Brain Food for Pioneering Spirits: How does power influence our thinking and behavior? That’s the question we explore in Room #938 of the Deep Talk Club, under our overarching theme of “Power & Violence.” Listen in on the examples that came up and the perspectives that emerged in dialogue…
Note: This session was recorded live in German as part of the Deep Talk Club, so the video above is German-language audio only. What follows is an English translation of the conversation, lightly edited for readability — the back-and-forth between the moderator and participants is preserved, but the original timestamps and speaker names have been left out.
A very warm good morning to you. Today we continue with the psychology of power and want to look at how power influences our thinking and behavior. Here we can basically pick up all sorts of different aspects and maybe get into the topic through examples, to look, in the sense of reflection, in which direction the whole thing takes shape. So you’re all very warmly invited to join in again today and step into the exchange. Maybe just a quick reminder, the room is recorded the entire time. Anyone who joins automatically agrees that the whole thing will also be published. We have three small room rules, a profile photo where you’re recognizable, first and last name, and at least one sentence in your bio. Anyone who doesn’t want that for whatever reason, or can’t speak right now, can of course also use the chat to bring in thoughts or questions, which we can pick up on over time. So, the psychology of power — you could basically pick up all sorts of different aspects here. The question is, what impulses do you have when you hear that, regarding how power actually influences our thinking and behavior? What are the first impulses that come up for you? Maybe a few impulses from my side, what sub-topics we could open up under this, also to see what comes to mind for you, things like, what effect does holding power have on behavior? Someone who has power, what does that do to someone, how does it affect their behavior? Leadership styles and power, we can look at how power is exercised in different leadership styles. How do leadership styles influence the well-being or productivity of teams and organizations? That would be an aspect we could pick up here. All the way to abuse of power and corruption — what psychological factors lead people to abuse their power? Then we have the social and cultural level of power, where we can look at how power is perceived and exercised in different cultures and societies, what social norms and values play a role in that, and maybe also the direction of the psychology of obedience and subordination, why do people follow authorities even when they give unethical instructions. There are various experiments that have been conducted on this in the past, with astonishing results, so maybe we can look at how that can be explained and understood. Then we can look at how the experience of power or powerlessness can affect a person’s mental and physical health, all the way to gender-specific aspects, so what role do gender roles and stereotypes play, for example, in the exercise and perception of power. Those are quite different aspects, in which direction things can go today, so to speak. Maybe you have further aspects that we can pick up and look at in this context too. So how does power influence our thinking and behavior is roughly the question we want to engage with and address today. With that, I’ll mute myself now and see who’d like to join first this morning, to step into the exchange, so we can shape a dialogue.
A very warm good morning, dear Ria.
Good morning, dear Yasemin. Good morning to everyone out there. What I just experienced in the last two minutes made it clear to me — I do similar things at school too — that for me, put quite plainly now, the psychology of power stands between pressure and coercion. This not being able to bear it, this not wanting to wait any longer, and knowing what the other person actually wants, what the other person expects, and at the same time this feeling, but not me this time. Someone else could do it too. Does it always have to be me? But on the other hand, why not me? I’m here, I can say something, I have an opinion on it. So why doesn’t anyone else speak up? All eyes are lowered, the teacher stands at the front, it’s quiet, and yet the silence isn’t nice. And that’s the power that stands in the room, even though the teacher maybe doesn’t even want to use it, but they possess it. And we know that they say, after 30 seconds, once a question has been asked, either the next question comes, because the teacher can’t bear it, or the children raise their hands. And I held out for two minutes. And then I thought, well why not? Then maybe I’ll speak up and say exactly what I’m feeling right now. And that’s maybe already a way to bypass the power. Not to answer the question, in this case I did answer it after all, but to say, why are you doing this now? Why are you waiting so long, why aren’t you asking a new question? Maybe we didn’t understand the question correctly. And the psychology of power is a psychology of dependency at school. Of course that’s not an all-encompassing answer, but it’s my current momentary feeling that I just had, and I wasn’t quite prepared to be back at school so soon. Thank you.
Oh wonderful, thank you so much, Ria. And what I find exciting about what you just laid out, above all, is that on one hand there’s maybe a certain power there, the teacher’s or the moderator’s or whoever asked the question and is holding out here. And at the same time, interestingly, you can observe that it’s an interplay. That means, do I take it into my own hands, so do I now decide, for example, to raise my hand, to join in, and thereby influence and change this relationship a bit, so to speak, at this point.
