Empowerment is the process of owning our own voice — standing behind our own power. It is a noble quality that is related to the central tenet of Perspective Mapper — to own our own perspective. What happens when it goes too far, however, is a power struggle ensues between our voice and the world around us…when we try to win is ironically when we go astray.
We’ll start with a disempowered voice. A disempowered voice is not familiar with making an impact in the world around us. There is very much a purpose and place for having a quiet, incubating, unseen voice, though a disempowered voice can be distinguished from an incubating voice in that it doesn’t have the capacity to return to its own center. That said, these voices do not yet have an impact.
When such voices eventually gets empowered, we realize the impact it has on the fabric of the universe. We realize that it has the power to change and affect the way we feel, and how others feel. We start to affect change with such a voice, and start to define a life and lifestyle centered around our desires. And this is good…to a point.
What happens is that it starts to feel good…and at times too good. At a certain point, we then start to demand the world and people conform to our voice…and THAT’s where empowerment turns ugly.
The universe is continuously responding to our voice by providing not what we want, but what complements our perspective. This includes those that are critical, those that are supportive, and those that provide alternative angles. When we start creeping into entitlement, we start demanding the universe gives us only a response that we deem worthy or appropriate. We’ve stopped listening and started imposing.
The universe might appease the entitlement for some time. Depending on our level of power, we can get stuck in a vicious black-hole (think evil dictators without checks/balances). Eventually however, a brick wall appears — there is a hard limit to what can be done. The empowered individual loses themselves in their own power, and there will likely be an incredibly painful downfall.
How then do we keep our power in check…to prevent our empowerment from leading to entitlement? From a Perspective Mapper standpoint, it’s from speaking and listening at the same time. It’s from taking information in, and letting it out, simultaneously. It’s from loving ourselves, and loving others (i.e. love=respect) in the same breath. It’s cultivating gratitude for the experiences, objects, and people in our life. It’s such a process that keeps our empowerment at a level that is in harmony within ourselves, and the world around us, allowing us to stay empowered, inspire others to be empowered, but without getting caught in becoming entitled.
Ranjeeth Thunga
rkt@perspectivemapper.com