In Twelve Step programs, the first step, as I understand it, is recognizing that we are powerless to heal alone.

We cannot overcome addiction, trauma, or systemic oppression through sheer willpower or individual effort. Healing, recovery, and meaningful change require connection, support, and systems that foster growth.

All true! But we should not make a virtue out of being powerless.

Recognizing what is beyond your ability isn’t the same as accepting that you are powerless to change. Powerlessness is, in fact, a protective response that disconnects us from our personal power.

When we conflate protection with powerlessness, we risk internalizing the very dynamics that keep us trapped in authoritarian systems—whether in families, partnerships, workplaces, faith communities, or governments.

Power-over systems create environments where speaking up feels dangerous, where challenging authority risks humiliation or exile. But no matter the system or oppression, we always retain what Right Use of Power methodology calls our personal power. And that’s precisely why authoritarian structures work so hard to make us feel otherwise.

Owning your personal power in an authoritarian system requires deep, intentional work. And we cannot do it alone.

My guest today will introduce you to the types of power in the Right Use of Power framework and help you reconnect with your personal power so that you can stand firm and do hard, scary, necessary things.

Dr. Amanda Aguilera currently serves as the Executive Director of the Right Use of Power Institute and a Trusted Advisor at The Ally Co. She has dedicated most of her career to helping people and organizations understand systems, conflict, and social power dynamics to create right relationship and a sense of belonging. She has a knack for making difficult conversations easier, complex ideas more accessible, and resistance more workable. Integrating power, contemplative practices, neurobiology, and restorative practices, she works by finding a balance of head and heart and facilitating the co-creation of strategic maps that lead us forward in a more equitable way.

 

 

Listen to the full episode to hear:

• How the Right Use of Power framework gave Amanda language to understand and articulate power
• Why power itself is fundamentally neutral
• How Right Use of Power reframes power as a dynamic and not a possession
• Breaking down the six types of power from personal to universal
• Why direct challenges to status power are so often destabilizing 
• How undeveloped personal power leads people to do harm with their role and status power
• Why we have to become aware of how power exists in our relationships
• How developing our personal power helps us to participate in the collective power that can actually challenge systems
• How leaders can foster healthy power differential relationships

 

Learn more about Dr. Amanda Aguilera:

• Right Use of Power Institute
• Instagram: @rightuseofpowerinstitute

 

Learn more about Rebecca:

• rebeccaching.com
• Work With Rebecca
• The Unburdened Leader on Substack
• Sign up for the weekly Unburdened Leader Email

 

Resources:

• EP 88: Right-Use-of-Power: Navigating Leadership Dynamics with Dr. Cedar Barstow
• EP 14: Consenting to Grief as a Leadership Practice with Dean Nelson, PhD
• Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps, Richard Rohr
• All About Love, bell hooks
• Marie Beecham
• Alt National Park Service
• Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls, Kai Cheng Thom
• Indigo Girls – Closer to Fine
• Pose
• The Karate Kid 
• Star Wars

 

Transcript:

[Inspirational Intro Music]

Amanda Aguilera: Power is simply the ability to have an affect or influence. It’s fundamentally neutral. It’s how we participate in it that ultimately determines its outcome. Thinking about it as a thing that you can possess actually leads us to more of a commodified understanding of power, which is quite dangerous because commodities get their value from scarcity, and when we, as human beings participate in scarcity, we show up in a very different way. Understanding power as a thing you possess puts all our focus on trying to get it or keep it. Whereas in Right Use of Power, we talk about power more as a dynamic or as a verb.

[Inspirational Intro Music]

Rebecca Ching: Hey, Unburdened Leaders! I am so glad you’re here for this episode. I have a little housekeeping to take care of first before we dig into the show. First, you might notice my voice sounds a little weird. I’m coming off my first and worst case of Laryngitis. So, while I sound like I smoke a pack of cigarettes on the regular, it’s just that I’m still healing and I want to keep the show going, especially with some of these episodes that we planned. So raspy voice it is! Thank you for your grace.

And second, I would be honored if you took the time to rate, review, and share this episode with anyone you think may benefit from it. It helps us expose the show to new eyes and ears, and I’d really appreciate it if you could do that. So thank you!

__________________

Today’s show originally was gonna drop a few months later than it is dropping. But it got bumped up in the calendar, and it started when I emailed one of my producers right after I interviewed my guest and said, “I think I want to drop this ASAP.”

2:08

And they run a tight ship, and so, I knew the chances were slim, and they have a very well-oiled machine and navigate a lot. So I knew it was a big ask, and at first, they said, “No, we can’t swing it. But we’ll get it out soon.” I was like, “Fine.” I’m a big fan of just ask, let people say no. Then one of my producers, Sean, started listening to the episode and pinged me shortly after and he’s like, “Okay, I get why you want to bump this up, and we’re gonna make it work if you can turn your part around quickly.” So a special thanks to everyone at Yellow House Media for getting this to you at this time.

And what moved us to bring this episode to you sooner rather than later stems from the topic: power. And more specifically, we’re gonna talk about a methodology I refer to a lot on this show called Right Use of Power. Those of you who’ve been around the show for a while may have heard my interview with Cedar Barstow, who is the founder of Right Use of Power, and that dropped several months ago. And when planning for this year, I knew it was essential to have another conversation about this lens on power given all that’s happening — as I’m gesturing, you can’t see me, but sense me gesturing all that’s happening in our country, in our world, as it offers a very valuable framework as we lead and do life right now. And I’m thrilled to introduce you to one of the incredible leaders of this approach to power and share this conversation with you. And make sure you subscribe to me on Substack so you can join or follow the conversation as we debrief this approach to power and all that we talked about in this conversation.

I’m Rebecca Ching, and you’re listening to The Unburdened Leader, the show that goes deep with humans who navigate life’s challenges and lead in their own ways. Our goal is to learn how they address the burdens they carry, how they learn from them and become better and more impactful leaders of themselves and others.

4:15

A few days ago, prior to recording this, in my Sunday School class, my friend and teacher Dee Nelson, who’s also a friend of this podcast, led us through a chapter of Richard Rohr’s book Breathing Underwater. And it’s about this intersection between the 12 steps and spirituality. Our discussion focused on the first step of the 12 steps and the concept of powerlessness and its importance in the recovery process. And as I understand it, the first step, as many clients and friends have taught me, is recognizing that we’re powerless to heal or do this thing called life alone. You know, we can’t overcome addiction, trauma, let alone systemic oppression through sheer willpower or individual effort. Healing, recovery, and meaningful change require connection, support, humility, and systems that foster growth within and around us, right?