Ria, what do you say to that?
Oh yes, if something like that happens to me at school and the class really endures such a situation for a longer time, if there’s an argument or discussions, or if I ever have a serious word and the class doesn’t speak up, then I know that not only the situation needs to be discussed, but our relationship needs to be discussed. Then it goes a level deeper. But that’s how it is in class, the class knows each other, and the class can coordinate beforehand. The class talks in the class chat, the class forms an opinion, and a group of people who live together for half a year, three quarters of a year, has its own dynamic. I always say, every class is like a personality. They have certain character traits, they take on character traits as a class. And then you say, that’s a lively class, or that’s a discussion-loving class, or that’s a stubborn class. Though calling it “the class” is nonsense, because they’re different individuals. But as a class they almost form a body again, their own individual body, and you can tell exactly whether this class-body is coming toward you, likes you, shows you sympathy, or whether it says, let’s leave them hanging now, we’re not in the mood. That doesn’t work here in this group, I think, because we don’t know each other offline, because we also otherwise don’t, well most of us don’t communicate and, let’s say, move with each other, so that at that moment we also don’t know at all what the other person is thinking. I think this topic is very theoretical at first, and you don’t quite know how to respond to it. That’s why most people stayed silent, or almost everyone stayed silent. But yes, the other side has power too and can demonstrate it, and then the supposed power-holder has a real problem.
Yes, thank you so much, and this also makes clear again, in adult education, whenever it’s a context where people are, so to speak, forced to participate in a training or similar, or also in school, where it’s compulsory at first, at least up to a certain grade or a certain age you have to attend school, we often first have the situation that voluntariness has to be established from within a compulsory framework, so to speak. There are wonderful studies on this too, showing and proving that voluntariness first has to develop out of involuntariness, so that there’s willingness to learn or develop further and similar. Here we have a different situation, in that this room on Clubhouse right now isn’t prescribed in the sense of, you have to participate here. There’s no one forcing you to join in every morning here. That means the voluntary situation is per se already given at first. But now comes the differentiation again, do I want to speak up, or would I rather listen? And I find it totally exciting to observe these phenomena here too. What you described, Ria, I’m pretty sure that at one point or another the other participants feel similarly. This “no, now I’ll just wait and see if maybe someone else speaks up too or similar.” And then always trying further to endure this silence, which mostly, in quotation marks, only leads to us having long, long gaps and pauses in the recording. In the end usually the same players are on stage again anyway, so the same people again and again. And at the same time we’ve also already had various situations where we noticed that one or another applauded via the chat, so that there’s relief among the participants who usually aren’t on stage, because they maybe don’t dare, or whatever, following the motto “phew, thank goodness someone finally spoke up and is joining in now.” But it’s exciting how all these phenomena run in the background, so to speak, and that’s just one example of that. We have many situations in everyday life where, in quotation marks, you could say power and counter-power stand opposite each other, and maybe at first glance one person has more power from a status perspective, by position, by office, outwardly, but that’s not necessarily equal to the power that, for example, is also available to the individual person, the individual, in terms of possibilities, and the question is, do I engage with that or not? And this definition by office, that someone is granted power, doesn’t mean the others, in quotation marks, simply follow along, but there can be really, really big differences accordingly. And that’s where we get into all these different forms of, for example, authority. So is it defined by office, or is it maybe simply an authority figure in person, so to speak, who’s recognized as such. Those are other aspects we can open up in this context too.
Ria, would you like to say something briefly about this before we can gladly bring in Leila?
