The problem with feeling powerless is that it squashes our innate desire and potential to change and improve ourselves and the situations we are in.

Powerlessness isn’t a feeling. It’s not an emotion like fear, hurt, anger, sadness, or joy. Although we might use the words, ‘I feel powerless’, powerlessness is really a thought. It’s a state we’ve put ourselves in by our own thoughts. We do not get robbed of our power, we give it away.

Since powerlessness is our own thoughts and since we can indeed control our thoughts, we are not really powerless. We put ourselves into this state of powerlessness and we can choose to take ourselves out of it.

We may be afraid or angry at the situation. We may feel very uncomfortable with the ambiguity and uncertainty of a situation. We may think (or feel) that a situation has stripped us of our control. But we are never completely powerless, each of us always has a wellspring of power within us.

It may be true that we can’t always control our circumstances, but we can always control our reaction to our circumstances – our outlook, our attitude, and ultimately our actions. In Victor Frankel’s book, Man’s Search of Meaning, he talks about the freedom to choose our response.