But as our conversation in Sunday School unfolded, for me, and this is kind of like a curse, right? Even Dee was like, “I know, we’ve got a couple therapists in the group today, and I want to hear from them,” and I don’t want to be that person, but this is something I really care about, and I noticed kind of a troubling conflation that was happening that the idea that powerlessness itself is a virtue rather than a protective response that disconnects us from our power, and I think this distinction is critical because so many people are feeling and sensing powerlessness, “What do I do? What can I do?” feeling shut down, and surrendering the belief that you can control your addiction isn’t the same as resignation. Recognizing what’s beyond your ability isn’t the same as accepting that you are powerless to change or be a part of change.

6:24

So when we conflate protection with powerlessness, we risk internalizing the very dynamics that keep us trapped in these authoritarian-type systems, whether in families, partnerships, workplaces, faith communities, schools, and yes, governments. And my training in Family Systems has shown me that authoritarian structures, whether in a home, a school, a workplace, or a nation, are not designed to honor any kind of personal or collective power. They demand compliance without question. They enforce rigid hierarchies. They punish descent, not always through overt force, but definitely can go there. But often through reputation damage, shame, psychological manipulation, and when caregivers, mentors, bosses, teachers, those we’ve trusted to lead and care for us impose these dynamics on us, the impact lingers and echoes throughout our life and how we show up.

Relational trauma leaves an imprint on the nervous system. Even after deep healing, our bodies still recognize the threat of an authoritarian dynamic when it shows up in our present lives. These power-over systems create environments where speaking up feels dangerous, where challenging authority risks humiliation, exile, or worse, and many of us have learned, often at significant cost, that silence is the safest option.

8:08

But y’all, here’s the truth. Feeling powerless is an emotional response, and it’s not fact. No matter the system of oppression, we always retain what Right Use of Power methodology calls our personal power. We’re gonna dig into this more in my conversation. And this personal power that we connect to, that’s precisely why authoritarian structures work so hard to make us feel powerless, because when we connect with our power, look out! And as leaders, we need to face these kinds of challenges head on. The systems around us are designed, often, to disconnect us from connecting to our power and make us believe we’re powerless to create change, to have us kind of fall into comfort, to submission, and this is why we need to develop and really redefine and connect to our own power now more than ever.

Now, if you’ve been listening to The Unburdened Leader, you know that the Right Use of Power framework is foundational to my approach to leadership. It’s a core pillar of The Unburdened Leader framework. So when I hear the phrase “surrender your power” used in ways that encourage passivity, even if well-intended, I’m gonna push back. Yes, we need to release protective hubris and unhelpful coping mechanisms and rugged individualism, and over 20 years of working with people has shown me how transformative that kind of work can be. But surrendering to authoritarianism, to oppression, to systems that thrive on keeping us small, that’s not healing. That’s harm.

When our bodies shut down in response, we need to understand that this isn’t failure. It’s a survival response. But it’s one that doesn’t actually protect us in the long run.

10:12

Instead, we need to build our capacity catalyst, the inner and outer supports that allow us to stay the course, to stay true to our values, to create spaces where others can also remain connected to their agency and power even in the face of grief, overwhelm, and vulnerability.

Now, right now I hear from so many people who feel powerless, right? Some feel silenced. Some believe this moment won’t affect them, so they disengage. Some are filled with rage, betrayal, and pain because they’ve been warning people for years these kinds of things would happen in our country, only to feel ignored. And others just can’t be bothered with all this, what they call, drama, right? There’s a whole spectrum. All of this is not about a lack of power. It’s an undeveloped relationship with our personal power. And we’re gonna dig into what this means more in our conversation. I just want to reassure you. But I want you to start thinking about this because when we develop our personal power, we increase our ability to stay regulated and connected which, we learned in our conversation with Deb Dana, is such a powerful way to navigate overwhelm and dysregulation even in difficult and high-stakes conversations and challenges.

Now, this is a theme that runs through everything I teach and do in my work with Unburdened Leader clients, right? We work on Self leadership. We work on shame resilience. We work on nervous system regulation and more, all tools to help us lead ourselves and others well, no matter what’s before us.

12:00

And this is long-term work, and y’all, it’s never ever too late to start. And going back to my roots again in Family Systems Theory, it teaches us authoritarian structures don’t welcome change, right? They’re rigid. They demand obedience and allow little room for negotiation or descent.

And if you were raised in this and then now are experiencing it in another dynamic, that’s a lot, right? Because, these systems, they use shame and isolate those who step out of line. They demand so much from others, but it’s not a reciprocal system, right? They withhold warmth and compassion. They punish and they’re punitive in really consistently inconsistent ways. They restrict autonomy and agency, offering no grace for mistakes. They use mistrust and control to manipulate and confuse. You start questioning yourself, right? At their core, these authoritarian systems rely on a fundamental lie that you’re powerless, your voice doesn’t matter, and your resistance is futile.

I think this is why this conversation is so important right now because if you, listeners, are connected to your power, that means you’re helping others connect to their power. Even as we’re moving through WTF, right? And even if you’re not, I think it’s essential that we look at this because the greatest threat to authoritarian power is your belief in your personal power, that it is something that you have and only you can give up and delegate because when we connect to our own power and develop Self leadership, and the skills to regulate our nervous system, we stay present and we stay focused.

14:01

We become unmanageable to those who rely on fear to maintain dominance. I mean, this is classic. Things that I studied in power control, in relational dynamics, family dynamics too, right? And that terrifies people when you’re not manageable. At least it terrifies the people that have this authoritarian lens. And here’s the thing. You become a magnet for others who desire to lead with more courage and clarity right now. I know that’s what you want.

Now, Right Use of Power teaches this kind of mind-blowing concept that power is neutral but it’s how we use it which determines whether it leads to harm or is healing. And when we exist within authoritarian dynamics, especially if we carry trauma from these kinds of systems in our story, it’s painful, it’s exhausting, and again, often shame-inducing. Many people survive by shrinking, by self-silencing, by compromising their values in order to maintain safety. Part of these systems want to demoralize. It is a shock to the system to the best of us.