I have to laugh right now. A story comes to mind, which I’ll tell in a moment. But at first, yes. What you formulated, I’d say, what are my intentions when I come into this room? And I can well imagine that many people say, I’m getting inspiration for the day. There are people here with great ideas, great thoughts. And I participate in that. But I myself don’t feel so eloquent or so well-read that I can join the conversation. But it gives me impulses. I notice that too, when I come into your room, but don’t want to say anything on the topic, can’t say anything, and I listen to others, even if it’s often the same voices again and again. And sometimes I already have the feeling, we really do know each other. Then I say to myself, man, that thought is good. If you bring that into your thing, into your tutoring or your coaching program, that’s a great idea. Man, that has a completely different meaning, connection on the level you need right now. So these are punctual, small, wonderful hacks where I say to myself, it was worth it just to be here for that. And on the other hand, I’m always a type who likes to talk with others, because I notice that in speaking I get triggered by the other person to keep thinking, to think even more strongly in a certain direction and say, there’s another idea, and now another idea just came to me. In the middle of speaking, the idea usually still arises. But thinking processes run very, very differently for everyone. And everyone develops their ideas in a different way. And for me, this room is such that I say, in speaking, new ideas come to me, in speaking I understand something better, and there are people who understand better by listening. So on one hand that’s quite legitimate and doable, but to go back to school and use that means, someone who doesn’t raise their hand still participates. And so it’s presumptuous, and a bitter pill of power, to grade children’s participation based on hand-raising. And that’s really tough stuff now. How many teachers do that every day? The child didn’t speak up today, they get an F. They only spoke up three times this month, they get a D. What? Why? Can you look into their head? Do you know what they thought and how they organized their thoughts and how they participated from that to understand and solve this task, and maybe wrote a B on the math test, why can you then, or why are you as a teacher so presumptuous, and give them a D for participation? So that’s one side. The other side is, you said power by office. A wonderful story. Me and my mom on the way into town. We walked because it was a nice day, and my mom starts to get urgent, meaning with us she really urgently needs to use the toilet. And we knew there was a public toilet building in town where you had to pay. And we get to the toilet building, and in front of the toilet door lies a broom sideways. And then the toilet lady comes out and says, you can’t come in here now, I’m cleaning right now. And my mom says, but I really, really urgently need to, I really, really need to. No, I told you, it’s not possible. And then, by luck and chance, we found a restaurant, but back then, 40, 50 years ago, that wasn’t so easy either. And then my mother said a saying I still use today: give a toilet lady power and she’ll let you pee outside the hut. And for me that’s a wonderful form, or a wonderful sentence, for abuse of power. That was my story. Thank you.
Thank you so much. And with that I’d like to bring in Leila.
A very warm good morning, dear Leila. What do you say about the topic?
A very warm good morning. I’m still on that story and thinking about it. Yes, I think the psychology of power really is one, because it’s really true, give someone power and you recognize their character, usually. That’s really, really, yes, that’s something I’ve noticed too. And it’s actually irrelevant who it is, as soon as the person has power over you, the question is how do they use it? What I wanted to bring in is that power doesn’t necessarily include authority. Just because I have power over someone, it also depends on how I use the power. If I go into a leadership position, not every boss who’s a boss is also recognized as such. And that has a lot to do with leadership, I think. I don’t even know if this really fits your topic, since you’ve addressed so many points. It’s just something I kept becoming aware of. It’s always the question of how do you use it? You addressed the topic of forced community with group formation, and regarding what Ria said, yes, it’s really true. So, what does one presume, to tell someone what’s going on in their head? Here it’s really, really important that with participation too, there are regulations you have to stick to, just like everyone has them. So quantity isn’t quality. But that doesn’t mean everyone sticks to that. So it’s always about how do I use my power, and whether I’m aware of it. And whether I abuse it. Because abuse of power also has a lot to do with psychology. So I think the most important point is simply, I think it shows so much about a person, how they handle it when they have power, whether they use it to manipulate or not. And that’s not meant to be judgmental, saying, well then you have a bad character. No, it just shows a lot about someone, I’d say, if I evaluate it neutrally or leave it standing neutrally. Neutral doesn’t mean not evaluating.
Yes, thank you so much. And here the question arises for me — I’d like to formulate this as a question too, to check — because especially sentences like “give someone power” and “you recognize a character,” or similar, roughly, there are so many sayings you could open up here. And that also goes in the direction of what Ria said, the story she told with her mom, so to speak, the conclusion drawn from it, there we’re relatively quickly in generalizations, there are beliefs hidden behind that, and those aren’t necessarily always and everywhere valid. So we should first check whether that fits at all, and sensitize ourselves to that again. So I’d like to formulate the question, is that really so? Is character per se always the same, or does the person possibly also take on different roles, for example, where power is also shaped differently, or maybe even in one and the same role or task, that maybe gets lived out and filled differently in different contexts, so to speak. So here it’s worth, from my point of view, using this room again to check exactly that. I’m curious about that too.
And with that I’d like to bring in Jürgen. A very warm good morning, dear Jürgen. What do you say to that?
