attempt to obtain from an imbalanced space.  

After some inner-debate, I have chosen to first focus on Power and its role in Balance. A pure inner power is what produces a drive and courage to face what is necessary in the search for wholeness.

One of the biggest ah-hah moments that I have had on this journey is that Power can never fully be taken from us; it can be misused and abused, or it can be given up. Freedom is lost when power is misused or given up (I expound on this later).

Most people have the tendency to equate their level of power to how much control they have over their outside world. However, no one can have control of external people, places, and circumstances and also remain balanced. To stive for that type of control is to abuse power and to misuse others. Our true power lies in our ability to make choices, manage and live from what is inside of us, and then show up with authenticity and integrity.

Although we feel powerless at times, as if we have no choice or control in a situation, we always have the ability to choose and act. Even when you feel anguish, a great grief combined with powerlessness, such are the moments that can actually lead to a massive movement of power. That crumble-to-the-ground feeling presents you with a choice to give up your power and remain motionless, or to rise and carry on. How often have you chosen to face deep hurt, to pick yourself back up, to put one foot in front of the other? Yes, you may feel powerless for a moment but that doesn’t mean you actually are.  

Standing in your power is living true to what you believe and what you value. This true, balanced power exists in following your heart and carrying out your choices in a positive way that creates, heals, serves, and protects, without compulsion or fear. 

Balance: Will

The two main components of balanced power are a person’s purified will and the actions that make a person the vessel of that will.

Will is the heart’s choice, what a person desires according to their values. It is an internal movement of Power. Will is more than just choice, it comprises intentions, wishes, belief systems, and passions. Your will is made up of what you desire and why you desire it.

What you choose has a never-ending duality of consenting or resisting. If you choose to consent and say “yes” to one thing, by natural law, you are resisting and saying “no” to something else. Society generally supports the idea that people must acquiesce to cultural systems in order to be good and acceptable and that resistance is bad and makes you a threat or a “rebel.” Every choice has a “yes” and a “no” within it, regardless of what society believes. Whether it is a “yes” or a “no” that the heart says louder, that is the desire of your heart and the what of your will.

Assessing what makes up your will can go even deeper when you take a look at your intentions, the why behind your choices.

In order to evaluate your intentions, ask why you desire what you desire. Keep asking until you get to the root intention. This process can be very enlightening about your subconscious belief system. You may come to realize what it is you value most based on the emotions and thoughts connected to your belief system.

Through sincere efforts and courageous honesty to understand your will, you discover that refinement is needed from time to time. This process is absolutely worth it.  A choice based on pure intention, with no fear or shame within it, is what balanced Power is all about. 

Balance: Vessel

You don’t get far without the external movement of acting as the vessel of your will. Acting as a vessel means to move your own feet as an agent unto yourself. Instead of leaving things to fate or to your expectations that others will carry out your will for you, you are standing in your power.

By taking on this responsibility and ownership, you become the steward of your life and your space. Stewardship entails bravery, perseverance, and patience. Your actions do not have to be disrespectful, desperate, or pushy. You can remain curious and observant, waiting for the right moments to act.

You are a vessel that is unique to you. Own it! You can be the torch for the fire of your own will and you can carry it out to create, heal, protect, and spread light.

Overall, keeping your actions in line with the other layers of balance will have a powerful ripple effect in your life and beyond. There isn’t much more to say about being a vessel. It is just this.

Aligning Wills

Even though it is your responsibility to purify your will and then see it through, that doesn’t mean you have to do it without support or teamwork.

Imagine a group of people who come together, each empowered personally and capable of supporting the whole, while having their wills aligned to a common purpose. Such a group would be unstoppable and could accomplish great things!  

An alignment of wills and a team work of vessels can happen between a person and a Divine Source, two people in a relationship, or even a community. Such alignment is created through agreements, (without pressure, fear-tactics, guilt trips, shaming, bribing, or begging). The purity of individual hearts that come together to act as one is what will change to world for good.  

Imbalance: Dominance

An alignment of wills cannot happen when a person declares their expectations and then proceeds to convince others to follow along and be the vessel. This is an act of dominating, not aligning. It is okay for a person to promote their point of view or opinion, while also preserving the sovereignty of others.

Forcing your own will on others to gain compliance through any level of fear-tactic or manipulation is an abuse of power. It is not okay to threaten to take away something they value in order for your will to be carried out.

