The Hearts Hello

You’ve Been Giving Your Power Away — Here’s How to Take It Back

• Keona T. Ellerbe • Season 3 • Episode 14

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A quiet conviction can change an entire day. We start with that gritty, 5 a.m. honesty—the rush of thoughts, the sense that too many tabs are open—and follow it into a practical map for taking back what we’ve been handing out without noticing: our peace, our voice, our time, our energy, our joy, and even our identity. Along the way, we talk about the difference between control and alignment, why saying yes while your spirit says no is a slow leak, and how to move from surviving to thriving with small, repeatable choices.

I share the exact questions I ask when I feel drained—Who am I seeking validation from? Which conversations shrink me? Where am I over-explaining just to be understood?—and the everyday habits that close those leaks. You’ll hear simple scripts for protecting your peace, how to audit your yes, what it means to treat your voice as a contribution, and why curating your inputs may be the most loving boundary you set this week. We also get honest about identity beyond titles and roles, and we anchor it all with a practice most of us skip: self-forgiveness. No grand gestures, no revenge arcs—just steady, aligned authority.

If you’ve felt scattered, stuck, or small, this conversation offers language and tools to reclaim your center. Bring a notebook, pause before you respond, and reintroduce yourself to the person you are when nobody is watching. If this spoke to you, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs a gentle push, and leave a quick review to help more people find this space. What are you ready to reclaim today?

SPEAKER_00:

