What Does It Mean to Be Powerful?

May 18, 2003

Lone Jensen

No, I did not chose this topic because we have our Annual Meeting later today though that is a good example of where the real power resides in Unitarian Universalist congregation, with each and every member. If you are member here does that make you feel strong and powerful? Now, if you are a visitor, you should know that this congregation is governed democratically which does give each of us limited power. After all we only have one vote per person. Except maybe in Texas where lately some of the Democrats went into self imposed Oklahoma exile to avoid voting on a particular bill that would have re-districted Texas and changed the balance of power. Then some of the Republicans asked the State troopers to bring them back by force. Oh, power can do strange things to adult human beings and make us act more like children in a school yard fighting but without any teacher to intervene. And say: now go to your separate corners and sit and think about your behavior! Power can intoxicate, seduce and reduce us when it becomes and end in itself but it can also uplift, ennoble and affirm our best selves. A deep sense of powerlessness can kill the soul. It can bring about violent and hopeless rage, hopeless because it seems the only way out is through more violence.

We have seen too many images lately of impotent and futile rage. There were bombings this week in Saudi Arabia and Morocco and sadly business as usual in Israel where a tiny flicker of hope for peace seemed to provoke once again a firestorm of violence in an attempt to snuff it out. The sheer physical and technological power of the US military assured a quick victory but so far an uncertain peace. But it was a photograph in the Arizona Republic that really inspired this sermon. Two days ago on the front page was a picture of a grieving man sitting in an empty dilapidated bus. Some of you may have seen it. He cradled in a plastic bag, tenderly, the remains of a dead relative from yet another mass grave found in Iraq. It was in many ways a powerful photograph. The reality of the horror and brutality of a regime built on fear shook me once again. But the human love and tender grief of that man was what really moved me. I wondered how many years he had waited to find out what had happened, how long it had been before he could at last grieve openly and hold those bones against his heart. For all that time he had remembered and loved the memory of that person that had been so cruelly torn away. The power for good and the power for evil were both there in one snapshot and evoked compassion and anger. What forces determine how we use our powers? What does it mean to be powerful? What nurtures compassion and what feeds brutality? What raw hunger for more and more power is it that makes a dictator tick? Is it possible, as in the fairytale The Wizard of Oz, that behind every feared tyrant is a fake, a wounded and insecure self, someone who actually feels powerless? The North Korean dictator Kim Jung Il is reported to have said to a woman interviewer: “Aren’t you surprised to see that this noble leader has the outward appearance of a toad? “ It is not reassuring to know that this dangerous angry little boy plays with nuclear toys.

In her book Feeling Strong Ethel S. Person has a very different take on what she calls authentic power. Power is the ability to exert command over the self. Power is also the ability to maintain relationships, the capacity to mediate the inevitable power clashes that arise in our personal and professional relationships and to exert influence on others. It is the ability to forgive, to work at our relationships, and to accept the fact that our self interest may sometimes conflict with that of our loved ones.

What she describes is familiar, admirable but certainly not how much of the world’s rulers see power. It is impossible to imagine Saddam Hussein, who killed even family members, forgiving anyone. Any sign of weakness in his world meant certain destruction. Most of us here are lucky enough never to have to live in such a society. Power for us remains in the ordinary realm for which I am grateful. But we would do well to remember that there are seeds of the tyrant and longings for absolute power in every one of us. Have you ever dreamt about winning the lottery? Have you thought about what you would do with such powers? Power in and of itself is neutral, neither good nor bad, nothing more or less than a force or an energy. Very much like money.

When we feel power less we are more likely to day dream about being someone else, someone powerful in ways we are not. In the gym one of my favorite exercises is the rowing machine. Not that I am very good at it. To keep going I day dream. On the outside I am a middle aged woman in a T-shirt, slightly overweight, getting red faced and sweaty at a pace someone younger and more fit would find very easy. But in my mind I am an explorer, a female Viking warrior in a open wooden Viking ship with a dragon head rowing across the Atlantic to discover perhaps America. I have to keep going or I will not survive. Salt winds blow in my face. I fear nothing, I am woman, I am powerful. Well it keeps me going for another 10 minutes or so.

Childhood teaches us much of what we know about power. If you are a parent you know how many ways your child will test you, trying to get her way. As children we learn how to use a range of different power ploys. A new baby has all the power of the weak. In most people the utter dependence brings out caring and compassion. We want to protect the innocent, the powerless. But children also can be small tyrants. Toddlers are struggling to learn how to control their own impulses, a prerequisite for the acquisition of personal power. The writer and psychoanalyst Judith Viorst describes how you sometimes hear a child mumbling about whether or not to do something forbidden: “I will take the cookie. No, I shouldn’t.” Not only “no and yes” but also “should and shouldn’t”

If all goes well we grow up with some measure of authentic power that comes from a strong sense of self. But many do not. Sometimes the sense of self is so wounded or so lacking that it drives people to fervently seek the outward signs of power that are never really enough to satisfy the emotional hunger. Others meanwhile judge us by our perceived power. Mark Twain once remarked: “In Boston they ask, now much does he know? In New York, how much is he worth? In Philadelphia, who were his parents?” In Washington the story goes Mrs. Cafritz called the wife of Congressman Joe Casey to invite the couple over for drinks one evening. After Mrs. Casey replied that they would love to tome, the conversation continues: ‘I understand your husband has just been nominated to be secretary of Labor.’ said Mrs. Cafritz. ‘That’s right,’ replied Mrs. Casey. ‘Well.’ continued Mrs. Cafritz, if he gets confirmed, we would love to have you stay for dinner.’

