I stumbled across the premise of The Power Process a couple of weeks back. The founder of this concept is not the most outstanding role model, but his idea of “The Power Process” is interesting. The power process is closely related to having goals and then reaching them. Like what I teach and coach people on, the power process goes more in-depth about the negative and positive sides to the fulfillment or unfulfillment of our goals. In this month’s T-U-S, I will be speaking about the power process and where it can help you progress in life.

The power process is defined as having a goal and putting effort toward that goal. Once you reach your goal, you should be filled with higher self-esteem and self-confidence, which gives you a stronger sense of power. If you fail to reach your goal, then that power doesn’t come, and it is replaced with consequences. Some examples of those consequences include boredom, demoralization, low self-esteem, inferiority feelings, and defeatism. Those consequences can even be as severe as depression, anxiety, guilt, frustration, hostility, spouse/child abuse, and sleep/eating disorders.

With this being said, the power process is similar to success and failure. Success and failure are two common phrases termed with our advancement in life. If you succeed, then you can move forward with life. If you fail, then you cannot pass “Go” and collect your $200; as a matter of fact, you go straight to jail for rolling the dice the wrong way. The idea of failure was not meant to shun people for their shortcomings. It was to help them elevate and adapt to their environment. Now that many people are living a plush lifestyle, it has caused failure to be frowned upon. Failure, which was once a part of the learning process, has become a sign of weakness. The power process will give us a new vantage point to look at our goals in life and see an alternative way to achieve victory in life.

The Steps Of The Power Process

1. Identify A Goal, Finding A Purpose

2. Effort Towards Achieving That Goal/Purpose

   1. Primary Activities

   2. “Surrogate” Activities

3. End Result

   1. Goal Achieved (Victory)

   2. Goal Failed, Disruption (Defeat)

Victory in life is not as simple as creating/finding a goal/purpose. You will hear me and many others say that life is about the journey. It is supposed to have its good and bad moments, but the goal is simple, victory when faced with the power process. That victory doesn’t have to be tangible, but it does have to be feasible. So what is a feasible victory? According to the power process, the end goal is always freedom. This can be best explained by the need for people to want to be financially free. The idea of financial freedom is that you do not need to worry about money anymore. You can take that vacation, you can order that bottle of wine, and you do not have to worry about how you will pay your mortgage at the end of the month. Knowing that freedom is the end result of our goals, let us build our T-U-S guideline together.

• 1. Identify A Goal and Finding A Purpose –  These two questions should be answered before proceeding any further.

What Is A Goal You Have Right Now?

Do You Know Your Purpose In Life?

Now that you have a goal and the purpose of deciphering, we can get to work. If you are one of those people who simply do not know how to find your intention, do not worry. You are not alone. I have many clients who have the same issue, and with a short dialogue, I can place them on the right track. However, since we are not speaking, you will have to do your best to guess what your purpose may be.

The goal/purpose you came up with has some importance to you. Whether you are after a specific outcome or way of feeling, it should have some benefit to you, even intrinsically. The first thing I want to ask you is, “Do you have to struggle to achieve your goal?”. If not, then your goal has already been attained. If yes, then it is time to get to work on accomplishing your goal. Having a goal is not something to add to your to-do list. It should be something that should pull you forward. As a human, we need a purpose to live life. If we get so low, as in how we feel and think life is meaningless, our body does these crazy things. For example, people will stop having an appetite or even contemplate suicide. Just like a sick wolf who separates itself from the pack to die alone, our minds are doing the same.

The power process is not simply the process of attaining and maintaining power in life. To be in a place of power has nothing to do with the power process. What the power process does is give us a reason to live. Whether that be our beliefs or motives is up to each individual. People need to accomplish things in their life. That reason typically ties in with their purpose and ideas. It becomes their mission in life to make sure that the goals that were set are met. I find that this way of the power process causes much of the world’s hate and disagreement. Just as I might view racism and rights here in the U.S.A, so do you have the right to believe in what you want to? That belief does not need to be even a semblance of what I am going for. However, it does have to be something you believe in.

The power process works beyond your personal goals. For example, if a company has a vision/mission/goal and you believe in it, then you are also joining one person’s power process to fulfilling/attain that goal. Doing this might also help you fulfill your goal too. For example, choosing a career that pays well. That is why I wanted you to write down your goal and purpose before you read further. The reason being is that words influence people. In those few paragraphs, you could have adopted a view that was not entirely your own. I believe it is essential to identify your actual goals in life. Once you can do that, then your purpose will follow.

2. Effort Towards Achieving That Goal/Purpose

This is the area I find that gives people the most trouble. In this area of the power process, we are faced with a plethora of things to deal with. Those things include accountability, planning, passion, desire, and perception, to name a few. All of these things will affect your effort and progress toward the goals you are going after. For example, if you want to get in shape but love to eat fast food, you will have to plan and become accountable. You will have to leave your love for fast food behind because it will only serve to hinder you from reaching your goal of getting in shape. Also, yes, you can still eat fast food and be in shape. It is about moderation and understanding what you are putting in your body.

The first area we will tackle in this section is our primary activities. Our primary activities are the things we have to do the most to reach our goal. Just like eating fast food is not conducive to being in shape, it is an area that has to be checked. By check, I mean it has to be monitored. Many people fail to get in shape because of the amount of work and discipline needed to get there. The same is true in corporate work. To rise in the promotion tracts, you have to put in an endless amount of work. You have to make sacrifices to get closer to achieving your goal, promotion.

