Stepping into your power
By: Ashanti Callender
This time of year, we always hear about love. What does love mean to you besides being in a relationship or getting flowers and chocolate on February 14th? As a child, the first way I saw love outside of what I had seen at home was at school. Every Valentine's Day, we would distribute candy or cards to our friends, showing our appreciation for the relationships we have formed during our year in 2nd grade. In these settings we are taught that love is power. Someone giving us a little candy with a Mickey Mouse card instantly changed our mood. This token of gratitude we have received, gave the giver the power to know that they had the opportunity to make their friend smile.
When I mention love being power, I don't mean it in a negative connotation. I associate power with agency. Agency meaning that love gives us the conviction to turn feelings around, an action we bestow onto others, or love provides us with the freedom to act in our best interests. We hear about love ruling emotions and love between others, but never about the love we have in ourselves and how it gives us personal power.
Love is power. But what does it look like when we give this power to ourselves?
I call on each one of you reading this right now to think for 2 minutes how you have stepped into your own power. Maybe it's by taking more time to be by yourself, perhaps it's by following your dreams rather than listening to what society tells you to do, maybe you don’t even know how to step into your power. If that is you, here are a few ways to do so:
GET OUT OF COMPARISON MODE
One of the first things you have to consider when stepping into your power is how you lost it in the first place. Most of us lose sight of our inner-knowing once we step into comparison mode. Comparing yourself to others, who are on a completely different journey than your own, moves you off your path. Once you lose sight of your course, your power slowly fades away.
The reality is, we all compare ourselves to others. It is a nasty habit, especially with the social media age we have been in since 2011. However, getting rid of this nasty habit is through discipline. Dismiss the voice in your head that calls you to compare yourself to the next person. Each time that voice pops up and says, "well, look at this person., or why aren't you as good as…" yell at it. Yell at it inside your head or aloud. Just banish it from your thoughts. Doing this frees your mind from living in ego, so you can live in self-power instead.
LISTEN TO YOUR INTUITION
Our intuition fuels everything. Our intuition guides us where to go. Our intuition allows us to pause. When you trust your intuition, you can drown out the outside noise. When you trust your intuition, you can hear your heart's longing. When you hear AND follow that deep voice found amongst the external chaos, that's how you find your power.
LIVE AUTHENTICALLY
Now more than ever, we are being called to LIVE. Being on lockdown has forced us to return to ourselves and reflect on what kind of life we were living. Were we living for ourselves or others? Were we living for validation or self-satisfaction? When you remove the comparison mode you programmed in your mind and remove the doubt you placed on your intuition, you can begin living YOUR life. Not the life you watched the Instagram model have. Not the life your ego wants you to have. But the life YOUR soul wants you to have.
Love transcends time. As it transcends time, it manifests itself in different ways and meanings. When I was younger, love meant seeing my mom laugh. When I was a teenager, love meant getting attention from my crush. When I was in college, love meant loyalty. Today love means stepping into my power.
What does love mean to you?