With a hurricane bearing down on us and our electrical power gone, I was struck with the notion that this uncommon circumstance is rather common in our daily lives – we lose power often.

We become disconnected from our power source for hours, days, weeks, months, years and decades at a time. What storm could cause such widespread disconnection?

It’s the storm that rages in our head on a daily basis. Some days it’s a quiet storm and other days it’s a full blown hurricane.

Our life stories could all begin . . . “It was a dark and stormy night.”

There’s not much I can do about the storm outside, other than wait it out. The inside storm is something that can be addressed.

Did you ever notice that the inside storm has a ‘to and fro’ about it? That means you’re involved in an internal argument - sometimes on this side of the argument and sometimes on the other. We don’t seem to notice that our mind is arguing with itself.

We participate in the argument and blow a lot of destructive wind. Nowhere is it written that we have to participate in this back and forth, but we do. And when we take sides, we lose our power.

It reminds me of a hockey tactic . . . you send one of your least talented but bruising players into the game to taunt and mix it up with the other team’s top scorer. If the scorer bites, the two of you start fighting. The referee penalizes you both and you’re both sent out of the game for a time. There is little loss for the team who sent in the goon, but the other team loses its power.

You’re disconnected from your power when you are arguing in your head. With each point and counterpoint, you lose more steam as you steam yourself up.

The way to get reconnected to your power is to notice that you are arguing. That means to become a witness to the argument rather than a participant. There is no quicker way I know to calm the winds and shorten the storm than by becoming an observing bystander.

When you take the action to notice and become a witness, you remove yourself from the conflict. And without you, the storm quickly goes out to sea and you reconnect with your power with a strategy the Beatles sing about - “Let it Be.”

It’s tempting to get in there and mix it up making your points again and again, but you pull the plug on yourself each time you do.

Witnessing is a powerful tool we all own but rarely use.

I know the storm outside will eventually go away; I’m just as certain that the internal storm will rage indefinitely, unless I stop to notice the dark clouds and head for the higher ground of the witness perch.

All the best,

John