And I think that’s why this conversation feels so timely because feeling powerless is often a sign of nervous system dysregulation, a survival response. But this response is not the truth of who we are. It’s not our wholeness. It’s a response, a very understandable one. So here’s the reality: whether in an authoritarian family, a toxic workplace, an oppressive faith community, or an authoritarian government, these systems count on your silence. And I just want to talk about, too, the silence that you’re choosing to stay silent, not the pause to regroup, to reflect, to plan, to learn, to organize. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m not talking about social media silence, you know, and you’re not speaking up. No, no, no. I’m talking about where you are either having a protective response or a choice to say, “Nope, I’m not going to engage,” right? “I’m not going to speak up. I’m not gonna take action when I disagree,” or “I’m not gonna slow things down,” right? These systems rely on your disconnection to your power.

16:39

When you develop a relationship with your agency and your power, when you build Self leadership, again, regulate your nervous system, strengthen your shame resilience (there’s a theme here; I’m repeating this on purpose) you gain the capacity to face discomfort, you navigate threats differently, you stand firm even when the systems are trying to wear you down. And y’all, this isn’t just a  mindset shift, okay? Owning your power in an authoritarian system requires deep, intentional work, right? This is what I’ve seen people do day in and day out who are healing from these kinds of systems that they grew up in or were exposed to early in their life. It requires values work, again, Self leadership, boundary setting, grief processing, and y’all, we can’t do it alone.

Now, those familiar with Internal Family Systems know that healing happens in relationships, both internally with our inner system and externally. And the truth of the matter is it’s much easier to do the hard, scary, necessary things when we’re in community. So I want to acknowledge the feelings of powerlessness so many are experiencing right now, yeah, makes sense. It’s understandable to think, “I can’t make a difference.” It’s understandable to feel, “What’s the point?” It’s understandable to wonder, “Maybe if I just go along, I’ll be okay.”

18:11

These responses aren’t failures, they’re survival strategies. But every survival response has a story, and my hope is that this conversation with my Unburdened Leader guest today will help you reconnect with your personal power while developing an understanding of other types of power in the Right Use of Power framework because no matter what, forces are counting on your silence. So let’s get into it! Let me introduce to you my Unburdened Leader guest for this show, Dr. Amanda Aguilera.

Dr. Amanda is the executive director of the Right Use of Power Institute and a trusted advisor at The Ally Co. She has dedicated most of her career to helping people and organizations understand systems, conflict, and social power dynamics to create the right relationship and a sense of belonging. She has a knack for making difficult conversations easier (I’ve seen this firsthand in my trainings with her) and she can make complex ideas more accessible (which you will see today) and making resistance more workable. Integrating power, contemplative practices, neurobiology, and restorative practices, Amanda works by finding a balance of head and heart and facilitating the co-creation of strategic maps that lead us forward more equitably. How cool is that? I cannot wait for you to get to know Amanda. So you all, please welcome Dr. Amanda Aguilera to The Unburdened Leader podcast!

20:03

All right, everybody! Dr. Amanda Aguilera, welcome to The Unburdened Leader podcast! I’m so glad you’re here. Anyone who is a long-time listener of this show knows that as soon as I was exposed to Right Use of Power work, this has been quickly integrated into all of the work I do and also just how I move around in all the spaces I’m in. So I’m really grateful for you to come here and talk a little bit deeper about the Right Use of Power. So thank you for being here!

Amanda Aguilera: Ah, thanks so much for inviting me! It’s an honor to be a guest.

Rebecca Ching: So, before we get into the nitty gritty about the Right Use of Power framework. I want to hear a little bit more about you and your relationship with power and what originally shaped the way that you move through the world in terms of how you saw power?

Amanda Aguilera: Mm, wow, that’s a big question, and I’m actually going way back to childhood. And I won’t spend a lot of time there. But, you know, my family on both sides are from the rural South, and my own family was kind of conservative, Christian, Republican, military family. And so, there were a lot of confusing things that were said about power when I was young, and it never made sense to me, and yeah, there were a lot of things like racism or physical punishment or things like that. And I couldn’t understand why everyone was acting like it was a normal thing, and I was called too sensitive or those kinds of things.

Rebecca Ching: Too much, right? Too much, too sensitive.

Amanda Aguilera: Too much! Too much. You know, “You can’t get so upset about these things.” And so, I think I just, from the very beginning, have been really confused about power, to be honest, and curious about it.

22:13

And I was also really influenced by how my dad used power. He was a very interesting person in that he had these — you know, he was military and Republican and Christian and conservative, and he was also the best listener I’ve ever met in my life and really modeled and showed me how to listen with curiosity even if it’s a completely different view from yours.

Rebecca Ching: Wow.

Amanda Aguilera: So I think that shaped me pretty early on, and not to say that I haven’t misused the different types of power that I’ve had access to over the years because certainly I have. But yeah, that was the initial start.

Rebecca Ching: Thank you for sharing that because a lot of times, with our own biases, we can assume because of a role someone holds that this is how they are. I love that you brought in that complexity. I’m wondering if there was a specific moment where you really questioned your understanding of power?

Amanda Aguilera: I mean, I would really have to say it was in Cedar Barstow’s Right Use of Power workshop when I took that, I don’t know, 15 years ago. That was the turning point for me of, like, “Oh, I thought I understood this, and I actually had no idea.” And I didn’t really bother to investigate my understanding of power before that.

Rebecca Ching: Yeah, this work really is kind of like a head explosion.

Amanda Aguilera: [Laughs] Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: For sure. I think especially particularly for women too. What was the turning point that shifted how you approach power today? Was it attending that workshop, or was there something even where you decided this is gonna be a whole different trajectory?

24:12

Amanda Aguilera: When I took that workshop, it was like this moment of, “Oh, this is my work,” right? “This is my life’s work.” And I knew it right away and started trying to be around Cedar as much as possible after that. Luckily, she became a mentor of mine. I happened to be working on my doctorate and started writing about it in my dissertation and pitching it and developing it. So it’s really been a deep, personal, professional, and academic exploration for a good 15 years now.

Rebecca Ching: I can’t help but wonder, too, when you started rethinking how you saw power and your relationship with power, did that usher in some grief, maybe even some anger, frustration? How did you metabolize this new framework with your lived experience up until that moment?

Amanda Aguilera: I think the primary experience I had was relief.

Rebecca Ching: Mm.