When you feel strongly that a task has to be done a certain way, at a certain time, or whatever other specific opinion you have, it is for you and no one else. It is imbalanced to use your power to overpower the will of another, denying them your approval, acceptance, love, and support unless they comply with your will.

There is an exception I would add about forcing another to do something you want them to do. In a moment of danger, if you choose to protect those in your care who are unable to make decisions or protect themselves, it may require force. Outside of a moment of danger, it is important to look deep inside at your intentions when you want to be forceful in the name of protection.

I know that it sounds extreme when I define imbalanced power as dominating another, so you may be inclined to brush it off as something you don’t do. We all abuse power at some point, whether we realize it or not. It is through awareness that you have opportunities to use your power with better intentions to break old habits and cycles.

Please stick with me, and allow an honest evaluation of yourself. To abuse power is to say:

“I get to decide what you need.”

“I’m in charge. I make the rules and I will enforce them. No defiance allowed.”

“I am the one that knows what’s best for him. He is not capable of making his own choice.”

“Your opinions and objections are not welcome. Go along with the solution provided or else.”

“I’ve done the research and know the truth. You should trust me and do what I say.”

“If you don’t do what I think you should do, you will be making the wrong choice. People will think you are a bad person because of it.”

“If you love me, you will do this.”

“If you don’t do what I say you will be punished.”

“I can’t believe you don’t want what I want. How could you hurt someone who has done nothing but care for you?”

“If you will be obedient to every thing I tell you, then you will be good enough and safe.”

“If you are not obedient, you could lose everything you care about and you will be unhappy. I only tell you this because I care and want you to make the best choice.”

“You don’t need to think for yourself, just do what I say. I’ve got you.”

It’s likely that everyone has either said, thought, or heard similar phrases before. Or, you may search “manipulation phrases” and find those with which you are more familiar.  

Abusers of power use such words to have influence over others to further their own agendas, lusts (obsessions), and desires. Behind the scenes, they like to create a scenario that causes fear. Then they come forward with a show of emotion and care while providing a solution. This tactic plays upon the free will of another and is less obvious than tyrannical laws and demands. Intentions may seem decent and for the “better good” of all global citizens, but as soon as carrying out those intentions involves behaviors like demanding, fear-tactics, aggrandizing, gaslighting, and/or condemning, know that the line has been crossed.

It is beneficial to work out agreements with others in a team effort to have an alignment of wills. However, bribery (i.e. holding a carrot on a string to herd people along) is a misuse of power and can be cleverly disguised as a traditional call for obedience. Bribes may be filled with sweet words, convincing logic, and desirable promises. When you say all the good things that people will be entitled to, encouraging them to comply so that you may gain or maintain control, you are in imbalanced power. If you take the time to observe, you will discover that bribery contains various disempowering energies based on intentions to get compliance. 

Imbalance: Compliance

(Listen to Compliance by Muse. Pay attention to how it makes you feel).

Compliance is one of the most deceptive forms of power abuse and manipulation. At its root, this approach can never truly empower the individual into knowing their own heart and journey or into taking full ownership of themselves. Compliance is the death of individual power and of balance.

Compliance is the opposite extreme of Dominance. It comes into play when you give up your own will and become the vessel of someone else’s. You give up your life to fate and others’ plans for you. You may feel like there is nothing you can do about your life, so you become a shell of yourself, a vessel without will. You become disconnected from your heart and carry on like a robot, complying at every turn.

Those who give up their power often think, even beyond awareness, things like:

“It’s what I’m supposed to do, so I just go with it.”

“I need to ignore how I feel and what I think. It’s easier that way.”

“What I feel or think doesn’t matter. There are so many things I have to do. It’s better to suck it up and just keep going.”

"I'm supposed to sacrifice everything for the good of (i.e. my spouse, my church, my family) in order to be a good enough person. What I desire or need doesn’t matter.”

“This is just how things are. I have no power to change anything.”

“My wants and/or needs cause more problems than they are worth.”

“I want so and so to like me enough to keep me around. If I do what they recommend or what they think is best I will belong and be wanted.”

“I don’t know what I should do. I will wait until I know what so and so is doing and go from there.”

“I don’t want to speak up and oppose what they say. If I do, I may be rejected.”

“I don’t have it in me to show up. But if I don’t, I will be responsible for everything that may go wrong.”

“I should do this. I will feel guilty if I don’t.”

I could go on listing common phrases like this, but I hope this list is enough to get the point across.

