Autonomy at the individual level is the ability of a person to make decisions that govern his/her conducts. In the social context, we choose the designs of our lives with adequate information that our actions solely rely on the decisions we make (Castle 2004). Our decisions dictate our socio-economic lives and so, autonomy is vital to one's chosen path in life. However, sometimes, we let other people make decisions for us. An individual’s will to adhere to his/her autonomy may sometimes be suspended and they re-allocate the decision-making to other people. As normal as it seems, these decisions too may trigger the vulnerability of one’s self since they are crucial to the implications based on the extent to which they may influence our lives. This paper seeks to discuss why autonomy varies depending on exposure to different people. It will also address how I withdraw my sense of autonomy when subjected to some situations.
When exposed to some people, we tend to lose our sense of autonomy to them; we tend to feel like we have less control over our decisions. While we are all powerful, only a few people are able to harness the power within them and use it to govern their lives. They have the ability to influence our thinking, perhaps make some decisions for us. To begin with, these people usually have a high sense of confidence. Confidence makes them justify their reasoning, perspectives, behaviours and actions. When an idea is expressed with confidence, we tend to find reason in it. Most of them are also optimistic about life. It is easy for us to withdraw our autonomy grasp when around optimistic people. They talentedly change how we see life in case we had rather pessimistic perspectives. More importantly, in times of problem-solving, these people play a major role in helping others manage tough situations.
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Some other people are good at empowering others. They have the natural ability to help others nurture the sense of empowerment. This behaviour is motivated by their desire to seek trust, express loyalty or to motivate the people around them. They do this in an attempt to ensure that other people express their capabilities with the hope of sustaining their social relationships. Others exhibit this behaviour to help others improve performance. In the social perspective of performance motivation, these personalities are the crucial elements towards inspiring performance motivation. Besides, their capacity to empower others plays a significant role in the recruitment and retention of friends (Twain 2018). Their ability to listen to other people’s ideas helps them empower the people around them.
Personally, when confronted in some situations I do suspend my autonomy. This is in regard to the satisfaction rates of the people around me. For example, in my romantic relationship, it is rather automated for me to avoid compromises in my relationship. Romantic relations tend to invite conflicts when it comes to decision-making. Sometimes, partners have to withdraw their capacities or moral obligations that require them to decide upon what is good for them and let the opposite partners participate. To demonstrate trust and loyalty, we develop a sense of belief in decisions made by our intimate partners and barely offer any contradicting insights.
Conclusively, there are variations between those who give others room for self-empowerment and those who have the inborn ability to influence others by suspending their feeling autonomy. These variations are guided by their desires in life, personalities, previous-encounters, confidence levels etc. However, power manifests itself in our daily lives because of these two extremes; everyone who feels powerful needs an audience as well as motivators.
References
Twain. A. (2018) “The Benefits of Empowering Others.” Self-improvement”. Accessed at https://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/the-benefits-of-empowering-others
Castle, K. (2004). The meaning of autonomy in early childhood teacher education. Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education , 25 (1), 3-10.