Amanda Aguilera: To have language to talk about it, something that I felt a long time but I didn’t have the language for. And the framework for really understanding it in a different way. Yeah, all the tension and frustration I felt over my lifetime about people not feeling — and, you know, this is a common experience with a neurodivergent brain anyway. Yeah, with people not seeing atrocities in the world with the same degree of intensity that I felt or saw it.

26:00

So it was a relief that, “Oh, there’s another way to access an understanding of power other than cognitive understanding,” because Right Use of Power uses a very somatic, embodied approach, which is so critical for us to start to learn how to access that wisdom.

Rebecca Ching: Yeah, and I think that’s so powerful because there are kind of these schools of thoughts, right? Where, you know, we’re thinking people who feel or we’re feeling people who think. All of that kind of approach to growth mindset, you know, is you think it and then you feel it. But my training, my lens is more of we feel things and sometimes don’t even have the language for it until we start to get these frameworks and can move through it. So I really appreciate that. So let’s get into the Right Use of Power framework a little bit.

We were chatting just before we started recording, and you mentioned there’s even been some updates, which I will experience when I take some more trainings. But the Right Use of Power framework outlines different forms of power: personal power, role power, status power, systemic power, and, more recently, you’ve added universal power. So I’m gonna ask you to put your teaching hat on and just, on a high level, walk me through each one of these and how they may show up in our daily lives.

Amanda Aguilera: And if I can just take one step back to —

Rebecca Ching: Yeah.

Amanda Aguilera: — how we define power itself, I think could be helpful before we get into types of power.

Rebecca Ching: Great.

Amanda Aguilera: Just because the dominant, cultural understanding of power is that it’s, like, this thing that some people possess or have and some people don’t. There’s the powerless and the powerful, and I just want to talk about the neutrality of power, that power is simply the ability to have an effect or influence. And so, it’s fundamentally neutral. It’s how we participate in it that ultimately determines its outcome.

28:14

Thinking about it as a thing that you can possess actually leads us to more of a, what I call, commodified understanding of power, which is quite dangerous because commodities get their value from scarcity, right? And when we, as human beings, participate in scarcity, we show up in a very different way. So understanding power as a thing you possess puts all our focus on trying to get it or keep it, and those people have it and these people don’t kind of thing. Whereas in Right Use of Power, we talk about power more as a dynamic or as a verb. One of my favorite books is All About Love by bell hooks.

Rebecca Ching: Oh. So good.

Amanda Aguilera: And she talks about love, you know, as a noun versus a verb, and how we show up in love if we regard it as a noun is very different if we think about love as a verb. We show up in it differently, right? It’s the same thing with power.

So I just wanted to kind of take a step back and say power’s actually a verb. It’s a dynamic, and it’s present in every relationship. And so, that means everyone has access to some kinds of power. Just wanted to put that there first.

Rebecca Ching: I think that’s essential, and I’m gonna have you expand on that. I want to maybe bring that more into current times before we get into the different types of power since you wisely brought us to this important foundation.

So we’re recording this in February 2025. Can you give me an example of what you’re seeing of how people are seeing power and using it in the traditional sense and then where and how we can show up and respond through your definition, through the Right Use of Power definition of power?

30:20

Amanda Aguilera: Yes, and I can do that a little bit more deeply after we talk about the types of power, but I’ll just say that I see a lot of kind of power grabbing and power grasping and then a lot of anger at people who are grasping power. But when you understand the different types of power, then we can start to talk about why people are grasping for power even when they have what seems like a whole lot of power and they still grasp for more. I would love to walk through what I understand to be why people do that.

Rebecca Ching: So let’s do that. Why don’t we walk through the different types of power that I named and how they show up in our lives, especially at this time of our recording.

Amanda Aguilera: Yes. It’s such an intense time for power dynamics right now. Okay, so there are six different types of power.

The first one that we talk about is probably the most important, and that’s personal power. Personal power is our individual ability to have an effect or influence. Cedar talks about it as our birthright, and the personal power that we have, we may or may not recognize it or we may or may not have access to it in a particular moment or in a particular relationship, but it’s there, and it can be developed, which is really critical for participating in all the other types of power well, which is why I say it’s the most important.

32:00

The next is role power, which is what Cedar calls an add-on type of power. So in addition to our personal power, we have role power, which is usually associated with a position. It is elected, awarded, or assigned by systems or collectives, typically. And it has additional power and responsibility associated with it. You know, when I woke up this morning, I woke up with my personal power, right? But then I was feeding my kids and getting them to school, and I stepped into the role of mother, right? And so, then I have role power in addition to my personal power as mother. And then I stepped into teaching and that role of teacher has another role and has its own responsibilities. Role power is mutable. We’re kind of always going in and out of different kinds of roles, and each of those roles have different kinds of responsibilities and things that we need to be aware of.

The next type of power is status power, and similar to role power, it’s an interpersonal type of power. It’s an add-on type of power. But instead of it being associated with a position, status power is culturally conferred. So it’s in alignment with whatever is considered to be valuable within that context, within that organization or within that group or within that context. The value can be placed on any kind of human trait or attribute. So things like the color of your skin or the languages that you speak or your gender or your religion, value is placed on them. And with that value comes status power. So with that status comes status power, which means it is also accompanied by certain responsibilities because we have access to resources and social capital and various privileges that others who do not have that trait or attribute or do not have that role have. Role and status are very similar in my mind because they both only exist in relationship.

34:22

Rebecca Ching: Mm.

Amanda Aguilera: So if I’m a teacher and I don’t have students, then I don’t have role power because it only exists in the relationship with the person who doesn’t have access to that type of power.

The next type of power is collective power, and it’s power that’s gathered from multiple sources. There can be personal, role, and status power from many different people directed toward a common interest. What that common interest is will determine the outcomes of that type of power. Again, power is fundamentally neutral, so we can use collective power for voting or to organize a union. We can use it in support of something like Black Lives Matter, or we can use it for division and hate like the Ku Klux Klan, for example. These are all types of collective power, and it could be used towards many different things.

All right, the next type of power is systemic power, and this one is probably the most often ignored and misunderstood. Systemic power is kind of the widespread power that is collected over history and manifests itself through stories and structures. So structures are things like institutions and rules and laws and norms and standards and roles even. Though systemic power, through structures, has a huge influence on how all the other types of power manifest. It essentially shapes everything. You can think of systems like a container, and everything you put into that container takes the shape of that container. It kind of holds a boundary.

