If you are being controlled, you probably did a double-take at the title here. I don’t blame you. You would expect that from an SJ. We are known for controlling others in a bad way. When we do this, we are living in our weaknesses. However, we can also be counted upon to keep the ship steady, create order, and manage the logistics to accomplish goals. When we use our drive in that way, we are living in our strengths and people are thankful to have us around.
However, it’s control in a different area that I had in mind in the title. When we’ve been dealt a bad hand in life — birth defects, broken family, alcoholic parents, debilitating disease, unfairly dismissed from work or whatever the bad circumstances in which we find ourselves — we are still in control! Yes! We have a choice about how we will respond to our circumstances. By making that choice, we control the effect our circumstances have on our lives moving forward.
We can choose to blame the circumstances (or whoever caused the circumstances) for our failures and unhappiness, or we can take control of the outcome by simply determining that we will find a way to benefit and overcome. If we choose to blame the circumstances or the one who caused it, we give control to them and we remain victims, forever subject to those people or circumstances. We become embittered with negative attitudes toward others and pessimistic about every opportunity that comes our way. The circumstances or perpetrators are then in control, and we are weak and suffering by our own mistake to allow them that control.
However, when our choice is to leave the bad experience in the past and move forward to new opportunities — new job, further training, new location, adjusted goals to accommodate and make use of our current positioning — we take the reins back into our hands and control what our future will become rather than allowing others to determine it. We can focus on what we have and what we can obtain through effort, and we will become better and stronger.
The same is true with our weaknesses. It is not necessary for me to continue in a weakness (like controlling others) just because the drive to control is hardwired in me from birth. That urge or drive is a positive, good strength when used correctly. When I concentrate on developing that strength in its positive, productive form, the weakness of overusing it to control others disappears. I am in control and the drive appears as a strength when I use it for the good and to benefit others.
What is your choice? I hope you choose to take control!
