Self Improvement
Things To Think About
- Education or Indoctrination,
- Which do we have?Has the education system in the US failed in its mission?
What's Up With Ming
"Did you ever feel like an alien who somehow became stranded on a planet called Earth where nothing seemed to make any sense?" A quote from "Ming The Merciless"
Civilization Rehab
Recovering from civilization can be brutal but neccessary if we are to become truly free from it's influence. Kick the civilization habit here!
Being Human
The Condition Of Our ConditionArticles on the Human condition and how we might improve it.
Personal Power By R.E. Darby
Realizing Personal Power
If you ask most people if they know what personal power is, chances are that they will respond in the affirmative. But it you continue to ask questions that drill down into this subject, many people will suddenly realize they have an appointment or task they have forgotten. It is indeed a slippery subject.
The first difficulty you will encounter is the extremely broad range of interpretation applied to this subject. It seems that the term 'Personal Power' has been recruited by every agenda known to mankind, especially the marketing agenda. Personal power apparently means everything to everyone.
So I had to invest a great deal of time in order to simply filter out the superficial, in an attempt to wrap my brain (or reasonable facsimile thereof) around something close to a reliable understanding.
Since none of the definitions I found for personal power were satisfying, I decided to build one myself.
So, here goes; 'Personal power is the measure of the quality and quantity of the results achieved through the use of Human abilities'. As usual, this is not designed to make very many people happy.
Abilities?
How well our abilities are developed will determine the level of power they can be said to have. Not only that, but many abilities are interdependent with other abilities. Take for example the simple act of making a decision.
Decision making is a Human ability which depends heavily on not only our ability to think well but also bring emotional intensity to the table. The less well developed our emotional intelligence, and ability to think, the less powerful will be our decisions.
When we are not too busy supporting our denial systems, we know that there are two kinds of decisions; half hearted decisions that have little chance of effecting anything, and firm decisions backed up by the emotional charecteristics of commitment and determination.
The first are powerless and the second are powerful. So, again I state; 'Personal power is the measure of the quality and quantity of the results achieved through the use of Human abilities'.
The saying, 'knowledge is power' is misleading and usually refers to the advantage one person has over another by virtue of possessing information that the other person doesn't have.
True power comes from our ability to process information in such a way, that we become aware of deeper meanings, implications and consequences held in the information, and so achieve a high level of understanding.
In this case, understanding itself, represents the results and power of our ability to process information correctly.
Fear and Responsibility
The problem with this definition is some of the consequences it implies. Especially where decision making is concerned.
Personal power implies personal responsibility. Meaning that when we make a decision, we must also take responsibility for the consequences of that decision.
The Human ability to determine options and make decisions based on those options represents enormous power, and with enormous power comes enormous responsibility.
This creates fear and insecurity because the thinking skills in this country are so little developed, that we are unable to feel confident in our decision making ability.
This is due to the fact that critical thinking skills are not an educational priority in America. The biggest faulty assumption on the planet today is that the Human species knows how to think correctly.
And so, many decisions turn out to be less than what we hoped they would be. It is easy to understand then, why anyone would not want to take responsibility for the consequences of decisions based on shaky thinking ability.
Values and Priorities
If we as a species were to reevaluate our values, this would surely force us to also reevaluate our priorities and this would lead to unprecedented change. And we have delayed our maturing process for so long now, that unprecedented change will now be a requirement.
When the agenda of life produced the adaptation of life known as the Human life form, it took a huge risk in developing a form of life with the potential power to destroy everything. Why then even attempt such an experiment? What did life have in mind by creating such a powerful creature?
The Human species on this planet needs to wake up and grow up. We need to realize our power and stand up and take responsibility for that power and we will do this by developing our abilities through the activity of learning and growing and thereby replacing fear and ignorance with understanding and courage.
Perhaps then, through the realization and development of our personal power, we can find our place and purpose in the matrix of life on this world.