Good morning, dear Yasemin, good morning everyone in the room. Your last sentence, your last statement, was the final trigger that got me onto the stage for this topic after all. So far I was busy, and this is an expression for me too, “power of silence,” trying to bring together all the inputs, the thematic anchor points you set at the beginning of this room, from leadership style to cultural differences, gender roles, holding power and the like, trying to summarize that under a common level, a meta-level, again with regard to reducing the complexity of this topic, because we’re talking about psyche. We’re talking about psyche and we’re talking about power, about power in a terminology we’ve been discussing for, I don’t know anymore, two or three weeks now. And with psyche, I think it would go in the same direction, if that were the overarching theme. What I’m now, and that’s why your last statements triggered this, this change component of this feeling — that’s one of the essential characteristics for me too, if you try to define psyche briefly in one sentence, what is psyche at all, as the sum of the attitudes of our thinking, our behavior, and our emotions, roughly put, then that’s a dynamic system. A dynamic system that changes over the course of, just from us getting older alone, and our duration on the timeline. Our psyche, all these individual components, how we feel emotions, how we think, how we behave, changes due to the most varied influences. And so I’ve come to this level for myself, as a meta-level, to question this topic explicitly, effects on, or influence of, psyche. What actually puts us in the position to recognize that we’re powerful, and that someone or some institution has empowered us? Because I think this understanding and classification of the personal feeling of what power is and what power does to me right now, or what I can do with power, must have a recognition value, must be realized as such, especially in a leadership position, leadership positions, in order to then be able to use it in some form, either constructively or destructively. So it’s again, let me say this as a closing thought, this actual foundation from my point of view, before you focus on the elaborations of this position of power, to establish how you even come into awareness of this position of power in the first place. And that would be a really essential question for me, from which you can also derive whether, based on the individual situation or related to the position, it’s a positive power or a negative power. That’s it from me for now. Thank you for listening.
Yes, wonderful, thank you so much. Leila, would you like to pick up on this directly?
I’m actually still on a completely different point, but yes, I’m with what you said, Yasemin, where you said, let’s look at that again, and those are beliefs too. Can I pick up on that again? Is that okay?
Yes, of course, gladly.
Yes, and I just wanted to say to that, yes, you’re right. Because I thought about how do I do it, if beforehand, when I come into a position of power for the first time? I orient myself too, that can be, I orient myself on things I’ve experienced. I orient myself, when I think about it, when I was first — I don’t know if that’s power, I don’t know if I’d call it that — when I was a teacher, and the first time, I played a teacher. That means, I did it the way I thought a teacher should be. Whether that said a lot about my character, I don’t know, because I oriented myself on that. And of course it’s also about what happens in the course of things. How do people then talk to me? So for example, yes, and as a boss you have to do it this way and that. No, and this is important, and, and, and. And I think that also has a lot to do with this distinction. That’s why I do think you can’t say it that simply per se. What I was mainly getting at was this abuse of power. So always, when I see people abusing their power and making themselves much bigger in certain situations than they actually are, but bigger than they are, they try to appear very big. And then suddenly they’re very rigorous and very, very authoritarian. And for me that’s always a sign that either they didn’t have that for a long, long time, or they can’t handle it, or they simply abuse it, because now they’re at the lever and otherwise aren’t at the lever. And finally we all have to do what they say. That means if someone says “jump,” in this case that person, then the others have to ask “how high?” And that just became really clear to me again now. So you can’t say it categorically. And I think you also orient yourself a lot on what you’ve experienced. And what influences come from outside too, under certain circumstances. And also, I think, what happens inside. So for me it was always, how did I imagine a teacher? And then I played this teacher, until I developed my own teacher personality. Funny too.
Yes, thank you so much. And I think we can build a nice bridge here too. Jürgen, I saw you’re raising your hand right away. And what I find really exciting at this point, because Jürgen also said earlier, well how do I even get power in the first place, and then to recognize that I have power and so on, so on the psychological level. I find that totally exciting here too, because per se the position I get doesn’t actually mean that I have power. So I have to somehow assign that, I have to somehow recognize it too. And I find this level of interaction really, really exciting here, because power isn’t necessarily given by position, so to speak, but rather what can maybe even be individually shaped and gets shaped in the interaction, and how it’s used, how I handle it, obviously plays a really big role in the interaction too. And I’d like to look at that more closely there too. I’d like to open up an example so you can follow what I mean. For example, when I did my doctorate and then suddenly had the title in front of my name, something changed somehow, basically overnight, just because two letters and a period were added in front of my name. But two, three days before that I didn’t say anything different than usual. Only this title changed with my name, and I noticed that suddenly the way people dealt with me changed too, or the reactions to me as a person, or to content statements or similar. And here this recognizing plays a role too, then the question, how do I handle that? — You’re on speaker right now, just a heads-up, in case you hadn’t noticed. And how do I handle it and so on. A lot derives from that. So we can gladly look at that. But what becomes quite obvious is that something suddenly happens in the interaction with others, and I think this interaction plays a much bigger role in this power construct than we’re maybe even aware of at one point or another. That’s why I’d like to look at that more closely too.
