POWER VERSUS STRENGTH - THE MASTERY OF SELF AND OTHERS
I have a tumultuous relationship with power. When I was younger, I believed that terms such as "power" and "strength" were synonymous, and prided myself on having plenty of both to go around. I've never been a tiny thing, never carried myself with grace and delicacy. My life has been filled with grandiose excess, for better or for worse. So while my sister perfected the specific manipulation of various limbs in intricately sporting ways, I lifted up one corner of the couch at a time so that my mother could vacuum underneath it.
My emotions as well have always tended towards one extreme or another, never quite finding the ability to rest at a happy medium. Finally receiving a diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder has helped me come to grips with this in the most logical fashion, but that is a goose for another gander. The point is rather that my mental will has always been as strong as my physical prowess. Yet as I grew more into myself physically, seeking to shrink away and hide my bulk, I found myself exerting power through manipulation of the mental realm.
These days I shudder to think what means I wa seeking to accomplish in those times. Looking back over the antics I displayed when suffering from this defect of mentalities would make the most self-assured among us blush. When I say that I sought power through the demeaning of others' intellectual perspectives, I do so with no sense of pride for the so-called "accomplishments" I was granted. In fact, the punishments enacted against me by the universe for such behavior have stripped away any sense of pride I once held for being "Right."
While some seek the acquisition of power, I now yearn to remove all traces of said force from my life.
Power is the father of inequality. Those who seek power seek to control some bit of the universe, and the pursuit of control is a game of bending another force to one's own will. Those who have mastered themselves are in many cultures regarded as the highest of their kind, while those who have mastered others are faced with a great faction of belief towards, depending upon the lens from which they are viewed. While in many ways our modern-day society looks to the powerful as The Almighty, I find these individuals to be among the most toxic to an inclusive harmony.
To me, those who seek to master others are treading down a life path which leads them purposefully and unprofitably away from self-awareness, assurance, and mastery. Power overextended begets further power overextended in a maniacal race to stay on what one views as the "top." To overpower a person is, as previously stated, an assertion of a desire to bend the will of the individual being victimized. Doing so is isolating, in that it forces the entire interacting community into one individual's will. To do this is to deny individuality, and thus to deny the pursuit of wisdom.
An individual who is truly wise accomplishes no sense of self-satisfaction from championing the "Right" opinion to those who may disagree, but ze realizes that wisdom is a force which can only be accomplished through the challenging of principles, which leads a person to develop strength.
Strength of will, strength of character, and strength of conviction. These are all admirable personality traits which indicate something entirely apart from power. To have true strength, to be masterful of oneself and one's emotions, is a most commendable tool. Those who are truly strong of self feel no need to deny others their own journey, their own path towards noble self-mastery.