Our ability to deal with emotions is inconsistent. Sometimes coping is easy. When it’s not, if we can’t do it ourselves, we turn to something or someone else to help us feel better.

In the embrace of high power, we feel great. The more altered we become, the better we feel. High rank and power lower our inhibitions and prime us to act. Our confidence soars as our perceptions grow more distorted. Our self-esteem rises, while our self-awareness decreases. Our capacity to feel empathy for others lessens, just as the influence we

Of all the misuses of power I’ve witnessed, almost all typically stem from a feeling of powerlessness. Like me, in that classroom, allowing my inadequacy get the better of me, most people in power are quick to admit to a lack of power.

Our inner sense of weakness or low rank results in ineffective and poor uses of power. Power is only powerful when we feel it.

What I did as a twenty-year-old student teacher was a misuse of power. At least, to me, it was a misuse. Whether it was a misuse or an abuse, however, is not for me—the one with higher rank—to decide. From the perspective of those sixteen-year-olds, the only two racial minorities in that class in a small Ohio town, trying to get an education, it

negativity bias:

Dacher Keltner and his colleagues Cameron Anderson (of the University of California Berkeley) and Deborah Gruenfeld (of Stanford) conducted a series of experiments in which they randomly assigned individuals high- and low-power roles to see what, and if any, differences in behavior and attitude emerged. What Keltner, Anderson, and Gruenfeld found

“Wait!” You may argue. “High rank is emotional too. It feels great! I feel proud, confident, and assertive!” But didn’t I just explain, in the last chapter, how stepping into a high-status role makes us feel more confident, disinhibited, and in control? High rank certainly has an emotional charge, but those emotions are not life threatening ones.

Authority refers to the power that we have that rests on some sort of legitimacy, whether explicit in the role we occupy, or implicit in the sense that people agree to follow us. Your position at work gives you authority, as does your role as parent. But while authority is granted, it is not automatic. People can behave poorly in their roles, and