I saw Jürgen raised his hand, and then gladly Ria too, if it wasn’t an accident but you wanted to add something too, then gladly Jürgen.
For me it was actually more of an accident too, but through your last statements I’ll nod along in the sense that yes, that’s exactly the topic. You’ve clearly hit the point again, which I’d like to emphasize once more, that this power in connection with psyche is a dynamic system for me, that changes over the course of our life, through our attitudes, through our behaviors, which get confirmed or not confirmed. And a really essential aspect connecting to that is learning and socialization, and thus basically the path toward education. And in this context I’d see the meta-level for our topic today. Thank you again for listening.
Yes, wonderful, thank you so much. Ria, did you want to add something too, or was that just an accident?
That was an accident. I don’t even know why that happened, but I also haven’t been able to listen the whole time, because I had a phone call. Still, this topic is really deeply spinning around in me right now. I was just thinking about it, and I agree with Jürgen very much there. Standing at 1.54 meters in front of taller students is of course already a physical challenge, and nevertheless, at the beginning of my time as a teacher, I always had the feeling that per se, because I stood at the front, I could exercise a certain kind of power. And in many, many situations over the last 40 years, I’ve then decided for myself what kind of power I want to exercise. There were situations where I noticed that I exercised power on students in a very oppressive way, where I then noticed afterward, you hurt them. You really hurt them massively. You did something with words that you have to fix again. You really noticed that in this situation you’d added one more thing on top of what they already had to carry as a burden. And then, because I recognize this feeling or recognize this situation, and increasingly recognize it better, I crystallized that out in conversations with the student, and got confirmation that these words, these sentences, or also this way of acting, when it came to putting something on the table somehow or giving the student something in some way, whatever it was, that these things reminded the student of what happened at home, or what they’d already experienced, and that this got reinforced by it. And then I had the chance and the opportunity, not because of my position of power, but because of my knowledge and my abilities and my competencies that I’d acquired as an educator, to build a counterpart here, or build a bridge, to get out of this miserable situation for the student. And at the same time I then recognized that it was actually also a miserable situation for me, because I don’t want to exercise power in the way that toilet lady did. And this dynamic, in what way do I want to be experienced, in my possibilities of exercising power, has massively changed me over the last 20 years in my way of being a teacher, and thus also in my way of building my own structures, my own paradigms for my work, and this conscious questioning of what do I actually want to achieve and cause with my power. That’s a very dynamic process, but you also have to want to go through it yourself and not just say, okay, I have this power now and I’ll use it. Strength, men, water soup. Bang. Thanks, that was it for now.
Yes, wonderful. Thank you so much. And that’s where we are, I think, right at the term “responsibility” too, so having power and taking responsibility, or handling it responsibly, is certainly a really important keyword in this context too.
Leila, I saw you wanted to add something too.
