Do ordinary people like us have power at all?
- 4 hours ago
- 3 min read
We’re taught to believe power belongs somewhere else: people with authority, status, titles, massive wealth, influence, and a seat at the table.
At times, it may leave us wondering where our own power comes from, when the rules seem to protect those already in positions of power, all while claiming to serve the public and the greater good.
But the ladder that promises power is also capable of collapsing overnight. Titles disappear. Roles reverse. The same system that once gave someone power can one day decide they no longer belong.
What can be granted can also be taken away.
What can be bought with money can always be overtaken with more money.
Have we been mistaking borrowed power for true power all along?
True power is rooted in the very inner authority that no one else can hand to you. The kind of authority you rarely discover through external validation, but one that reveals itself the moment you begin looking inward and deepens as you continue holding your faith close.
This power doesn’t just fall into your lap or knock on your door to remind you it’s there. It’s anchored in the unseen. It lives in your conversation with the divine. In the unshakable inner peace cultivated through daily disciplines, a clear conscience, and the continuous work of purifying your soul. In the love and light you choose to bring into this world. In keeping your heart open when life gives you every reason not to. In the courage you've built, especially at the edge of it all, when enough is enough and you choose to take real action. In the belief that you, too, can make a difference. That you, too, can speak up, even when your voice is shaken.
True power also becomes visible through our collective effort. Through the shared willpower that turns individual waves into an ocean. Through alliances that stand up for the wounded, the vulnerable, the underdog.
Not because a few people devoted their lives to it, but because enough ordinary people decided not to look away.
It’s the kind of power that doesn't announce itself but quietly changes everything familiar: communities, workplaces, sometimes even history.
It doesn't come from playing a game whose rules were never yours to set. It comes from rooting yourself in integrity and remembering, every single day, that you still have a choice.
Every day, you choose whether to become a little more cynical or a little more courageous.
Every day, you choose whether to shrink yourself or step fully into who you are.
Every day, you choose whether to leave the world exactly as you found it or make it slightly better before you’re gone.
What is on display can be taken away. What is untouchable is indestructible.
True power is built on substance and depth, not lipstick on a pig or castles in the sky. It’s not consumed by the endless cycle of the power game. It lies in quite the opposite direction, in the quiet confidence of someone who no longer needs permission to know what’s right. It’s not for show or something to place on a scale for comparison.
The greatest societal movements were rarely sustained by the highest titles or the loudest voices. They endured through ordinary people who chose integrity over comfort. Ordinary people who refused to betray their conscience, who spoke even when others tried to silence them, who chose to do the hard things despite not knowing if they’d succeed. Ordinary people like us, reminding one another what courage looks like.
Our job is to practice every day not becoming cynical, even when we keep returning to the same place that makes us feel like, "I've seen enough," again and again. To trust that there are checks and balances in this world beyond the ones we can see. To believe that hope is still possible, because hope is every one of us.
True power lives in ordinary people remembering that they were never ordinary at all.
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📍 Etéreo, Playa del Carmen, Mexico
🎶 Credit: Original Music
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