Human Agency, Part 2 of Grasp the Nettle focuses on understanding and embodying personal power. It guides you to confront challenges, cultivate inner resilience, and leverage relationships and knowledge to foster individual and collective well-being. By exploring self-honesty, attitude, health, and the power of human connection, this section provides actionable insights to empower yourself, empower others and inspire positive change in the world.
In conversation a friend asked me to sum up what I am writing about in less than 300 words. I answered in 18, ‘It is about how, if we are to truly empower ourselves, we need also to empower others’. This is not just another book purporting utopia, but one that is grounded in the necessity of action. We need to dream to overcome the things that restrain us from moving forward. Goals need to be identified to map our progress towards the lives we want. Planning is needed if we are not going to waste time and resources. Is this idealistic? I don’t think so. I believe that the motivation needed is held inside us all.
My reason for writing is simple: I’m frustrated. It’s deeply concerning to watch intelligent people fall victim to social misunderstandings that come from oversimplifying complex realities. I feel a moral imperative to empower them by describing the world of power clearly. I come from the position of someone who is simply a member of the public – often referred to as Joe Public or the man on the Clapham omnibus. My understanding has not been shaped by formal academic training or political office, but rather by a deep and personal engagement with the world around me and a passionate commitment to advocating for social justice. This passion extends to other causes close to my heart, such as veganism, gay rights, and humanism. This section is my response, born from the hope that my understanding as an everyday person, driven by these core values, can save others from some of the pain in navigating life’s complex lessons.
What I share should not be the preserve of any elite, academic or otherwise. There needs to be an understanding that makes sense; an understanding that is grounded in everyday experience. Something you can approach from where you are right now, whatever your circumstances. I once wrote, ‘That a man is known as wise does not make him infallible. Equally, the fool can have wisdom.’ I invite the reader to use what I have written as the basis for their own personal engagement in understanding power and not rely on popular pundits. It is hoped that the presentation will engender a series of ah-ha moments where pieces of the puzzle fall into place. There is a specific understanding to which I wish to lead the reader: that their quest for personal empowerment becomes inseparable from a moral conviction that it has to be the entitlement of everyone.
Empowerment describes a journey of life mastery. There are so many manifestations of power we need a working knowledge of to achieve this. We don’t always see them all. In this part, I intend to focus on the perspective of you, the Individual. From this perspective, the things that help me are the powers I already possess, and whatever hinders me are the powers I don’t possess. Abraham Maslow described these needs in ‘A Theory of Human Motivation’. That quote by Maslow, “What a man can be, he must be,” sums up the idea behind the how and why of being human in a secular manner. It is this moral imperative that demanded I write these insights.
The concept of empowerment is a popular buzzword in the self-help industry. But the empowerment I am addressing is more than an attitude or state of mind. Without the realism of having looked at power in its complexity and entirety, such empowerment is just wearing rose tinted glasses. To become empowered, it is necessary to recognise power in all its manifestations. We must resist the temptation to demonise it. It is too easy to dismiss something you don’t have as being something no one should have.
Do you want to fast-forward to the good bits? Seeking the line of least resistance is a sensible strategy, but to find it, you need to first gain a broader understanding. This book is the product of years of my own failure, and reading it IS your shortcut. The following chapters will focus on specific manifestations of power. As seen in the opening summary, these chapters are organised in a sequence that broadly approximates the development and diversification of power in relation to individual human agency throughout history. And we need to have the patience to fully understand this if we are going to break the shackles of being imprisoned by the power of others. My wish is not a ‘feel good’ sense of the word, but an appraisal of all the possible blocks along the road and a realisation that they are within our personal capacity to overcome. Being armed with the appropriate knowledge gained through covering all the bases will allow you to know what to do. It is hoped that by seeing power in this way gives you the grasp of its relevance.