Yes, and I found what Ria told really interesting too. And I think there are many, many, many points, so it’s so important to look at this exactly, how do I handle it. And you said something really important, so words can hurt tremendously. And I experienced that in my school days myself, that teachers, you don’t think anything of it. I still use this example today, where I say, you know, I just want to treat you with respect, but respect isn’t a one-way street. Because it’s not like I’m some absolutist sole ruler standing at the front. I’m at a secondary school. My students are more like, they’d say “report’s been filed, you can’t do that.” No, so, warm greetings to my students, they’re all great of course. Yes, but with regard to authority, it has changed a bit in the meantime. And you’re not simply perceived that way anymore. Of course that also has to do with age, but perceived as authority. Sometimes you have to earn that a bit. And I had a teacher who once turned on a light and said, so that a light also goes on for you. That’s abuse of power. I always cite that example, and say, you know, and that’s not how I want to treat you, because you just don’t do that. Because what did that translate to for me? Well, she said they’re stupid and all that. I’m like, yes, and are you even allowed to do that? No. Well, and what should you do then? Well. And then they think about it, and then between aggressiveness and other courses of action, they consider what they could do. And then I always explain that respect isn’t a one-way street, because you shouldn’t treat people the way you’re treated, but the way you’d want to be treated. I know the situation, Ria, from my teacher training. It was different for me. I’m also only 1.60 meters tall, but I had to inform myself a lot about rules, because I wanted to know what I was allowed to do and what not. I wanted, I don’t know, well of course it was like that, but I was the trainee teacher, and as a new teacher too. I don’t know how it is at the Gymnasium level, but you have to earn your stripes a bit. That’s really how it is, and you’re not automatically perceived as an authority figure per se yet. That can happen, but it’s not always like that. And for myself I’ve noticed that it’s really important, what perception do I have of the whole thing, how do others perceive me, and how are my actions, that I have to handle that sensitively. And one really important thing I’ve learned is, I can’t — if I try to be overly fair and say sorry and I’m sorry to everyone and sorry, that doesn’t work, but it also doesn’t work to say, no, I decide that, and sometimes it’s like my kingdom and I’m the queen, that’s okay too, but not always. You can’t do that. And that’s why I think it’s important that you just look at when am I allowed to do things, when am I not. And as soon as I hurt someone, and especially with children, see, you said that so nicely. That’s really true. They’re so vulnerable, and I still have sentences from my teachers in my head today, both good and bad. And that’s why it’s so important that we pay attention to that.
Yes, thank you so much. And here the question also arises, I think, how it’s maybe experienced too. Experience also plays a role here too. That means we definitely have situations where, for example, siblings grow up in the same family and experience certain situations completely differently. And that can of course also play a role with regard to power and the exercise of power, how I experience it. There are also different types of people at this point. From my point of view, I can’t say per se that I can’t say, I’m the teacher now and we’re just deciding this now, but there are definitely possibly situations where that would be appropriate. And on the other hand, it also has a lot to do with, I mean, you have, say, 20, 30 students sitting in the classroom, and one or another even needs this orientation and this decision to be given to them, and not have endless discussions. And then there are others who might already experience that as intrusive. So we do have, there we definitely have a mixed group, whether that’s in school or in other contexts, where we always have different participants, so to speak, just like here too. One person thinks the contributions are too long. The other thinks it’s exactly right. One thinks Yasemin should finally intervene and interrupt. And the other thinks, let her finish speaking.
Leila twitched first, and then Ria.
Right, so I just wanted to correct that briefly. It is the case that I of course have to determine things, like for example I’m responsible for the seating arrangement. And whether we do group work or individual work, I’m responsible for that. How we organize processes, I’m responsible for that. And it’s also not the case that this can be voted on every time and everyone can raise their hand each time and say, well I’d, well we could do this and that here, I do catch myself sometimes saying, well, the person in the room who studied for this decides now, that would be me. I’ve put a lot of effort into that. I really do it right, because people want to decide a lot then. And it’s true, you’re right, Yasemin. Some things do need to be decided. I’m just concerned with, I’m concerned with the fact that when things simply get decided that aren’t… You have regulations. And you can tell those are important to me. You have regulations, seating arrangement, I determine that, I do that, I do that. But that doesn’t give me the right to suddenly determine everything then. And then for example, because the worst thing you can do, Ria mentioned earlier, where she said, how am I supposed to tell someone what, if a quiet child, if it doesn’t speak up, I don’t know what’s going on in their head, there are regulations, I actually have to call on them. And even if I can’t call on them, if they’re too shy, then it’s my job as an educator to find ways to achieve an equivalent assessment of performance, and then also again, in a subject conference or accordingly proceed there. Many people don’t do that, even though they should have to. But I think it’s really important that you consider what’s important, what can I determine, what should I determine. And it’s important to me that this isn’t exploited, and that you apologize when you’ve done something wrong, and that you don’t just decide about other people just because you’re allowed to and then do it as you please, because you have rules you have to stick to. Both regarding participation and regarding other things. But you’re right. I do determine the seating arrangement quite often. That doesn’t sit well with very, very many. And I do it anyway, because I have to, because it’s simply better for the children. And I decide that then.
Thank you, Ria.