The activities you do will differ if you try to get in shape or seek a promotion. However, what both examples share in common is that your primary focus will give you something at the end. That end is the “power” of the power process. (Think of it as more buying power on your credit card.) The idea of reaching your goal allows you to make sacrifices and put in a meaningful effort to make sure you get there. The problem with the effort needed to get there is that it is temporary. I like to use relationships as an example in this circumstance. Think of how your partner would do all these beautiful things for you at the conception of the relationship. As time goes on, the drive to be that person diminishes. That is why you should constantly be reaching and making new goals consistently. If not, you will fall victim to losing your purpose.

The primary activities you will be doing will have a direct impact on your goal. I like to think of our primary activities being closely linked to our lifestyle. For example, your schedule and leisurely activities will all add up to your primary activities. Those all add to the power process. The reason is that making sure you reach those activities will correlate if you can be happy or not. Think of the person who wants to go to a specific school. This person is concerned about the school and not the degree. If you find yourself in this way of thinking, you just have to insert the outcome of the primary activity and what it will bring into your life once you reach it.

In conjunction with primary activities, we have “surrogate activities.” Surrogate activities are defined as “an activity directed toward an artificial goal that the individual pursues the sake of the “fulfillment” that he gets from pursuing the goal, not because he needs to attain the goal itself.” In simple terms, this means you want to do something because it will make you feel better. This type of activity does not guarantee you any power, extra life, or advantage in being successful in life. I will use the example of getting in shape again. According to the power process, getting in shape is a surrogate activity. Being in shape does many good things for you and in your life, but it doesn’t guarantee you anything in the same turn. Yes, statistically, if you are in shape, you are less prone to stroke, heart problems, etc. However, simply going to the gym and choosing to live healthily is not going to stop cancer from forming in your body. The same is valid for your goals. You can have these beautiful goals, but they will not guarantee any a better life than you have right now.

I believe that is where these two differ the most. Primary goals tend to significantly impact what happens in your life rather than surrogate activities, which may give you a better life but are not guaranteed. If you know me, I love to work out and be in shape; however, I do not plant the idea that good things will come since I am working out. I think the goal of working out and being in shape gives me a certain level of confidence, but I know people who are 300 pounds too heavy and are more confident than me. Knowing that simple tidbit has helped me prioritize my primary goals and then work on my surrogate activities in my leisure time. Doing that has helped me to find a focus in my life and see how much each goal completed has impacted my overall well-being and lifestyle.

3. End Result

With all that being said, the result will be either good/bad or success/failure. If you haven’t caught on yet, the power process is all about your individual needs and gains. You want a result for reaching a goal. Whether it be intrinsic or worldly is dependent on the goal. For example, if my goal is to buy a large piece of land and build my dream home, then the result is having the house of my dreams come into reality. That would be classified as a success for me. I had a goal of building a dream house, and I accomplished it. With that goal being reached, I can classify/deem myself to be “happy.” I gave that goal a certain amount of power in the process of its inception. However, if I did not reach that goal and failed at accomplishing that goal in life, I would have failed.

That failure is what shies many people away from trying to reach their goals. People would rather not have to feel the unpleasant feelings that failure brings to them. Some people intentionally remain complacent so they never have to be let down. The same is true in relationships. People would rather be single because the implications of being in a relationship sometimes outweigh the benefits. However, for the sake of relationships, it is a part of the growing process to butt heads once in a while. Remember, things worth having don’t come easy. In reality, relationships are a ton of work. The same is true for your goals and dreams.

To turn your dreams and goals into successful ones, you must be willing to put in the work. If you achieve your goals and you can claim victory, understand life is not a war. It is a series of battles. Each of those battles will bring about its own challenges and hardships, hence failures. Those failures shouldn’t be enough to call the war quits. It should become the motivation for you to do better. However, failure is being as damned as it is today. It is bringing about all these unhealthy feelings and depression. So when people fail, they are quick to detach how they genuinely feel to protect “themselves.” However, doing that will only create obstacles on the road to victory.

The power process teaches that if you do not go on the journey to attain your goals, you will live a life that is not fully satisfied. If people cannot be satisfied with their lives, they face an onslaught of negative things happening in their lives. This dissatisfaction did not simply occur because someone failed and gave up. It occurred because SOCIETY has told people what is expected, and if they can not reach those expectations, they are inferior. That is why we live in a society where most people remain single and may never have a substantial relationship. It is not because they can’t, but rather they do not want to be viewed by society as a failure. Then again, society will label you as unwanted goods and give you a prescription of anti-depressants to get through the rest of your life.

All in all, The Power Process is the human control to have power over our own life. Though this power has become heavily saturated in societal standards, it is still there to go against the world and live on our own accord. The result is you feel like you are a free person. You should be able to make a choice and not worry about what others will think about you. You should make your own choices that reflect who you want to be at the end of life. If you are having trouble finding out how to do that or who you are, do not hesitate to reach out to me. I have helped many people have were lost and confused. You do not have to remain in a place of weakness if you do not want to. I encourage you to seek the power you want out of your life and then attain it. Don’t let life end any way you wouldn’t want it to end. You should be happy with your life right now and how it ends.

Until then,

Michael Rearden

CEO of Reven LLC.