What happens when you actually start using your power

In the last newsletter, I talked about strategic power — what it actually is, why we resist building it, and the five forms it takes in real life.

A lot of you replied. And the thing that came up most was something I didn't write about directly but probably should have.

It wasn't "how do I build power?" Most of you understood that part. It was: "What do I do when I start using it, and everything gets harder before it gets easier?"

Because that's what happens, and nobody really warns you about it.

When you start making decisions from a place of clarity instead of compliance, people notice. When you stop shrinking to fit other people's comfort, they feel it. When you enforce a boundary you've never enforced before, when you say no to something you've always said yes to, when you stop explaining yourself to people who were never really asking — there is friction.

Not always. Not with everyone. But enough that it can make you question whether the power was worth building in the first place.

I want to talk about that friction today. Because I think it's the thing that makes most people retreat to the smaller version of themselves right when they were starting to grow.

The testing

Here's something I've noticed about the moment you start operating differently.

The people in your life, not all of them, but some, will test it.

Not because the boundary was wrong. Not because the decision was bad. But because the discomfort of someone else's disapproval is so familiar and so heavy that it's easier to give in than to hold the line.

I've folded. More times than I'd like to admit. And every time I did, I had to start the work over again, not from zero, but from a place of having proven to myself that I wasn't quite ready to hold it yet.

The testing is not a sign that you did something wrong. It's a sign that something changed. And change, to people who benefited from the old arrangement, looks like a problem they need to solve.

The guilt

The other thing that happens is the guilt.

You make a decision that serves you. You protect your time. You redirect resources toward something you actually want instead of something you've always given them to out of habit. And then you feel guilty about it.

Not because you did something wrong. Because you were taught that putting yourself first is selfish. That wanting things for yourself, not for your family, not for your community, not for the greater good, just for you, is a character flaw.

And so the moment you start building power that is genuinely yours, the guilt shows up. Disguised sometimes as doubt. Sometimes, as second-guessing. Sometimes as the voice that says "who do you think you are?" in the middle of the night when you're trying to sleep.

Here's what I've learned about that voice: it's not wisdom. It's conditioning. And the way you respond to it determines whether you grow or whether you stay comfortable in a life that has stopped fitting.

You can acknowledge the guilt without obeying it. You can hear the doubt and keep moving anyway. That's not arrogance. That's practice.

The loneliness

I want to name this one, too, because I think it's the part people feel most but talk about least.

When you grow, when you actually, meaningfully change the way you move through the world, some relationships will not survive it. Not because anyone is a bad person. But because some relationships were built on a version of you that no longer exists.

The dynamic that worked when you said yes to everything doesn't work when you've learned to protect your energy. The friendship that felt comfortable when you were both uncertain starts to feel misaligned when you've gained clarity, but they haven't. The relationship that was built on your smallness can't accommodate your full size.

Losing those connections hurts. Even when they needed to end. Even when you knew they'd been slowly suffocating you. There is grief in outgrowing something, and pretending there isn't doesn't make you stronger; it just makes you lonely in silence.

The loneliness is part of the cost. It's not a sign that you made the wrong choice. It's a sign that you made a real one.

What carries you through

Here's what I keep coming back to when the friction is loudest.

Power built with integrity compounds. Every time you hold the line when someone tests it, you build evidence that you are someone who keeps their own word. Every time you feel the guilt and act from your values anyway, the guilt gets a little quieter. Every time you let go of a dynamic that was keeping you small and survive the loss of it, your capacity for your own life gets a little larger.

None of it happens fast. And none of it is comfortable.

But the alternative is staying where you are — comfortable, safe, and quietly building a life that belongs to everyone's expectations of you except your own.

I'd rather do the hard thing.

I'm guessing that if you've read this far, you would too.

With love,