Leila’s thoughts just pointed me to the situation that school is actually, or not actually, but that school is the best and strongest example of positions of power, and also of powerlessness. Many people out there probably aren’t teachers, and they say to themselves, man, this is all about being a teacher, about educating, about school, but exactly this subsystem of society, in which more or less directly or indirectly 50 percent of society is involved, actually shows these strange power structures very, very clearly as an example. And when Leila talked about the teacher training period, that’s the time when trainee teachers, for one to two years, and that’s supposed to be extended again, have to and get to show that they want to become teachers. That means they can gain practical experience. In one and the same moment, if someone from the teacher training seminar is sitting in the back, that’s usually a former teacher who worked as a teacher for two, three, four, five years, then went back to university and holds seminars there that are supposed to show how to prepare lessons. And then these trainee teachers get to write up to 20 pages of lesson preparation for one lesson. That the 20 pages don’t get written in 20 minutes will be clear to everyone. This trainee teacher, this trainee, is in an absolute state of powerlessness. Teacher training leads to 50 percent of the people currently in teacher training quitting school. That means the few teachers still there, and in all federal states teachers are currently desperately being sought, they get driven away, and at the same time this person is supposed to prove positions of power toward students with these 20 pages of lesson preparation and the teacher sitting in the back. They’re just trembling. They’re scared they’ll say some sentence wrong again, that they’ll write something wrong on the board, that they won’t do some slide right, or that the projector won’t work, or this or that, and that a student will express themselves in some unfriendly way or do something they still have to react to, where they don’t know exactly how to react. I once experienced such a situation myself, when I was already an established teacher, I had to hold a lesson to get a teaching qualification in a subject. I stood there, I sweated blood, because someone was sitting in the back who got to decide whether I could continue. And afterward I said to myself, hey girl, did that really have to be? Why are you putting yourself through this? You know you’re good. Yes, you didn’t study this subject, but you want to teach this subject, because you notice that you can do it, and the students have signaled that to you too, why do you let yourself get cornered like this here, and this discrepancy, or this conflict, between simultaneously holding a position of power and simultaneously being powerless toward the person sitting in the back judging and evaluating you. That belongs to a really, really difficult situation, where you have to work in an ambivalence which, in my view, can very, very quickly lead to pathological changes in the psyche, if this situation happens over longer periods. That means, if I exercise my power in a way that’s hurtful, then soul, body, and mind get hurt. That became clear to me again. Thank you.
Yes, thank you so much. And with an eye on the time, I’d like to pick up one or two points again, also from the chat, to make connections here again and build the corresponding bridges for the next rooms we have too, before we move into the closing round now. Namely, power and powerlessness ultimately arise in interaction. Those are different, and I found that great too, with the example you just brought up, Ria, with this — how could you maybe describe that — different positions of power within a room, so to speak. One person has power, the other has power, and the other has power over the other again. So on different hierarchy levels too, for example. Those aren’t exceptional situations either, if we look more closely at these interactions. That means we always have power relationships among each other too, shaped in different degrees. And power and powerlessness arise behind, in the interaction. What I mean by that, and that’s also something the room confirmed for me again today, is that it’s not by office or similar, but rather in the situation this “how do I experience this?” plays a really big role too. Even when abuse of power takes place, that means then de facto maybe abuse of power was undertaken or exercised. But the question is always, how do I deal with it? Do I let it happen to me, or don’t I let it happen to me? And there are all sorts of different strategies. We have here, for example, also on the psychology of power, the question again of how power functions, what are the psychological maneuvers. We haven’t worked through that in such detail today, but you can maybe listen back into the author’s breakfast with Susann Grieger-Langer. That was one of the first author’s breakfasts we did in this context. I think we’ve already opened up quite a few topics, also in the author’s breakfasts, where you can definitely hear about exactly these aspects again. So maybe that as a recommendation, to listen back into that podcast episode. So quite specifically, really this episode with Susann Grieger-Langer. There were a lot of power aspects in there too. We surely have a lot more, where it keeps getting touched on in the different episodes and similar. So it can definitely be worth it. But that’s one that’s really vehemently in my mind right now, which I can recommend listening back to, because various strategies get opened up there too.
Then we’ve already talked about adult games, so power and power games also happen in every interaction, in daily interaction. And so here too, listening back into one or another digital campfire. We picked up these topics there too. We’ve partly picked up interactions from the chat, to demonstrate exactly these maneuvers here. What actually happens there? Also on the verbal level, for example. And then of course we also have this nonverbal track, things like enduring silence and so on. That all falls under, and that’s what we started with today too, power and dealing with power, so to speak, as a topic too. So there are very diverse facets you can pick up here. That was one thing.