36:14

And then the newest one that we just added, which I’m really excited about and it’s more controversial, is universal power, which is the kind of power that’s beyond cognitive understanding, that’s everywhere all the time, that connects everything. So you can think of it kind of like energy. You know it’s there. You feel it. But you can’t point to it. People have all kinds of names and structures and theories around this kind of power. You could call it a consciousness or collective consciousness or God or the earth or the universe or the great mystery. And the reason why it’s named universal power is because what I’m understanding more and more of is how critical it is for the right use of our personal power, and I can talk more about that later.

But I want to just pause because I just kind of named all the types.

Rebecca Ching: I want to hear more how you see the connection between personal power and universal power. I’m trying to formulate a question or a follow-up question around status power because we’re in a time right now where folks, particularly those that have a lot of status power, whether they acknowledge it or not, are fatigued by this conversion.

Amanda Aguilera: Mm-hmm.

Rebecca Ching: And that’s a gentle way of saying it.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: That’s a generous way of saying it.

Amanda Aguilera: Yes.

Rebecca Ching: Because I hear that. I hear some folks generally are like, “This is exhausting. Can I just be with?”

Amanda Aguilera: Yes.

Rebecca Ching: And I think that there’s a lot of — those are good questions to have. And then the extreme is folks that have a lot of status power who maybe lost some of their status power while things were becoming more equitable or maybe there just were a lot of polarities as folks were moving towards more equity and there was a lot of nuance and a lot of things that maybe we could do differently and some that we were doing phenomenally but there’s a backlash against it.

38:30

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: Like, not wanting to acknowledge status at all.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: I’m saying this lightly, not because I’m afraid of a hard conversation but mostly I know for the people that listen to this show, the people that I work with have wrestled with the polarities of the extremes around people with different status power, and that intensity of that conversation has felt harmful, and to try and eliminate the fact that it’s there is incredibly harmful too. So I’m wondering if you want to follow up to that at all.

Amanda Aguilera: Mm, there’s so much in that —

Rebecca Ching: I know.

Amanda Aguilera: — especially right now. DEI is under attack, which is so devastating and tragic on so many levels because we’ve done so much good work in the world to try to help people be more rooted in a larger understanding of what’s happening in organizations and in the world. I think a lot of the resistance comes from the fact that we’re only talking about status power instead of talking about it in the context of all the types of power.

What I’ve noticed is that when we start with status power, it’s just dysregulating for everybody, you know, no matter where you are in the power differential, meaning when there’s a difference in status power between two people or between groups of people, it’s just inherently dysregulating. It feels threatening to everybody, and that’s no one wants to participate in those conversations.

40:22

Our strategy is that we begin by talking about power, its kind of fundamental nature, and we start by talking about role power and how role power dynamics work, and that allows us to investigate the dynamics without being completely flooded with shame or trauma or whatever it might be for the person.

The other thing I want to say about that is that what we’re seeing in the world, especially in The United States right now politically, is essentially up-power fragility, right? There’s a fragility that’s happening because people don’t understand the nuance and complexity of power, meaning that people who are born with a lot of status power, a lot of identities that are valued in the world or in their system, tend to get more role power earlier on. Status power begets role power. And then people with role power are the ones who get to make the rules and the laws and the norms and the standards, which make up systemic power. And then those things inherently reinforce status power because we bias the groups we’re a part of.

Rebecca Ching: Mm.

Amanda Aguilera: The problem with that is that when you’re given a lot of status and role power, then you don’t need to develop your personal power because you’ve been given a bunch of power already by the systems that you’re in.

42:10

People who are not born with a lot of status power, who don’t get access to role power, the only type of power they have access to is personal power. So what I see often is that they either dive into powerlessness through internalized oppression or they seek their personal power and develop it. What I’m seeing is that those with a lot of status and role power think that power only comes externally. It comes to us from external sources, and when we lean on status and role power for our sense of self or our sense of power, then we’re gonna be externally focused, and we’re never going to develop our personal power. And I say never but there are people who have status and role power who do develop their personal power. But in general, we become reliant upon systems to give us that power. And this is where the fragility comes in, right? Because if there’s a threat to the system, it feels like a threat to self.

Rebecca Ching: Okay, I love this, okay? And I’m gonna have an unpopular opinion I’m developing in this conversation, and I’d love your thoughts. I am rethinking and not a big fan anymore of using the word fragility. I get it. But here’s where I’m rubbing against it. As someone who’s trained in trauma in my clinical work, there’s something about fragile and power that almost has the opposite effect, because when that word is used, it just bounces. It bounces hurt, it bounces shame around, and there’s a thought leader whose name I’m escaping, and I’ll make sure to put it in the show notes (her name’s Marie and I’m blanking on her last name), who’s really flushed this out some more.

44:17

But I’m wondering, underneath that word, can we operationalize that? Is it fear of if they lose — power is up high, right? And that’s often how maybe role power is seen or some of the systems, right, that’s how they’re developed. Is it vulnerability? Is it greed? I don’t know. Am I missing the mark here? I’m just seeing that as a conversation and a thought. Even in my thought life it shuts things down. “Oh, that’s just fragility.” I’d love your thoughts on that because I have a lot of respect for how you think these things through.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, I appreciate you bringing that up. I think, you know, fragility was first used I think by Robin DiAngelo in the context of race.

Rebecca Ching: Yes.

Amanda Aguilera: Which, you know, once again, I think it can be applied to any power, and I didn’t define up and down power. But in a power differential, when someone has access to a certain kind of power like role or status, then we say they’re up power and the person in relationship to them that doesn’t have that same access is down power.

So people who are up power, there is a phenomenon that happens because we don’t understand that there are these different types of power and because we don’t understand how power works, and because we are complex humans with many identities, there’s no person who is up power and down power as an identity, which I hear a lot. Even the cis, white, heterosexual man, right, who’s often targeted as having the most power, there are likely some identities or some experiences they have where they experience down power. So it’s a temporary state that’s inherently relational. So it depends on the relationship that you’re in. That’ll determine where you stand in the power differential. I just wanted to say that.

46:23

Rebecca Ching: I think this relational piece is huge. As I’m thinking about what we’re seeing, particularly in the US right now, there is no relationship, and there’s not a seeing of humanity. It is cognitive, it is ideology, it is greed. I mean, I can go into all the psychological terms, but I’m gonna refrain from that intentionally because I think that doesn’t always help. But the absence of relationship with these types of powers leads to harm to self and others is what I’m hearing.

