How Is Empowerment So Easy/Why is It All So Hard?
Creating and/or finding empowerment can be so easy…but why is it also so hard?
One of my all-time favorite books is Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist.
If you have not read this book – I can’t recommend it enough. I don’t know that it matters what genres you typically read – this book is just amazing.
The central premise is the idea of living every day with purpose – and finding your way even when the way is blocked. This is told via fictional characters and situations, but rooted so clearly in this world that it goes beyond fiction. Probably why The Alchemist is one of the bestselling novels ever.
There is a point where the characters discuss the central text of alchemy – the Emerald Tablet. A text that many see to be so impossibly simple that they refuse to believe it can be that easy.
Thus, many who seek the Master Work – the Philosopher’s Stone and its ability to turn any metal into gold; and the Elixir of Life and its ability to cure all illness and even stop death – engage in in-depth, endless, scientific and philosophical study. They create massive tracts and endless experiments to achieve the Master Work.
The simplicity of the Emerald Tablet is considered too simple. So simple, there must be a trick. It can’t be that easy, can it?
I relate to this idea because on the one hand, choosing non-toxic positivity and other relatively simple notions for empowerment to better my life feels too easy. How is empowerment so easy?
But then, trying to actively work with it, why is it all so hard?
Belief in the unseen gets corrupted
Many of the religions of the world see miracles as the purview of God or some other mystical godlike deity. Miracles only happen through the intervention of this higher power or an intermediary like Jesus, Mohammed, or Krishna.
The power to create is not an external power. It’s internal. And it lives in you.
Awake or asleep, conscious or subconscious, you have a creative spark inside of you. Maybe you already work with that in your life – and maybe not. But you are a creator – in one form or another.
You’ve been – and are still being – frequently overrun by messages. Messages of the worthy and deserving, special, gifted, skilled, and talented individuals. Individuals who single-handedly change(d) the world. Or – an other-worldly figure inspiring life, the Universe, and everything and ultimately being the One True Creator.
All of this makes it super easy to disbelieve your own power. When messages you receive consciously and subconsciously tell you otherwise – in numerous ways – it’s easy for belief in the unseen and what that amounts to getting corrupted.
Some of this is not with ill intent. Some of the great stories of miracles I don’t think were meant to be taken so literally. I believe they were meant to inspire you and me to strive for our own creations.
For every known creator – hundreds are not known. When a team builds something that changes our world – are they not all creators? To make anything that is not in the physical universe now, you must believe in the unseen to create it.
No matter how significant or insignificant it – and you – might be or seem to be.
How is empowerment so truly easy?
When many people see or hear the words “positivity” or “mindfulness”, they often conjure in their minds complex ideas that hooky-spooky gurus and doctors of psychology throw around as cure-alls.
Both positivity – in its nontoxic, true form – and mindfulness are so easy. And being easy, they are readily available and useful tools for empowerment.
True positivity is not an all-the-time, positive thinking, no negative thoughts/ideas concept. It’s a choice of attitude that will be tested along the way – because shit can and will happen that will be negative. It’s the choice – after the shit happens – to refocus and take a positive-facing attitude rather than one of negativity or no direction.
Mindfulness is also incredibly easy. All it takes is being present, right here and now. When you are present, you can be consciously aware. And all it takes is one question – what am I thinking? (Also, that can be substituted with what am I feeling, how am feeling, what am I doing, what do I intend, and the like). That question can only be answered right now.
What you were thinking in the past isn’t what you are thinking now, and you have no idea what you will be thinking in the future. The answer to this question is only in the now. Asking and answering it, consciously, now, makes you mindful.
It truly is that easy to take greater control of your mindset/headspace/psyche self and choose things to change who, what, where, how, and why you are.
Why is it all so hard?
The short answer is the endless messages of disempowerment you get all the time.
Sadly, too many world leaders, politicians, business leaders, and religious leaders truly don’t want you empowered. Why? Because if you’re empowered, you have far less need for them.
The institutions we created to form a community and provide structure in various elements of our world have often gone rogue on us. The leaders of those institutions become greedy, control-obsessed, and power-obsessed to greater and lesser degrees. Sometimes intentionally and sometimes not so much.
Whatever the case may be –empowered people self-govern and make more choices for themselves. That’s why those leaders seek to disempower you and me. Can’t have that and retain the false power they have, can they?
Another thing making it all so hard is our lack of attention toward mental health. Mindfulness, positivity, and self-awareness live in your head, heart, and soul. When matters of mental health get bulldozed by matters of physical health, you’re further disempowered. Mental health being treated as lesser does a disservice to everyone.
When empowerment begins on the unseen, mental level – which gets derided, shunned, and disregarded – is it any wonder that it’s so hard?
What’s more, formal education tends to do nothing to focus on self-awareness. They barely touch on critical thought and reasoning anymore – and many reject both as “triggering” and uncomfortable.
As a child, you probably experienced physical growing pains along the way. Growth on every level comes with discomfort. That’s the nature of life.
There are many things you must unlearn to be better empowered. And you’ll meet a lot of resistance along the way.
Not all resistance is external.
Comfort zones are mislabeled
Human beings in this day and age love creature comforts. And the majority of the world has at least the basics – electricity, piped running water, and food. Beyond the basics – much of the world has amazing sources of comfort.
If you are reading this, you have comfort above and beyond the basics. Sure, you might be struggling in various ways – but the basics are covered. You’ve likely got things you do by rote, routine, and habit you practice regularly.
If you act to break out of your routine or habit, you likely meet some discomfort. A sense of wrongness or misstep that might even hold you back. That’s your comfort zone enfolding you in its downy softness.
But, you might think – I’m not comfortable there. Literally, no. What a comfort zone is is a sense of stability. It’s a sense of familiarity. A comfort zone is a known quantity – even when you would rather not call it your comfort zone.
This is a subconscious matter that becomes conscious via your ego-driven identity. A previous or current version of who – that you believe yourself to be – desires to stay there. Hence, it puts up resistance to chosen change.
Overcoming this is easy. Your empowerment of yourself. That comes through mindfulness and non-toxic positivity, among other things. Empowerment really is so easy – but can you see why and how it’s also all so hard?
Recognizing how empowerment is so easy isn’t hard
It’s all about working with mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, and intentions to direct your actions.
When you believe that empowerment is all too easy, recognize that this comes from a place of resistance created by both external and internal forces. Knowing that empowerment can be expanded by both mindfulness and an attitude of non-toxic positivity, you can see that – while it can look like empowerment is hard to come by – it’s truly as easy as these simple ideas put into conscious, active practice.
This empowers you – and in turn, your empowerment can empower others around you. Then that can expand to change the bigger picture matters, too.
Taking an approach to positivity and negativity – from the vast cylinder that exists between them – shifts matters in a way to open more dialogue. In that form, you can explore and share where you are between the extremes and how that impacts you here and now.
Choosing thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions for yourself employs positivity for realizing amazing potential and possibilities for your life.
Lastly, the better aware you are of yourself in the now, the more you can do to choose and decide how your life experiences will be. When that empowers you, it can also open those around you to their empowerment.
To me, that’s a worthwhile endeavor to explore and share.
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
This is the four hundred and seventy-seventh entry of my Positivity series. I hope that these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog, and spread the positivity.
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