The other thing from the chat that I wanted to pick up again was, there was also a question about empowerment. I can give the hint that we’ll definitely build the bridge. So we have the overarching theme of power and violence, and under this overarching theme we have different focus topics, and we’ll definitely go quite intensively in the coming days and weeks, I don’t know exactly when it’s planned, into the area of empowerment, self-empowerment. That means building the bridge here too, also with regard to what can I do, or how can I shape that myself, even if I’m not, in quotation marks, the power-holder, so to speak. So what does power do to me and how can I deal with it are the questions we’ll still engage with.
And then I’d like to pick up the needs here too, not the pyramid of needs, but needs. And that of course, and thanks again for this hint with the term needs, plays a really big role too. We’ve talked about our brain in many places. We’ve talked about needs in many places, emotions. And especially in the context of power or also powerlessness, this topic of belonging or security of course plays an important role here too. That we look at that again too. I don’t think we’ll be able to conclusively wrap that up today. But I’m sure that in the coming days and weeks, when we pick up the further topics, we’ll definitely pick up one thing or another at another point again. I’ll definitely take that as a keyword for myself, so we can weave that in somewhere again, to make sure it comes up.
With that, I’d like to move into the closing round for today. Ria, Leila, what were your highlights, so to speak, and I’d like to start backward, because Leila wanted to add something, and then Ria, and then I’ll wrap up with the announcement for tomorrow.
Leila.
Okay, yes, I just wanted to briefly say, so I think, and this is also my closing comment, that it became clear to me that power has a lot to do with interaction too. And I found this careful looking really important too, because I wasn’t only a trainee teacher, I also examine the second state exam. That means I examine teachers. I think what I’ve heard now is true, that often the trainee is in this position. Not all the trainees I’ve ever experienced were in this position of “oh God, I’m doing something wrong now,” but I’ve also experienced trainees who were firmly convinced that everything they did, they did right. And if someone said something, then the fault lay with them and not with the trainee. That’s not criticism now, just simply an experience I had, because I was a trainee myself. I think this careful looking is simply important, and it has a lot, a lot to do with interaction. Good teacher training has a lot to do with a good school, it has a lot to do with me having good mentors, it has a lot to do with me having good subject didactics experts, and with the person examining me being aware that they only see a snippet, and it’s really important, I can certainly look at a teacher-student relationship for the moment, but to presume to say I can judge the teacher-student relationship of this teacher or trainee as such, I find that very presumptuous, and I’ve made it my mission not to do that. Thank you for listening.
Thank you so much, Ria.
I just want to say thank you for this enlightening and inspiring hour. It was once again a very special highlight, a first highlight of this day. Thank you all so much.
Yes, wonderful. Thank you so much. I’d like to take the opportunity here to briefly point out again that we’ve added a new keyword to our Knowledge Base again. And thanks for Ria’s support here at this point. On transactional analysis, feel free to take a look, drop by. Here too, and I think this fits wonderfully with the topic regarding how to handle things, so to speak, things like “I’m okay, you’re okay,” or also not, maybe picking up these levels here too. Just take a look. That’s on my website, yaseminyazan.com/knowledgebase, but you’ll also find, when you’re on the website, the Knowledge Base tab. You can drop by there. By the way, you can always drop by there again and again. We keep adding new terms, look to weave that in, and especially against the background of interdisciplinarity, we look to get different perspectives on the terms afterward too, and accordingly we find links etc. taking place. That means it’s still in its emerging phase, but this emerging phase will also never end. I can promise that already, because it’s not a process that ends at some point, but actually keeps being carried further. So the warm invitation to just drop by there.
And yes, then I have the announcement for tomorrow. Let me see what’s coming up tomorrow. Namely, that’s violence against minorities. How can we combat discrimination and violence against minority groups is the question we want to engage with tomorrow, will surely be really, really exciting too. So you’re all very warmly invited to join again tomorrow morning at eight, and I’m already looking forward to it. Thank you for the contributions on stage as well as the contributions in the chat. Great. I found it very enriching again, and one thing or another that remained open, we can just let it resonate now, to see where connectivity can be established again in one of the other rooms, to round off certain aspects again. In that spirit, take care, and I’m looking forward to tomorrow. Ciao!
