What is true power?

Is it having financial wealth?  Position or fame?  Perhaps it’s the ability to have an impact on someone’s life?

While I have always viewed wealth and fame as being fleeting in nature, I see true power as the ability to affect or have an impact on someone’s life.

In this context, and starting with ourselves and our own life’s direction, we are all powerful; let alone taking into account our ability to affect those around us.

We may not necessarily have the immediate breadth of impact of Richard Branson or Oprah Winfrey relative to the actual number of people our decisions affect but, to those with whom we come in contact on a regular basis we are no less significant.  Think about the power you have with friends or colleagues seeking out your advice or needing a shoulder to lean on.  What about the strangers to whom you reach out with a helping hand?  Power is not about controlling others but is all about the impact you have when you use your power to make a difference.

I am reminded of the Liberty Mutual “a helping hand is contagious” commercials (see video below).

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frpp6DjCaJU]

Who beside yourself do your actions affect?  It is an interesting question on many levels especially from the standpoint of your personal brand.  Or to put it another way, if your brand is the sum of every experience others have had with you, what would people say?  Would you be seen as considerate and helpful?  Can you be relied upon when the chips are down?

Regardless of the effort someone expends to build the image they want to portray, if they fall short in their practical day-to-day interactions with others it is this disconnect that will ultimately stand out.

So tell me, do your actions align with your brand?  If they don’t, you and you alone have the power to change!  And at the end of the day this is all the power that you really need.