Amanda Aguilera: Yes, and not just relationship with others. Absolutely relationship with yourself too. And I would say relationship with something larger than yourself and larger than systems. 

Rebecca Ching: Which is the universal power, how we’re interconnected and…

Amanda Aguilera: Exactly.

Rebecca Ching: Yes, okay, thank you for that. Okay, I just wanted to pause on this status piece because it feels important to flush out and by just the labeling of “things went wrong because it was a DEI hire” is so — that’s insane. Anyone with “down power” or who doesn’t have status power, that’s why things fail, is confirming the need [Laughs] for us to use our role power and status power differently. But it’s so violent and so dangerous because it cuts off us seeing humans. We can probably go into that a lot.

48:06

You were gonna talk a little bit about the connection between personal power and the newly added layer of universal power. I’d love to bring you back to that if you’re okay with that.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, and I think this actually ties in with the fragility conversation because if you can think of it like three different layers, right, we have the role and status power layer, and if we don’t bring along personal power with our role and status power, then we’re going to misuse it.

Rebecca Ching: Oh. Wow.

Amanda Aguilera: And that’s what I see over and over and over again, and if you haven’t developed your personal power, then you’re not gonna have access to that to bring it into role and status.

Rebecca Ching: Okay.

Amanda Aguilera: So again, you’re — 

Rebecca Ching: I want to pause. This is big.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: So if my personal power is not developed —

Amanda Aguilera: Yes.

Rebecca Ching: — how am I gonna show up in my role and status power, and how am I going to, very likely and potentially, do harm with the role and status power if my personal power isn’t developed? Can you use me as an example?

Amanda Aguilera: Yes. So when you don’t have access to your personal power or you haven’t developed it, you have it but you may not have access, you may not have developed it, then you’re going to lean on (meaning, be over-identified with) your role and status power.

Rebecca Ching: My titles at work.

Amanda Aguilera: Exactly.

Rebecca Ching: What I’m owed, not owed, okay.

Amanda Aguilera: Your whiteness, your wealth, right?

Rebecca Ching: My education.

Amanda Aguilera: Your education. The things that have allowed you to have an affect or influence in the world, the things that have given you power, right? You become overly identified with those things, and when you become overly identified with systems, you tend to be more fragile, meaning you’re not rooted, you’re not standing in anything bigger than that.

50:21

Rebecca Ching: There’s a rigidity, a lot of binaries, all or nothing, good or bad.

Amanda Aguilera: Exactly.

Rebecca Ching: Okay. Okay.

Amanda Aguilera: When you can become conscious of and develop your personal power and bring that into your relationships, especially when there’s a power differential, you are going to be more available for connection, more available to be human, right? It drives me crazy that the standard of professionalism doesn’t allow for us to be human beings. And tell me if I’m getting too deep here. I’m writing a book about this, so this is why there’s so much there.

There are two different types of personal power. So there’s socialized personal power and then there’s what I call rooted personal power. Rooted personal power is when our personal power is connected into universal power, which is that thing that is larger than ourselves and larger than systems, whatever that is for you. When you have roots and they’re rooted deeply, then you can think about it like a tree. The longer and deeper your roots, the higher and longer your branches can be, and the higher and bigger your influence can be. I call that rooted personal power. And the whole point of this exploration of power is really to learn how to be in right relationship with one another.

Right relationship in my mind is this temporary state that is reached when everyone in the relationship experiences an active honoring of their rooted personal power, when there’s an honest acknowledgement of the other types of power at play in the relationship. With that definition, it’s very challenging to achieve, right? It’s very hard.

[Inspirational Music]

52:20

Rebecca Ching: Leading is hard. Leading is also often controversial as you navigate staying aligned to your values, your mission, and your boundaries. Navigating the inevitable controversy can challenge your confidence and clarity and calm when you feel triggered and less confident in your ability to navigate the big emotions that you’re feeling. I know you don’t mind making the hard decisions, but sometimes the stakes seem higher and can bring up echoes of old doubts and insecurities during times when you need to feel rock solid on your plan and action.

Finding a coach who gets the nuances of your business and leading in our complex and polarized world can help you identify the blocks that keep you playing it safe and small. Leading today is not a fancy title or fluffy bragging rights. It’s brave and bold work to stay the course when the future is so unknown and the doubts and pains from the past keep showing up to shake things up. Internal emotional practices like IFS are needed to keep the protector of cynicism at bay and foster a hope that is both actionable and aligned.

When the stakes are high and you don’t want to lose focus, when you want to navigate inevitable conflict between your ears and with those you lead, when time is of the essence and you want to make hard decisions with confidence and clarity, then Unburdened Leader Coaching is for you and where you deepen the capacity to tolerate the vulnerability of change, innovation, and doing things differently than we were taught. To start your Unburdened Leader Coaching process with me go to www.rebeccaching.com and book a free connection call. I can’t wait to hear from you!

[Inspirational Music]

54:12

Rebecca Ching: What do you say to a leader who’s listening to this and going, “Oh, wow. Okay, power is neutral but I’ve never really experienced that in my life. It kind of feels dangerous, and now I’m hearing about all this.” What do you say to someone who’s like, “This is a bit unrealistic and maybe harmful to try and do all this”? There’s a lot of questioning right now, and I’m a big fan of it, but it’s not like it’s not the questioning and they’re just not willing to hear the answer. I think the people I work with are really just, you know, wanting to question this going, “That sounds all lofty, Rebecca, and not realistic. That’s a great paper, but let me tell ya, in the day to day in my work, I don’t even know how I could do that and how that wouldn’t be harmful.” [Laughs] What would you say to someone who’s listening but going, “I don’t know. I don’t think this is realistic.”

Amanda Aguilera: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, I get that comment sometimes, particularly in trainings that are mandatory within an organization.

Rebecca Ching: [Laughs]

Amanda Aguilera: Usually, it comes from people who tend to have a lot of up-power identities. I actually don’t hear it as much from people with down-status and down-role identities, which is interesting.

Rebecca Ching: It’s noteworthy.

