Authority

Authority comes from the root word author.

When someone has authority over us, they can author parts of our story.

It’s like they have the pen. At least some of the time.

And vice verse when we have authority over others.

It’s a powerful thing to contribute to someone’s story.

What will we write?

But in more cases than we’d probably care to think, authority is ours to give away.

We have more choice than we realise as to who’s holding the pen.

So who’s co-authoring our story?

Our family of origin?

Our culture?

Our silos of choice?

And in some cases, our bosses?

As Seth Godin once said when referring to bosses…. that would be you.

Me.

Us.

Let’s decide not to become the victim of living a mediocre story because we’ve tricked ourselves into thinking we don’t hold the pen.

Victor Frankl says it best:

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”