Creating and Experiencing Empowerment

Empowerment is one of the greatest experiences we can have throughout our lifetime. Beginning as a baby we develop into a child, then from a youth into a young adult and finally into an adult. Most of us have had daily experiences of empowerment or “promoting self-actualization” throughout our life. Such experiences shape us into who we become as adults. As we reach adulthood fewer experiences of empowerment occur and for some they become non-existent.

How can you bring empowerment back into your life?

There are several ways to experience empowerment and because our earliest experience is through movement, I find this to be the most accessible and profound place to experience empowerment. During one’s experience of empowerment the movements feel easy and they have quality of smoothness and fluidity to them, you experience a sense of effortlessness with complete agility. In that one moment with all of the ingredients there, you have an exceptional feeling you would like to have over and over again.

Reflecting back on childhood, we can all remember a time when we enjoyed the gift of moving freely; whether running through a field or playing a game of kick the can, swinging on a swing set or climbing a jingle gym. Even now as an adult, you can bring that feeling back in to your world. Perhaps through sport or working out, empowerment can become part of your life again.

Where should you start?

Choose something you would like to improve like running, biking, swimming, or workout routine. Once you’ve selected a sport, take time to make a list for yourself of where you feel deficient or would like to see some improvement. Identify what you would like to improve and then come up with some reasonable goals. Often, we create goals that are much nearly impossible to obtain, which can be a set up for disappointment and failure. When you set a goal that is reasonable and obtainable, you are aligning yourself for success and empowerment and you can reach your goal with ease, fluidity, and smoothness.

Variety provides the opportunity to experience change, growth, improvement and empowerment. Read “Is Variety Part of Your Game?” for more on this.

For example, if you set the goal of improving your running 10k personal record by 10 seconds, think of a few ways in which you can change your current running style or training to move toward that goal. Relying on only one path to achieve your goal could set you up for failure.  Instead, come up with different options like adding in hill workouts, speed work, or distance. I recommend trying these changes one at a time.

If you are going to try the hill workouts, add it in to your weekly routine and stick to it. Pick a distance of hills and number of times you will repeat it. The number of times you repeat your hill needs to be flexible so you can determine what you can currently do and what you may be able to do in the future. You want to stay at a level that feels comfortable for you to avoid straining or stressing your system. As you improve, you can time yourself and increase the number of times you repeat a hill. You will see how this impacts your daily run and your distance and you may even experience two or three levels of empowerment.

Empowerment is that moment when you achieve something you hadn’t achieved before. It is an exhilarating feeling of ease, fluidity, effortlessness and even grace. In that moment, you feel like you are on top of the world and it is truly magical. It is one of the most amazing feelings any of us can experience and it makes us a much better person in our daily lives and how we relate to others. Search for ways to add the experience of empowerment into your life and take off!