Reclamation of Power

I close my eyes and exhale, dropping into myself the way one might allow themselves to drift down into dark, soothing waters. The sounds of my kids playing in the next room dull and I feel my body become lighter as though I’ve shed a restricting coat.

I ask myself a question. It’s short, as questions like this ought to be, but feels loaded as always.

“Does this feel powerful?”

And I wait. I wait for the answer to come in my body. Will I feel a sinking, recoiling sensation that I will want to escape from, or will I feel a surge of energy that makes me feel like I’m going to fly?

The surge does not come. I take another couple deep breaths and open my eyes, then respond to the message on my computer, asking me to do something.

“No, that doesn’t feel right for me. But thank you for thinking of me!”

My fingers itch to write more. To explain - to give a rational excuse as to why I’m saying no.

But no. I remove my hands from the keyboard and close the chat window. Explaining isn’t powerful either. Not right now, not for me.

If I’m honest, my excuses are empty, and the reason doesn’t matter either way. This request does not feel good to me, and so I will not do it. I do not need to expend my energy to make this person feel…what? What is it I’m trying to do? They either will take offense at my turning down their request, or they won’t. That is their responsibility, and their power. I’ll leave them to it.

Covenant Created

This is my New Year’s Covenant - to reclaim my power and stand in it as much as I humanly can.

I don’t do “Resolutions.” I feel surrounded by people who get all hyped up about their Resolution every single year, only to be hating themselves by February. It’s a shitty cycle that I feel disempowers people by setting them up for failure from the get-go. So I stopped engaging in it.

I thought about doing a promise or oath to myself, or a pledge, but none of these words worked for me. Because I am strange and I can’t do anything normally, I went with “covenant.” It feels powerful to my witchy soul.

Personal Power IS Wellness

Some people will say that this isn’t about wellness. That stepping into your power isn’t TRULY what we’re talking about here (assuming that people are stuck in thinking that we’re discussing health or fitness or habits.)

Here’s the thing though - what is wellness? The definition of wellness is “the state of being well or in good health.”

Physical health is important! I’m working on creating new habits and a support system for myself in the realm of what I do with and put into my body.

But mental health is also important. It’s a symbiotic system, where it’s difficult to have good physical health if your mental health is poor or overdrawn, and it’s hard to have solid mental health if your body isn’t getting what it needs - whatever that may be.

Doing everything from a place of your power isn’t an immediate fix-all by any means. It can take time for you to see the results that come from it. But here’s a great example of how making decisions from my power has helped me in the last month or so.

I have a long track record of eating things that I know are going to make me feel terrible, and eating too much of them in one sitting. Or too many times in a week. I know that too much processed sugar and carbs will make me feel achy and cause my focus to be worse than it usually is. But yet I kept finding myself raiding the treats I keep around for my kids and husband - yes, I know, I could just not have them in the house, but I feel that’s unfair to the members of the household who don’t binge-eat them.

And the craziest thing to me was that generally these weren’t even foods I liked! These were not my treats, because I’d stopped stocking the pantry with stuff I couldn’t seem to resist. But here I was, eating large amounts of crap foods that I didn’t even like!

I realized it wasn’t about having some kind of food I loved and couldn’t resist. This was about trying to create a happy brain chemical. Or this was my favorite way of punishing myself and making sure that I stayed overweight, feeling small, and not showing up in the world the way I wanted to be.

Not quite sure which it was, honestly. Might have been both. It doesn’t really matter. It was an unhealthy relationship with food that was being fueled by some kind of fear or anxiety-based thinking.

When I realized that I had a problem, I asked myself what I could do to fix it.

Unsurprisingly, the answer came in the form of what I teach other women. I guide women on how to stand in their power and come from that place, and we often teach what we struggle with most. I was falling off my own wagon, and instead of holding my power, I was handing it to the crap in the pantry.

I made the decision to take my power back, and since then, every time I find myself reaching for food, I ask myself “Is this powerful?” Often, the answer is no. No, you’re trying to distract yourself from the anxiety - how about we instead ask the anxiety why it’s here and what it thinks it’s protecting us from?

