Owning Your Own Power

I see people give away too much of their own personal power. While I'm not interested in power over other people, I see it as highly desirable to exercise your own power over yourself and your own life choices.

Mastery of our own power seems difficult for most people, but especially challenging for women. As women, we are socialized with the feminine archetype of the all-sacrificing, demure, other-centered mother who puts herself last. Most young women have trouble developing their own voice within relationships, advocating for what they need and want in an assertive way.

It always shocks me to be treating a bright, educated, talented young woman who allows herself to be verbally abused or otherwise mistreated in a love relationship. Many other young women are in relationships where they are so grateful to be loved and accepted that they pack away and sublimate their own desires, goals, and interests. It's as if young women believe we have to make a bargain, and give away part of ourselves to be in intimate relationships. You shouldn't have to do that, but first you need someone to remind you that you need to be yourself in close relationships, or it's not the right relationship for you.

How do you empower yourself?

1. You ask yourself what would you REALLY be doing or wanting if you were not afraid. Don't operate out of fear.

2. You keep working on your own personal goals, even when you are in a relationship. This might include career goals, more education, volunteer service, making and maintaining friendships, financial health, physical fitness, learning new things, developing your interests and passions, cultivating your spirituality, traveling, or learning a new skill. Remember, whatever happens in your relationship, you are with you, either way! Keep making you interesting, and keep growing.

3. Give up blame.

4. Take responsibility for yourself, your attitude, your mistakes, and your part in things.

5. Get some support. Most people feel more courageous when they are encouraged. Build your own supportive community. Find a therapist who can help you identify how to build yours. Consider deepening your existing support system by joining a support group, a meetup group, a women's or men's group, a book club, or a religious or spiritual group.

6. Give up playing 'victim'. Don't use victim language. Don't hope for a rescue, make some plans and set some goals. Act like you believe in yourself.

7. Learn to negotiate, and do it at work as well as in your close relationships. You may not be able to get what you want, but how do you know unless you try? Many partners and supervisors respect you more if you advocate respectfully on your own behalf.

8. Say hello to 'NO'. Boundaries have to be set and maintained with other people. Having limits gets you respected. Your yes means nothing if you aren't free to say no. Don't be a doormat. They get walked on.

9. Show some confidence. This isn't the same thing as arrogance. It isn't boastful or prideful. Humble confidence means you respect yourself.

10. Focus less on what other people think of you. People pleasing is overrated and exhausting.

11. Appreciate your unique qualities.

12. Work on accepting yourself, and speaking kindly to yourself on the inside. The power of our internal dialogue is huge. Become aware of what your inner voice is saying to you all day, and upgrade that criticism to encouraging, supportive self-talk.

13. Speak up. Say what you think, want, and feel. If you don't, you are going to be underrepresented in the relationship, and over time you may grow to resent the other person.

14. Don't sign up for any long-term relationship with a person who devalues you, demeans you, doesn't care what you want, or doesn't feel you are just as important as they are.

Recently, when I was participating in a large women's collective discussion, I noticed the dramatic difference between those we were fearful, and those who, in the words of writer and vulnerability researcher Brene Brown, were "daring greatly". Only you can decide to be you, undiluted by life's events and disappointments, and striving for a bigger life. Only you can play you at full strength. Don't settle for anything less.

Money, Relationships, and Power

The March 26, 2012 issue of Time magazine had an interesting article with fresh statistics on changes that have been occuring for women, men, and the balance of power in close relationships.

For example, 40% of working women make more than their partner does. In our children's generation, more families may be supported by women than men. Many men have been displaced from the workplace or are under-employed through the last few years of downturn in our global economy. Some careers have been permanently dismantled as industries change.

Here are some of the other trends:

• In dual-earner couples,women contributed an average of 44% of family income in 2008, up from 39% in 1997.
• Women out-earn men in part-time work, but men still earn more on an hourly basis in full-time work.
• Less than 1 in 5 married couples are supported by the husband alone.
• The percentage of children born to unmarried mothers has increased from 5% in 1960 to 41% in 2010.
• Women work more paid hours than ever, up from .6 hrs per week in 1965 to 22.2 hours per week in 2010.
• Most men do more to help at home than they did in the past. Men have about tripled the weekly time contributions they make to housework (up from .5 hours in 1960 to 2 hours a week in 2010), child care (up from 2.6 hours a week to 6.4 hours), and food prep and cleanup (up from .9 hours per week to 2.7 hours a week).

Women's increased earning power gives them more economic influence, at home and in the marketplace. A study by Pew Research Center found that when the husband brings in more income, buying decisions are made equally most often.When the wife earns greater income, she typically makes twice as many buying decisions as the man.

More households are headed by successful single women.Women's increased earning power steps up their confidence in asking for what they want and negotiating factors in relationships along new non-traditional lines. There are more unmarried couples living together and negotiating tasks and roles.

Earning power seems to make women more desireable. A 2001 study by University of Texas at Austin psychology professor David Buss and his colleagues found that from 1950 to 2000, there was a huge shift in how much weight men gave to a partner's earning power, relative to domestic skills.

Economic trends often require changes in society and relationships. In our lives, and certainly in our children and grandchildren's lives to come, these changes will impact their lives and choices. Girls need to prepare to have the training for a career so they have their own base of power from which to negotiate. Both girls and boys need to learn to participate fully in caring for children, sharing household tasks, managing money, and making decisions. No damsels in distress needed, better to help our damsels aim for success, instead. Earning more shouldn't give either partner the ability to dominate decision making or hold all the power. Mutual respect is still the key, and valuing each partner's contributions, whether at home, or in the marketplace.

In an upcoming book by Liza Mundy, called The Richer Sex,will be published in 2012 by Simon and Schuster, and go more in depth about some of the trends featured here and in the Time article.

In the future, money, decision-making power, and task assignments won't be able to be made only on gender assignment. None of these topics can be taboo before partners plan a life together. Instead of role assignments, perhaps we can shift to roles that are shared, or are preferred by the individuals involved, or with consideration for maximizing family earning power. Parenting will be more of a shared hands-on task in two-parent families. More children will be raised in single parent families.

Our world is changing, and our task is to adjust to it, and welcome less rigid roles to play as we partner, live, raise children, and create balance between work and family life.You know what this means: less assumptions, and more discussion about who does what, and how we create a life together. These changes might have a bright side. I always like less assumptions, and more discussion! We can't use the template of earlier generations in gender roles, family responsiblities, handling money, decision-making, and the distribution of power. It's time to create our own way, and respect the unique, differing gifts that we each bring to relationships and our shared life together.