The Power to Act

Why did this 62-year-old woman decide to do Tae Kwon Do? I can’t tell you the number of people who, when they hear I am a second-level brown belt, look at me wryly and ask, “Why?” It’s no little decision, not something I did on a whim or because others were doing it. I didn’t do it to learn to defend myself, although that is a great reason to do it. I wanted to know what it felt like to feel powerful all the time, and to create a container that would protect my nascent voice. I did it because I was sick of feeling contained and small, and forgetting that I had power. It was the natural next step of my personal and spiritual development. And, like most major change, it was preceded by a hard life lesson.

Two years ago, I was hired to coach a VP of Exploration whose team was in revolt to turn his working environment around. To clear the air, we were to hold an off-site meeting where the team members had an opportunity to tell Dave what they wanted and why they were unhappy. It was expected to be contentious. My contract was expanded to facilitate this meeting. Because the team was large with about 15 Type A personalities, I brought in my partner to assist with the day-long facilitation. It was a great opportunity to forge new inroads into this corporation at a very senior level. I was excited by the opportunity that was laid at my feet. It should have been a big win, but instead I won the battle and lost the war!

I failed that day because I turned over my power to my partner. Let’s be clear: he did not ask me to do it; I did it because I got scared and lacked confidence in my ability to facilitate the group process. Was there any evidence to back up my fear? No! A struggle happened between my right and left ears, in the dangerous battlefield that is my thinking. Doubt, that insidious villain, advanced upon me in the form of a rational plan. One hour before the meeting, I asked Bruce to lead the facilitation so that I could focus on my VP to ensure that he got the best coaching possible.

In case you think it was a reasonable plan, let me assure you that is what a good justification is—a little truth, but not the ‘Truth.’ A skilled saboteur can take the absurd and make it plausible; she can take cow paddies and make them a must-have for every clothes-conscious consumer. The day ended well. The VP was brilliantly coached in how to show up in the meeting, and the team members seemed to be receptive to the process that we orchestrate. And no blood was shed. At the end of the day, we shook hands and celebrated the day’s success—on the way home, we celebrated our brilliance at Starbucks. That happiness lasted for a fleeting 48 hours.

While the VP was out of town on vacation, his team circled back to the Regional VP and complained that my partner, not me, facilitated the day. I received a call to come to his office to discuss the situation. With that call, I knew that this was going to be one of those very expensive life lessons. Because of the dollars that were at stake, I understood immediately that the lesson was going to be about my turning over my power to Bruce. My actions had undermined the team’s confidence in me. I went to the meeting with my head held high and with a sense of calm that was surprising even for me. The milk was already spilled, and there was no way that I was going to be able to put it back into the bottle. I explained my thinking and had the opportunity to finish the process with the team on my own. It went well, which only cemented my realization that I could have conducted the process myself from the beginning. The lesson I learned was so big that I could no longer deny the elephant in the room. I had to find a way to consistently own my own power!

When I think back over the years, the evidence was strewn like litter along most highways. I was really good at letting others shine while I sat back safely in the shadows. I keep a picture of me sitting on the front stairs of our home: my twin brother sits on the first step while I sit demurely on the step behind him. Even at birth, I arrived after my twin, Jim who got fed first, while I waited quietly for needed nourishment. You could say that I was situationally predisposed to turn my power over to important people in my life; but that would make me a victim, and I’m not that.

Rather than an expose on the many ways I’ve denied my own power or my clumsy efforts to find my voice, I choose to focus on the most constructive things I’ve done to learn to own my power. People frequently ask me, “Why do you practice martial arts?” They are always surprised by my response. I practice Tae Kwon Do because I realized that I wasn’t consistent in how I owned my power and my voice. On good days, I was solid and sure of myself, and on other days, I moved back into my historical stance of being small and voiceless. What I knew was that more of the same would give me more of the same; and I was very tired of that! In the quiet recesses of my heart and soul, I knew that I mattered and that I had a lot of things to share and do. I had to take the tiger by her tail and wrestle her to the ground and that would take strength, not of will but of body. I needed to build a body that has an experience of her power.

In the practice hall, I am a natural teacher because I know the subtle ways that my body has shaped itself to be small and contained, because I’ve lived them. In each practice, I’m building a body that will not move silently into justifications that, although rational, still held me up at knife point and robbed me of my power. I practice Tae Kwon Do so that every muscle, bone and piece of connective tissue in my body knows, at a cellular level, that I will not give my power away willingly. That this beautiful chaise of a body, that contains my spirit and soul, is being re-engineered for performance. I stand tall in my body and solid in my spirit; I will fight, not just perpetrators from outside but also the insidious demons of doubt and fear that were locked into the fiber of my old body. Now when I look into a mirror, the person who smiles back at me knows in a body-felt way that she is magnificent and can kick butt!

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