Libra Alert: Personal Power & What It Looks Like in a Friendship

© 2009 by Guest Blogger, Jeanette Jackson on soulfulindustry

Donna says:  Committed relationships aren’t the only close ties being challenged by Saturn in Libra—so are friendships. Friendships are always an important support system, particularly for those of us with no partner or family close at hand. As we saw recently in Libra Alert: How to Stop Being a People Pleaser, Libra is one of the signs that are especially prone to hiding their own needs and desires for the sake of preserving a relationship.

By following the links that come into Skywriter, I’ve met some remarkable like-minded souls who are making a valuable contribution by sharing their wisdom on their own blogs.  Yesterday, a link led me to Jeanette Jackson, an astrologer and yoga instructor whose writing comes from a deep and heartfelt commitment to helping people retain their center in relationships. She kindly allowed me to reprint this beautiful, healing post. Here’s what she says:

I’ve been writing a good bit about personal power on my blog, and I am not sure I ever gave a working definition or an example of it in action. Let’s begin with Personal Power as knowledge and deep understanding of yourself and your purpose. Personal power gives you permission to express and pursue what is important to you. It makes no excuses for who you are or why you need to do whatever you need to do. Personal Power just makes sure you know what is your responsibility and what isn’t.

Adequate personal power prevents you from allowing others to control or define you. With personal power you will not buy into societal trends, beliefs, ideas, frameworks or concepts unless they align with your truth. So in essence, Personal Power is a compassionate space created by self knowledge and dedication to living your truth.

Personal power does not alienate you from others. It just provides boundaries to help you maintain personal integrity. When you function with personal power you understand that other people are very important, but everything you need is within you. All the power, understanding, support, nurturing and wisdom you need resides within.

There is nothing that anyone else can give you. The person in front of you may radiate aspects you think you need, but you would not recognize them if they were not part of your nature. You are inspired by and connected to others to experience your truth. 

You are whole, complete and capable, but you can only learn this in relationship with someone else. So it’s very possible and real to function from a space of personal power in a relationships. Here are some ideas around what a friendship between two empowered people looks like:

Commitment to supporting one another’s truth, but not living it. You support your friend: you love them, you care for them and you share with them. But at no point do you allow their truth to become yours, or their burdens to end up on your back. You realize that your connection with others does not define who you are, what your truth is, or how you should act. You remain connected to your truth and have your own experience of life.

You and your friend have a separate list of responsibilities and duties. At no point do you become responsible for your friend, or does your friend become responsible for you.

You are committed to living and expressing your unique truth in a respectful way. You understand that relationship and connection is important, but you know that you must express and experience your truth and no one else’s. There is nothing else for you to do, other than live your truth. If anything, relationships are a tool for learning and growth that brings you into deeper alignment with the truth and nothing heals more deeply than aligning with your truth.

You allow relationships to be a tool for evolution. You learn from them and allow your experience of them to guide, heal and deepen your expression of truth. And that is all. Growth is all there really is to do and relationships are the main tool for growth. When we misunderstand who we are and what we are here for our relationships will help us find balance. In fact people connect and form relationships with each other to help each other out. To view relationships in any other way removes a sense of equality and is a gross misunderstanding of who you are.

This is only a general exploration of personal power and what it looks like within a friendship. There is so much more to say. Depending on your truth and what you are working on, Personal Power and your relationships may be quite different for you. I hope this helps.

Note: See the original article and more of Jeannette’s thoughts here: http://soulfulindustry.wordpress.com/2009/05/12/personal-power-and-what-it-looks-like-in-a-friendship/#comment-61.  See another article on how to stop people-pleasing here: Libra Alert: How to Stop Being a People Pleaser. For more Articles on Relationship Issues on Skywriter,  See the category Relationship Help.

What the Author Says about herself: I am an intuitive evolutionary astrologer and Certified Yoga Instructor. Yoga is a way to access the wisdom of the Universe and integrate it into the body. It’s a way of synchronizing your self and your practice with Divine flow, so you can move forward with a little more grace and ease. As a certified vinyasa yoga instructor and astrologer I create yoga practices that assist you in utilizing Full and New Moon energy to your benefit.

 The information written in the stars is also available in your body, if you choose to access it. Yoga is the perfect tool for integrating and applying divine wisdom. Interested a having a personalized yoga practice that is synchronized with Divine flow? Check out my Etsy shop, or shoot me an email at Soulfulindustry@gmail.com.

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