What is Power? Essay

Submitted By Torey
Words: 712
Pages: 3

Journal Entry: What is Power?
The idea of power is to have the ability to influence or persuade someone to do what you want them to do. To persuade someone to change his or her way of thinking into what you believe is a form of power. People use power on an everyday basis even, without knowing. I can recall a few experiences and situations in my life when I have used a type of power. Power over is the most commonly recognized form of power and it tends to have many negative associations with people. Considering the incident that I encountered when I was in the sixth grade acted as “power over” in my life. I had got in a fight with another student and things got a bit out of hand. I lost control of myself and begin to swing repeatedly and accidently hit one of the teachers who was trying to break up the fight. Now, I had power over that student because I was the winning opponent. However, when everything was said and done, someone had power over me. I was sent to a juvenile boot camp for three and a half months for simple battery on a teacher. I could not do anything without permission. The detention offices had control of my every move all because I couldn’t control my own actions.
In my household, we have a rule that if the kids be on good behavior and bring home good grades, then they will be rewarded five dollars at the end of the week. I have power over them because I’m the mother, so if they don’t do what is expected of them, then they don’t receive anything at the end of the week. Another experience in my life was participating in rally after the not guilty verdict from trial Zimmerman verses Trayvonne Martin. I felt like justice was not served. I gathered with a small organization called “Save Our Youth” in my community. We joined together to boycott and declared that justice be served for the guy whom took this young teen’s life.
When considering myself and power, I noticed that a lot of my experiences in life dealt with power over situations. Historically, we live in a male dominated society. There are still struggles for us as woman, especially black women to gain equality in America. It’s hard for us to gain leadership in congressional positions because society feels like the job is too much for a woman or a bit too aggressive for this job. It is extremely important for black to learn as much as possible and obtain higher education. Since the re-election of President Barack Obama, those of power who