Powerful or Powerless: The Choice That Changes Everything (Part 2)

Powerful or Powerless, You Get to Choose

Do you ever feel completely out of control in your own life? Like your mood, your day, even your whole week, is being decided by someone else's choices and not your own?

There are two ways to move through your relationships. A powerless person believes what's out there is stronger than what's in here, so the job becomes managing everybody else. A powerful person knows the choices I make decide the quality of my life, so the job becomes managing me.

This isn't theory for me. Jo and I ran the powerless version for years without knowing it had a name. The material comes from Danny Silk's book Keep Your Love On, and it's some of the most freeing teaching we've come across.

Here's the good news buried in it. Powerful people know their life is the sum of the decisions they make, not the circumstances they're handed. You're not stuck waiting for anyone to change, apologise, or finally get their act together. You get to change the one thing that was always yours, you.

The Language That Gives It Away

You can hear the difference in the words people use. I have to. I can't. You made me. I'll try. Every one of those hands the wheel to something outside yourself.

Powerful people talk differently. I choose to. I will. I won't. Small shift in language, massive shift in ownership.

Helping Someone Without Rescuing Them

Galatians 6:1 says restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, watching yourself. Restore, not rescue. Five questions help you do that well: how's that working out for you, what do you need, what are you going to do about it, have you talked to them yet, and I can't work on your problem more than you do. If it's needed, add one more: I've got some suggestions, do you want to hear them.

None of that takes the problem off someone or leaves them stranded. It hands strength back to the person who actually needs to carry it.

What Changes When You Own Your Decisions

You don't need everyone around you to shift for your week to look different. You need one thing, good decisions, made by you, today. That's not a smaller life. It's a genuinely free one.

Want the full teaching? Listen to the episode here