Hey hey, all right. So y'all, this morning, you know, I will get on here and share what's on my heart. I will share what has gone on in my day, my week, my month, my year, whatever it may be, right? So when I woke up this morning, I had this different level of conviction. I kind of laid in my bed for a little bit and I was just in my thoughts. I don't know if any of you all kind of feel like that or have had moments like that where you kind of just wake up and there are a flood of thoughts that fill your mind. And it's like, well, sheesh, I just opened my eyes and yes, Lord, thank you. But where are all of these thoughts coming from? And so I began to pay attention to what exactly it was that I was thinking and why I was thinking, and then I just got to a place where I stopped. And I'm like, okay, this is not the best way to start my day. And as I sat in that moment, I was realizing that all of the things that I was thinking about were things that I have already gone through in my life, and they're things that I have given too much power to, or power that I should have never extended to begin with. And it caused me to think: if I have given this much power away, then that means when I am showing up in spaces with people, in rooms, whatever it may be, that these individuals or these places are now holding a piece of me. And to be honest, I ain't like that. I didn't like the idea of the fact that I had given away something that should never have been given away to begin with. And so, in my mind, you know, sometimes you just have to become like a child, and you know how we used to daydream. So I closed my eyes and just began to envision me taking it all back. Everything that I had given away, all of the power that I had given away, should I say, not the actual tangible things, but the power that I had given people, the power that I have given places, the power that I had given things that did not deserve it. Because it's it almost feels like, and this is what just popped in my mind, even as I'm talking to you all, where we have our phones, and the more apps you have open, the more power your battery is being drained by those apps running in the background. And so I just want you to visualize that. And for some of you all, you may need to just go to your phone and see how many apps you have open and think about that in the sense of sometimes that's how we give our power away to people in conversations that we should have never argued with, to situations that have already transpired, but yet there still milk there still may be this feeling of guilt, of shame, of fear, of whatever it may be. You have given pieces of you to that situation, and it's time for you to take it back. It's time for you to take back what belongs to you. And the scripture that just came to mind is that the kingdom suffers violence, and the violent take it by force. Sometimes we have to take it back. People will only do to you what you allow them to do. Same thing applies to the power that you give. It's time for you to take it back, and so today that's exactly what we're doing. We are taking our power back because as we are going through this journey called life, and when life begins to life, we need to have that. We don't need to have people, places, things, situations having pieces of us still kind of just lingering out there. So, see, it was a conviction for me, and sometimes it doesn't always just show up, sometimes it just feels like awakening, and that's exactly what kind of happened to me this morning. And so I want this to be a reminder to you that the version of you that was surviving can't go with the version of you that's about to thrive. I'll say that again. I need to remind you today that the version of you that was surviving can't go with the version of you that's about to thrive. So when I say sometimes we have given our power away, let's go ahead and be real. Giving away your power doesn't always look loud, y'all. It looks like saying yes when your spirit is screaming no. It looks like waiting for someone else's permission to move when God has already confirmed it. And even if we're not taking it on a spiritual level, the permission that someone else you're believing that someone else needs to sign off on something in order for you to move. No, you know when you are supposed to move. See, it looks like you holding your tongue to keep your peace, even when the peace costs you your voice. And sometimes it's not even just about the people, y'all. Sometimes it's about the environment, a job, a relationship, even a mindset that's been collecting your energy like the rent is due. So today, I just want to very quickly go over how we can recognize where our power has been leaking, because the first step to taking it back is going to be your awareness. So you're going to have to ask yourself, where have I been over-explaining myself just to be understood? Or who or what am I still seeking validation from? What conversations leave me feeling smaller than when I enter them? See, when you start to see those patterns, you begin to realize this wasn't just them taking it, it was you giving it. And that's the realization right there. That's where the shift begins. And so, as we sometimes will sit still in seasons because we have to hear the why, and that's the next step after the awareness becomes the stillness. And so you have to sit with the truth of why you gave it away. See, this is the accountability piece. This is the piece where you are owning it for yourself. It's not anyone else, it's you. That's almost like when you hear people say that's like you drinking the poison, expecting them to get sick. No. You have to be accountable to what you have given away. It could be fear of rejection, it could be a need to be needed, or maybe you were just tired of fighting, so you surrendered your power for peace. I know it all too well. And so I don't want you to rush through the reflection. Because if you don't understand the why, you'll end up in the same pattern wearing a different outfit. And so here are going to be, I believe, some of the areas where we tend to just give it away and we don't even realize it. That we give away so much more than just our time. We give away pieces of our peace, our voice, our boundaries, those little fragments of our identity in exchange for the things that don't actually fill us. So here's going to be your examples. Here's your time to go ahead and get your notepad out. Or maybe you're just going to come back and replay this episode. Either way, I appreciate it. So the first thing is going to be your peace. You give it away every time you replay a conversation in your head that you have already prayed about. Where every time you absorb someone else's chaos, like it's your assignment to fix. And so, how do you take that back? You're going to have to learn to pause before responding. Do you know how many times I have sent or wanted to send a text message where I have written it out and I didn't send it, or I've typed up an email and then it just will sit in the delete. Because it's sometimes you just have to get out what it is that you need to say without sending it. And the opposite to that is sometimes you need to write it out and then wait a day before you actually send it. Because you could be in your emotions when you are um in a situation, you've typed it up and then you are hot and sending. You may say something that you really didn't want to say. So again, we're taking it back because we are learning to pause before responding. You have to protect your peace like you protect your passwords. Only share it with those who have earned your trust. And when you feel that inner tug, honor it by stepping back instead of stepping in. That's number one. Number two is going to be your voice. You give it away when you silence yourself in rooms that need your truth, when you shrink your ideas to make others comfortable, or second guess your intuition. And how do you take it back? Start small. Speak up when you normally stay quiet. Remind yourself that your voice is not a disturbance, it's a contribution. Number three, your time. Your time is your most precious commodity. So sometimes you give it away when you keep saying yes out of guilt, not out of grace. When you when your schedule is full but your spirit is empty. So how do you take it back? Audit your yes. I like to say it this way: if it's not a hell yes, it's a no. Period. So ask yourself: does this align with who I'm becoming or does it distract from who I'm called to be? Boundaries are not barriers, they're clarity. Number four, this is a big one. We give away our energy. We give it away when we entertain situations that no longer serve our growth through arguments, old patterns, or even scrolling out of habit. My hand is raised, y'all. Sometimes I just pick up the phone just because. Scrolling social media just because. For what? I know for me, I'm going to start getting to a place where I just put the phone in a whole nother room. So I will have to literally get up, walk to it, and make a conscious decision that I'm going to scroll because it is taking up way, way too much of my time. And so, how do we take it back? We're going to have to be intentional about our input. Not everything deserves access to your attention. So you're going to have to protect your energy by choosing environments that refill you, not drain your spirit. Number five, your joy. You give it away when you let circumstances dictate how you show up. When you base your worth on someone else's absence, opinion, or approval. I will say that again. When you base your worth on someone else's absence, opinion, or approval, how do you take it back? Practice gratitude in the small moments. See, joy isn't something that you find, it's something you reclaim daily by refusing to let external noise silence your internal praise. Number six, this is a big one. Your identity. You give it away when you start defining yourself by titles, roles, or relationships. When you forget who you were before the world told you who you had to be. And how do you take it back? Reintroduce yourself to you. Strip away the labels and ask, who am I? when no one is clapping, watching, or needing me. See, the truth is taking your power back isn't about control, it's about alignment. So when we realize the power, the same power that created the universe lives in us, and that we can't that we can't walk in that truth halfway, you have to decide to return to yourself daily, intentionally, and unapologetically. Here's one thing that most people don't do. Once we have realized, acknowledged, we're aware of what it is, we have sat with trying to figure out why we do it, being able to release and let go of what that may be. Y'all, the biggest thing that I was forgetting to do sometimes is the act of just forgiving myself. See, that's the part that we skip. Because we don't realize that we sometimes need to apologize to ourselves. We're quick to apologize to everyone else, but we don't apologize to ourselves for the things that we have put ourselves through, the conversations that we have put ourselves through, the situations that we have put ourselves through, the environments that we have allowed ourselves to sit in. Forgiveness. See, we'll forgive everybody else for what they did, but rarely do we forgive ourselves for what we allowed. See, forgiveness doesn't mean pretending it didn't happen, it means saying to ourselves that I see you and I understand why you did what you did, but I release you from the guilt of it. You don't owe the owe punishment, you owe yourself compassion. So when we take back our power, and I say we, yeah, when we take back our power, we take it back with intention. We take our power back, and it doesn't have to be loud, it's just consistent. It's saying, I choose me every day, even when it's uncomfortable, it's walking differently, speaking differently, praying differently, and it's not about revenge. Nah, this ain't about anybody except for us. It's about returning to alignment because when you're aligned, you don't chase control, you carry authority. So I want you to ask yourself today, where have I been giving my power away? And what am I ready to reclaim? I need you to write it down, name it, and when you do, whisper this truth to yourself. I forgive me, I release me, and I am no longer living beneath the power that was given to me. Y'all, I appreciate each and every one of you. Because when I say that I share, because we don't just go through things ourselves, right? That means somebody else is also going through the same thing. And so for me, it was just waking up with this level of conviction, this level of fresh fire, this level of fuel that I needed could very well be the thing that you needed to hear to. So I don't typically pray us out on the show, but today I will do so. Heavenly Father, thank you for the power that you have placed within us. Thank you for the reminder that we were never meant to live small. Today, we reclaim the parts of us that have been silent, overlooked, or afraid. We release the guilt, we release the shame, and we walk boldly in the truth of who you created us to be. And it's in your name that we pray and do give thanks. Amen.