It is very common and very dehumanizing to be judged this way. In our society to be powerful too often means that you can control others. Person describes a fictional boss Mr. Jackson who was critical, stingy with praise, and controlling toward his employees. This aggressiveness appeared to be the way he protected himself from experiencing any conscious sense of weakness. Under the guise of upgrading her, he sent his wife to a speech therapist to “remediate” her accent, and he made innumerable other assaults on her self-image and self-esteem. What he was doing was projecting onto her the loathing he felt for himself. As I read this I am struck by how fragile such a seemingly powerful person really is. Our shadow side cast large becomes society’s prejudice, racism, homophobia, our scapegoats the other, the stranger, the ones who are not like us. Projected loathing! The mirror image of that person is someone who can only see themselves as victims. Their weakness becomes their power tool. What if the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. What if everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us?

Maybe when I say power you think control. In this rapidly changing world, in our anxious times, where we seem to live in a state of constant transition the words power and control are often seen as the same. But they are not. Control actually limits power, restrict it, sets boundaries. We control our impulses, we control our weight, we try to control our children, but control can in itself become debilitating. I grew up learning all too well how to control my anger. But I was not taught, as few of us are, how to use this same anger for good. I turned it inward instead. Let me quote Marge Piercy: A good anger acted upon is beautiful as lightening and swift with power. A good anger swallowed turns the blood to slime. Her point, as I see it, is that anger is another source of power. It can be used for positive energy. For many women, who have learned all too well to let other’s needs always come before their own, it may take just such an anger to realize that perhaps the only life you can save is your own.

What we need are new definitions of power according to James Hillman. The legendary heroes Hercules, who diverted whole rivers to clean up old messes; Marduk, who drained the sucking swamps; Moses, who freed his people and drowned their pursuers. These are take-charge figures of command and control. Whatever stands in the was can be met by fixing or fighting. Power has been defined for us by our inheritance . The statuary in our parks, the stories in hour schoolbooks, the program notes at the concert reinforce heroic accomplishment against odds by effort of will. Power is persuasive force, muscular struggle, decisive command, productive results, widest practical usefulness,. Power is imaged by the winner, even the slayer.

Today, the heroic challenge forces a confrontation with heroism itself. Heroism is asked to face its own myth, thereby releasing the imagination to find other ways to think about power which has been defined for so long by heroic notions… Today we need heroes of descent, not masters of denial, mentors of maturity who can carry sadness, who give love to aging, who show soul without irony or embarrassment. Better sadness in high places--Lincoln as example--than endemic depression in the population and the economy. The legendary heroes of the ancient world--Persephone, Orpheus, Dionysus --descended into hell to learn other values than those that rule the daily business of sunlit life. They come back with a darker eye that can see in a dark time.

Darker eyes that can see in a dark time. A descent into the underworld? Is that really what we need? The world seems harsh enough in sunlight. Still he has a point. How do we define who is a hero? What does it mean to be powerful? And how do we re- claim our own powers?

Maybe we need to look at it another way. Williamson writes: Our deepest fear is not that we are in adequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. While that is a bit simplistic still I think we often deny our own authentic power. Ralph Waldo Emerson said: “Insist on yourself, never imitate”

As a movement our relationship with power and authority is marked by a deep ambivalence. Unitarian Universalists who proudly claim the label of unrepentant heretics sometimes refuse to admit that we do in fact have considerable powers not to mention privilege. We are not on the outside of society but in fact insiders. Our role is much more than just to challenge the status quo, our role is to help heal the wounds and to build a better world. One person at a time. This congregation has chosen to move forward and claim its own power. We will have the space to grow and be a strong and powerful voice here in the Valley. Power also means responsibility.

As Jameson writes the world is ruled by power. But perhaps it would be better to say that is it ruled by powers, plural not singular. Power like love comes in seemingly endless varieties. In the photograph I mentioned earlier I find both love and power, brutality and tenderness. We chose daily which it is to be.

If we have a mission here it may be radical acceptance of our own and others imperfections. This is power. In the emotional realm, it’s hard to overestimate the constructive power of love, compassion, forgiveness, and mercy.

Our deepest sense of self-worth rests on how we feel we are appraised by those we let truly know us. To be known and still loved may be the greatest gift of all. After fifty years of ministry a colleague was asked what he had learned. He said: Every Sunday I stand in the pulpit and say: I love you and God loves you. Now go home. I agree with the essence of his answer. But as you go ponder these last words about power.

The impulse to power is a kind of life force that propels us into the world to sing our song.

Selected sources:

Kinds of Power, the Guide to its Intelligent Uses by James Hillman

Feeling Strong, The achievement of Authentic Power by Ethel S. Person, M.D.