Amanda Aguilera: We’re talking about the complexity of power, which is hard to follow and even harder to understand in our day to day. I think when it just comes right down to it, it’s how connected are you to yourself and what is yourself connected to and how are you nurturing the connections in your life and what kind of awareness about power do you have in your relationships. Because, at the end of the day, the reason why we need to be conscious of power is because fundamentally there are different responsibilities and vulnerabilities that are present in power differential relationships. Can I be aware of the responsibilities I have when I’m in up power, whether that’s role or status, and can I be aware of the vulnerabilities present for those who are down power from me?

56:45

When I’m interacting with my kids, and they’re having a meltdown, right, can I be understanding of the vulnerability they would have if I start yelling at them to calm down, right? Or if I’m a boss, a supervisor, and I have an employee, can I be aware of the vulnerability that, at any moment, I can fire them or I’m the one who gets to decide if I demote them or promote them or what resources they get. Those are vulnerabilities that are present that impact how we show up in relationship.

So, at the end of the day, it’s about this awareness, and the reason why we don’t want to be aware of it, right, is because we don’t want to think about responsibilities and vulnerabilities. In this system I’m in, that has so many demands on my time and energy and attention, there’s no room for relationship. There’s no room for me to think through, “Okay, let me pause and see about what the vulnerabilities and responsibilities present here are.” That’s the fault of the structure of our systems, which is why I harp on systems a lot.

58:00

Rebecca Ching: Good. That was like church for me. I was, like, conducting while you were talking. [Laughs]

Amanda Aguilera: [Laughs]

Rebecca Ching: I see this now, what you did. I feel like you’re burning through all of my questions. You know, at the heart of it is our self-awareness is rooted into our relationship and development with our personal power, so that, then, we can move through the other types of power without dehumanizing, without degrading or erasing other people.

Amanda Aguilera: Right.

Rebecca Ching: And so, here’s a follow-up question. A lot of people are experiencing right now, especially if they are working in any federal groups or any groups that are getting a lot of federal funding — so you’ve got the leader who says, “Okay, I want to embrace this. This is awesome. But the organization I work with still prioritizes a power-over approach to leadership, one that lifts up your titles, lifts up certain identities and ways of moving in the world.” So yeah, what do you say to that person that’s like, “Oh, wow. I can’t just leave my job. These are my benefits. This is my pension.”

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: It is a choice to stay or to go, but I don’t want to be flippant about that, right? So what would you say to somebody who wants to do their best to utilize this model in a system that they’re working in, and it could be an educational system, a faith-based system, we can go on. But they’re having a hard time. They’re feeling discouraged or feeling like, “What’s the point?”

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, that’s a great question, and it’s challenging to exist in systems where you don’t have a lot of role or status power. But here are some of the things that I would say. Alice Walker says, “The most common way we give up our power is by thinking we don’t have any,” which is a quote we use often in the Right Use of Power work.

1:00:08

Which means that no matter how down-power you are in any given group or relationship, you have that personal power that you can develop and learn how to access in the moment. And there are all kinds of skills and things that you can learn to do that. You know, so emotional regulation, nervous system regulation is, for example, one of those things, which we all need to learn how to do better with. So learning how to develop your personal power.

And then the other is to form collective power, whether that’s an ally in the moment or a group of allies because the only kind of power that can change or shift systemic power is collective power. Even people like Martin Luther King Jr. or Mahatma Gandhi, these people didn’t change systems on their own. What were they really good at? They were good at forming collective power.

So if you want something to focus on, focus on developing your access to your personal power, your relationship with whatever is something larger for you, whether that is your higher self, your values, God, whatever it is because those things are deeper than the systems you’re in. So if systems shake or falter, you have something deeper anchoring you. When we’re in the face of abuses of power, oddly enough, one of the first things we do is we give up the power that we do have, or we forget about it.

1:02:00

Rebecca Ching: I’m getting emotional here. I think this feels at the heart of it, and what I’m conceptualizing as I integrate kind of the modalities that I use in how I work and move through the world, like shame resilience or Internal Family Systems, accessing and developing my personal power helps keep me regulated. It helps me expand my shame resilience and my courage. It helps me stay in a critical mass of Self energy. This is how I’m seeing this connection, and systems falter, crumble, sometimes need to.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: We don’t need it to be a full wrecking ball all the time. I know that’s an unpopular opinion. I’m a change from the inside out kinda gal, not just blow it all up.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: But there’s room for all of us.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: And I think from a relational trauma perspective and a betrayal trauma, sometimes people are kind of going into that shut-down mode, and it may feel like they’re disconnected from their personal power, but their body’s just trying to protect. And so, to stay the course, to do the work, to get the supports so you can stay connected, what you just said, to your personal power and the things that help you connect to what’s bigger than you, and that every little piece matters.

I can’t help but think of the Alt National Parks folks right now that are organizing online and those of us who are watching from afar that they’ve organized over a million federal workers kind of in this underground. And they’ll put a code number. They’ll say, “Three!” And they’ll go, “Disregard, general public. You’ll understand at a future date.” And it’s feeding me. Their organizational power, I don’t know what’s happening, but something’s happening, and the energy of that helps me even access my own personal power in these times that feel really volatile.

So thank you. I feel like I almost want to pause because I want folks to chew on this, and I would love for you to come back, especially when your book is done. I have some follow-up questions before we go, but I just want to let you know I’m not cutting this short. I just think I want to let this breathe and build on it, but I want to wrap up with a couple questions. One is where can somebody who maybe isn’t in the complete fight or flight mode in their organization or business, but where do you see potential for leaders to build healthier relationships with power within their organizations?

1:04:36

Amanda Aguilera: So in power differential relationships, when you are up power, when you’re a leader, you can foster a healthy power differential relationship, meaning you don’t need to flatten the hierarchy, necessarily, right? And sometimes that can be quite harmful and dangerous to flatten a hierarchy that actually exists, because it’s not actually acknowledging what’s really there.

Rebecca Ching: Right.

Amanda Aguilera: To allow our differential to be healthy is to make base and offer support for the people down power from you to access their personal power, meaning that you will know if you’re in a healthy relationship if the down-power person feels like they can, as fully as they can, access their personal power, and what are you doing to support that.

So a common thing that I suggest is feedback, and I know that’s overused, but you having structures for feedback in your system is just another invitation or opportunity for down-power folks to say, “Hey, I’m in a vulnerable position, but I’m gonna offer you this feedback because it’s important for the health of the system and for the health of the relationship.” That’s why, in our trainings, we spend a lot of time on feedback and how to give and receive and use that feedback.

