Real Independence: Gaining Freedom, Power, and Peace

by Jami Keller

Power is the freedom to choose. Freedom is a gift of living in the present and having the power to choose how you feel.  This is not easy, but it is worth working towards. 
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As it turns out, most people have much more power and freedom than they believe. Accessing this power allows us to help people move their relationships from “Done to Fun”. 

At Passion Provokers we have a another word for power. We define power as humility. This may seem odd, but it has been well proven. The opposite of power is fear. Think of fear as a force that hijacks your freedom to choose. Often we have more fear than we are aware. It has become comfortable and common to all our processes and runs on autopilot. It requires good maintenance and redefinition. To move from fear to power requires forgiveness. Most good heart and mind maintenance comes down to forgiveness. 

If you would have asked me 14 years ago if I had forgiveness in my heart, I would have been very convincing about the fact that I did. I did not, I was holding on to so much hurt that it lead me to a need for approval that was insatiable! My need for others approval nearly killed me. It destroyed relationships and literally made me powerless. A slave, instead of free. I was giving forgiveness lip service and was completely in denial about my need for it in my life (for the same reason that 98% of college professors rank themselves in the top 1% of their field we inflate how good we are at forgiveness.)

I was being stubborn. My façade of being a community leader, having status (acceptance) among those who I thought were my friends was more important than being honest with myself and my wife about what was going on with me. So my problem became more serious. BSU’s coach Pete says either you are getting better or worse, there is no middle ground.  For me (by not telling the truth) I was telling more lies. Worst of all, to myself. My misunderstanding of forgiveness nearly killed me. It made me a slave instead of free. My pride kept me from  doing the work of having real relationships.

Here is a test for your level of forgiveness. When you can think of your greatest pain and feel peace for yourself and pity and care for those that hurt you, you have full forgiveness. 

How are power and freedom working for you? 
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When we have solid and ongoing forgiveness it leads to peace, power and joy and that together is love. Love is peace because of choice, power that is humility, and a joy that is full and flowing into all our relationships. We are fortunate to live where freedom is available to all that can forgive.  Come join us, and find new power every day!

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