Sometimes the answer is yes! Yes, eating that slice of pie is in your power because you have been consuming mindfully today. And because it’s going to be delicious.

I’ve tried diets. So many low-carb and keto diets. And some people would say that it worked. I lost weight, I felt good . . . except I always slid back. I would give in to one thing, like pasta, and I would eat WAY TOO MUCH of it, and then I would hate myself and feel like a failure. And then I would eat something else I knew I would regret . . . rinse, repeat.

And it wasn’t just food. I would say yes to doing things because I wanted to make someone else happy, without asking myself if I really wanted to do it. Without checking if I had the mental or emotional bandwidth to do it. And I often ended up burnt out, convincing myself I was weak and a flake because I no longer wanted to do the thing, and resenting everyone involved. Myself most of all.

Deflecting the Brain’s Attack Function

I don’t remember the exact moment I realized I needed to ask myself if the things I did were from my place of power. But I DO remember the moment I realized I was doing it, and how my brain tried to rebel.

First it tried to tell me that this was stupid. A ridiculous method of allowing myself to not stick to a diet or exercise routine! I pointed out (to myself) that I hadn’t been sticking to anything anyway. So my brain took another route and tried to attack my lack of consistency in anything lately.

Then it attacked how I had taken “too long” to realize I was doing this. Normally this would have been a brutal train of thought that would have left me spiraling in anxiety and beating myself up.

But that day I just kept asking, over and over, “Is this coming from my power? Is that thought coming from my power? Would my power speak to me this way?”

And if the answer was no, I just dropped the thought and kept going. That isn’t to say the thought didn’t pop up again later, but I chose to not give it any more of my time and energy than I absolutely had to.

Each day it gets easier, as I turn checking in with my power into a habit. And some days are still hard when the anxiety and everything feels like it’s ganging up on me, but I know I’ll get back on top of it if I keep making sure to check in.

Being in our own power is scary. Especially in this world where we are constantly encouraged to hand our power to someone else (government, church, school, marketing agencies who convince us that we NEED fancy cars, clothes, fast food, etc.) it can even feel wrong to say “I am powerful and can make my own decisions about what is best for me.”

When we claim our own power, it takes it away from a lot of people who would much prefer us just let them hang onto it (usually because then we give them money.)

But really, this is the first and potentially most important step in creating a life you are truly happy with.

You Can Look Powerful, But Be Dying Inside

I have had friends who were in the bodybuilding industry. Who had these amazing photo shoots done that highlighted how they were sleek, muscular, and just the pinnacle of health . . . except years later they talked about how awful it was. How they were doing it because they were “supposed to” and that the painfully restrictive diets and constant working out to maintain this “perfect” body were absolute torture.

I'm not saying bodybuilding is bad or shouldn't be done! Don't get me wrong. But just like everything else, it must be done from the right place for each individual.

Can you imagine being so svelte that you were featured in fitness magazines, but deep down inside you were suicidal? I sure can’t. But there they were, dealing with dark thoughts because they were making decisions about how to run their lives from a place of fear, or other peoples’ expectations of them, or whatever it was. It certainly wasn’t from their power.

It’s A Different Kind of Decision Making, For Sure

Making decisions from your power may sound “woo” or cheesy to some people. It may sound like just another slice of New Age hippy dippy baloney. And that’s fine! Ask yourself if using a method like this is standing in your power. ;)

But for many of us, this is a new way of life. A sustainable lifestyle that is going to change everything going forward.

I want everyone to find this freedom - this power. I want people to know that to have a fresh start you don’t need a certain date, or a “resolution,” or anything like that.

What you need is the willingness to take your power into your own hands, and to measure everything you do up against it.

That isn’t going to fix everything overnight. But whether it’s food, working out, saying no when you don’t feel the “fuck yes,” or just making sure you’re taking more time for yourself and the things you love, making decisions from your personal power is your new compass for guiding you to what WILL change your life for the better.

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