Power is not Bad

This is my second helpful reframe when it comes to starting to overcome ‘niceness’.

As women we inherit a history, a trauma, in our nervous systems from the women that came before us ~ that tells us ‘being powerful is dangerous’.

As we all know, women have historically been severely punished for daring to use their power ~ in challenging the status quo, exerting their influence or living according to their own desires.

Research is suggesting trauma may be passed down through up to seven generations.

We also see many of our sisters across the world today suffering gross oppression ~ denied their rights, being treated as property, even their bodies not their own.

And in our own lives as we grow up, we experience being punished in small and powerful ways, when we break the conventional ideals of femininity. We are taught not to interrupt, or be too bossy, our boisterousness is calmed, and we are praised for being polite, accommodating and placid.

This is how we are ‘good’.

So, of course in our minds we conflate power with being bad.

It’s in our nervous systems.

We see power being used abusively in the world, and decide we want none of it. Power corrupts.

And being denied access to our own sources of direct power, it gets pushed into our personal/collective shadow and projected onto others as negative.

But power is our life force.

It’s our capacity to fulfil our potential.

It’s our ability to act to bring about change in our lives/the world.

It’s what allows us to act on our values and desires.

The patriarchal view of power is a zero sum game.

If I have more, you have less.

The feminine view is that power is as a resource inside all of us, that we can cultivate to become agents of change.

As I develop my own power, I permission you to develop yours.

Power is no more or less skilful than passivity/niceness.

They are both choices in a behavioural range.

The challenge is choosing wisely, when to act and when to follow.

'Power without Love = Tyranny

but

Love without Power = Ineffective'

Paul Linden.

Women have been intentionally disconnected from their embodied connection to their power, no longer able to access how and where is resides in their bodies - their anger, their desire, their passion all suppressed and pushed into the shadows (more to come on the dark feminine).

Therefore, in order to have choice ~ we must find it again through the body.

Simple ways to start to access the felt sense of direct power:

~ Pushing on a wall

~ Lifting something heavy

~ Do a martial art

~ Walk deliberating and assertively to a clear point in the distance.

Much much more to come on this…

What’s your response to the word power?

What’s your experience of it?

Is this a helpful reframe?