1:06:06

Rebecca Ching: Yeah, basically open for conversation, and then people feel safe to say, “I don’t know about that,” or “I need help,” or “I don’t understand,” or “That wasn’t helpful,” and that builds trust, and when you have trust, you can do a lot with each other and within an org. And that’s something I think about with a lot of the clients I work with in organizations. They’re kind of creating these bubbles within their departments, doing their best to do that. Even if the larger organization doesn’t do that well, they’re really working hard to do exactly that. So thank you for naming that.

How do you define leadership, and how has that definition evolved from what you were taught growing up?

Amanda Aguilera: I think it’s the ability to bring forth your rooted personal power in your relationships, being conscious of the responsibilities and vulnerabilities present in those power differential relationships, and striving to find right relationship over and over again because, you know, it’s not a permanent state you reach.

Rebecca Ching: It’s not efficient, but it’s effective. It’s not quick and tidy, you get it done and then you cruise off into the sunset. It’s always circling back and checking in, to really commit to being in right relationship. And when you say that right now, how does that differ from that little girl that you talked about, seeing power around you in various ways?

Amanda Aguilera: Oh, well, I mean, again, I grew up in a military household, so, you know, power over, very rigid hierarchies was the thing, and I spent most of my, I would say, a good half of my life thinking that that’s how power worked is you tell people what to do and then they do it, you know? That’s what I thought leadership was, and I didn’t — just like so many of us, we imitate what we are exposed to.

1:08:29

Rebecca Ching: And we’re seeing that play out in volume right now too.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: I have a tradition at the end of my conversations I ask these quickfire questions. So it’s gonna be a little lighter toned. [Laughs]

Amanda Aguilera: Okay, great!

Rebecca Ching: So what are you reading right now?

Amanda Aguilera: Oh, I am a voracious reader. I read a couple books a week. Right now, I’m reading Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls by Kai Chang Thom.

Rebecca Ching: Wow.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah.

Rebecca Ching: That sounds like a must read.

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, I just started it, but yeah, I’m already loving it.

Rebecca Ching: What song are you playing on repeat right now?

Amanda Aguilera: You know, my favorite song since I was, like, 12 or 13 years old is “Closer to Fine” by The Indigo Girls.

Rebecca Ching: Hello, that’s a classic!

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, and especially right now, yeah, it just is helpful.

Rebecca Ching: What is the best TV show or movie that you’ve seen recently?

Amanda Aguilera: My partner and I just finished watching Pose on Hulu. It’s about ballroom culture in New York City in the eighties and nineties. So queer and trans people of color coming together to, I would say, experience right relationship together, and it’s so well done.

1:10:00

Rebecca Ching: I lived in New York in the nineties and knew some folks that were doing ballroom dancing, and it was big time. It was, like, next level.

So I’m a Gen Xer. I always ask this question. What is your favorite piece of eighties pop culture? If you’ve got nothing, what’s your favorite piece of pop culture from your childhood?

Amanda Aguilera: Yeah, I think probably the movies, like Karate Kid come to mind and Star Wars. My brother and I would watch Star Wars all the time.

Rebecca Ching: Are you watching any of the new Star Wars shows on Disney?

Amanda Aguilera: I have watched many of them. My brother is very into Star Wars, so it’s a point of connection for us, but yeah.

Rebecca Ching: My husband is too, and we’re bringing my son up into it also.

Amanda Aguilera: Nice.

Rebecca Ching: What is your mantra right now?

Amanda Aguilera: “What do I need right now?”

Rebecca Ching: Mm, nice. What’s an unpopular opinion that you hold?

Amanda Aguilera: I have so many depending on who you talk to, but probably the most commonly bristled about is that role and status power are given not earned.

Rebecca Ching: Ooh, yeah. That is a pretty hot topic right now. [Laughs]

Amanda Aguilera: [Laughs]

Rebecca Ching: And who or what inspires you to be a better leader and human?

Amanda Aguilera: I would say my kids for multiple reasons. They keep me honest, and also, they need a better world to live in, you know?

Rebecca Ching: Isn’t that true. How can people connect with you and your work at Right Use of Power?

Amanda Aguilera: You can go to www.rightuseofpower.org. We’re a nonprofit, and we offer many programs, and it’s probably the best place to start.

Rebecca Ching: Will you come back and talk more about your book and these concepts? Because I think we’re gonna need your guidance and your wisdom as we continue to move though trying to lead ourselves and lead others with dignity and care.

1:12:13

Amanda Aguilera: Absolutely!

Rebecca Ching: Awesome. Thank you so much for coming on the show. This was a great conversation. I really appreciate you and all that you’re putting out into the world.

Amanda Aguilera: Thanks, Rebecca!

Rebecca Ching: Before you go, I want to make sure you take away some key points from this timely Unburdened Leader conversation with Dr. Amanda Aguilera. Now, she talked about how personal power is not about control, it’s about staying connected to yourself, your values, your capacity to act, and Amanda brought this home by noting our relationship with our personal power impacts how we interact with role, status, systemic, collective, and universal power, particularly helps with the lightning-rod conversations around status power. And we talked about how feeling powerless is often a sign of nervous system dysregulation and not the truth of who you are. And the Right Use of Power lens can help you stay engaged and regulated when discussing what it means to hold status power, right? It’s a tricky one.

Developing a relationship with your personal power requires intentional work, work that can be done in isolation. So as you reflect on today’s conversation, I invite you to consider these questions, right, these reflection, debrief questions. How did this conversation shift how you look at power? How can this lens on power impact how you lead yourself and others, especially right now? And what is one step you can take today to nurture your relationship with your personal power?

1:14:00

Now, the forces that rely on your silence and disconnection want you to believe that you have no power. But redefining your relationship with power from the Right Use of Power lens isn’t just an act of resistance, it’s an act of healing. And this is the ongoing work of an Unburdened Leader.

[Inspirational Music]

Thank you all so much for joining this important Unburdened Leader conversation. You can find this episode, show notes, and free Unburdened Leader resources, along with ways to work with me at www.rebeccaching.com. And make sure you are signing up to follow me and join the conversation I’m having over on Substack so we can take these Unburdened Leader conversations and dig a little deeper together. And if you’re a lurker, lurkers are welcome! And I want to just give another special thank you to the folks at Yellow House Media who produced this episode!

[Inspirational Music]