Constantly avoiding rocking any boats, getting rejected, or feeling unwanted is to give up and deny your own power. It always leads to the loss of your freedom. Powerlessness becomes your self-induced prison cell, barred with fear and compliance. Giving up your power out of a sense of obligation, worry, shame, or guilt is the furthest thing from being in alignment with your will or with those who support and empower you.

I know this can all feel pretty heavy, because these things may resonate with deep, painful parts of yourself that you want to pretend don’t exist. However, you do not have to keep running and hiding. Healing is possible. Tucked in your heart is the key of your prison cell: your will! Find it, use it, and be the vessel that carries you forward into freedom and happiness. Owning your power is worth every risk. 

Anger and Power

One of my favorite movies that illustrates this concept of balanced power is Ella Enchanted. As a baby, Ella was given the gift of obedience by a fairy. This gift was said to be the best anyone could have. Yet, it turned out that this gift was more of a curse than a blessing. Ella was constantly trying to carry out her own will, which didn’t end well most of the time. When it mattered most, she chose to stand in her power, broke the spell, and became the vessel of her will. This power was always within her. She just had to believe it.

I want to emphasize the process of Ella breaking free of the spell. Through her declarations, expressed with anger, she connected to her power and made her heroic triumph possible.

Anger is an emotion connected to Power. Ironically, it is also an emotion people are often afraid of and unsure about. Until recently, I’ve been afraid of anger and unsure of it myself. I used to feel shame for any of my moments of expressed anger. If someone else was angry towards me, I felt devastated and afraid of all sorts of things. Then I came to understand that anger is okay to feel. I learned how to sit with this emotion in a way that honored how I felt and created a safe place to curiously observe what was fueling the anger. By doing this, I learned so much about myself, about power, and about other people.

To summarize, I learned that those who abuse power use anger to control and to create fear. They push others around and disrespect personal boundaries in an effort to intimidate and to force compliance. Those who choose to give in tend to cower and scurry in order to survive their wrath. Anger then becomes attached to trauma and abuse, which is why people can be triggered by this emotion. People learn to fear anger through less-than-ideal experiences, and it is an unfortunate reality that those who abuse power take advantage of this fear.

Another observation about anger is that those who abuse power in a more subtle way can manipulate others to avoid feeling anger. It is an emotion people are told they should not feel if they are to be a good and worthy person. I find this to be most common in religious cultures, ranging through all sorts of situations. Why do you suppose this is? Why would it be beneficial to influence others to avoid feeling angry?

It is all about control and compliance. Consider the following questions:

Do angry slaves gain freedom or compliant slaves?

Does an angry superhero use their powers to obliterate the villain’s empire or a beer-belly Thor who is indifferent?

Do angry citizens overthrow governments and tyrants or dependent and complacent citizens?

Is it an angry person who finally says “no” to an abuser and walks away for good? Or, is it a mollified and silenced person?

Every time, it’s the person who channels their anger to protect boundaries like freedom and personal well-being. The anger that an empowered person feels is fueled by their desires to protect, serve, and live within their inalienable rights. It is also the fuel that propels them toward healing and wholeness. It is a declaration, “I will no longer comply for survival. I choose to live and thrive.”

Let me repeat: anger is connected to power, both imbalanced and balanced power. It literally shows up in both spaces. That does not imply that you need to be angry all of the time to be in balanced power (no Bruce Banner required). It does mean that anger can help you maintain that balance when it becomes threatened. It is within your right to own your power, your space, and the opportunity to live as you will.

Because anger is connected to both sides, it is the key emotion to observe when there are power struggles, arguments, or controversies. It can help you discern if you or other people are acting from balance or imbalance, and it can inform you when and where power is being repressed.

On a personal level, observing your expression of anger in any circumstance (whether you do the silent-angry or the vocal-angry), you will get a better understanding of your relationship with power. When you are angry, is it because you are fighting to uphold your boundaries and your right to carry out your own will? Or are you angry because someone else is not complying to your will?

If you are uncomfortable with anger, why do you think that is? Have you been mistreated by another’s use of power? Have you been afraid of what someone would do if you defied them? Have you misused your own power and still feel ashamed about it? Have you avoided feeling angry because of the emotions silenced beneath the anger? Have you felt afraid to connect to your power through anger? If so, why?

How do you feel about anger?

Take the time to find out. It will help you in your search for balanced Power.

(Click here to read a couple example stories and for self-evaluation questions).

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