One of the main reasons why people seek power is to coerce people into doing what they want them to do.  There are a great many people whose goals for power or freedom are defensive in that they want to avoid others having too much power over them, but there is a certain segment of the population that is always seeking to gain power for the right of coercing others into acting according to their will.  It is this class of people who tend to want to run HOA’s, gain power within businesses or churches or other institutions, or run for political office.  We commented earlier, though, that the poop of our existence consists of the coercive actions that other people take towards us.  It is what others force us to deal with that embitters our existence, and it is coercing others that people seek when they ambitiously desire political power to use against others.  It does not take a particularly brilliant person to see how this sort of thing tends to go wrong rather quickly.  What people want from power is precisely what makes life miserable for others.  What other people want from power is precisely what makes life miserable for us.  It would be one thing if people wanted to do the same things that they wanted other people to do, but that is not the case.  What some people want to do and want to force others to do is simply intolerable for others, intolerable enough that the thought that people we do not like or respect will rule over us can fill people with a murderous rage that turns politics into bloodsport at times.

Many of the problems of power result from the desire to obtain or resist hard power.  One of the reasons why people often prefer hard power is that the coercive power it embodies forces others to act according to our wishes, and that is greatly appealing to those who   desire to get others to do what we want.  Yet it is precisely that coercion that embitters people and that makes them hostile not only to us but to authority in general.  Perhaps we do not care if we can get our way, but getting our way once through force does not mean we will always get our way.  Perhaps people may be driven to become stronger or smarter or acquire enough of their own power to be able to successfully resist us, and by our coercion against others we create someone who becomes our nemesis.  Most of us, of any age or location, should be familiar with revenge fantasies.  When people do us wrong, we are often filled with an intense idea to do unto them what they have done unto us.  This can lead to a poisoning of relationships within families, institutions, communities, nations, and even the world.  Does anything think that there will be peace in the world if the Palestinians are ever strong enough to do unto Israel what Israel has done unto them?  How would the Turks appreciate being treated like Armenians during World War I?  What kind of vengeful hearts burn in Sudeten Germans who were so harshly oppressed at the end of World War II as Germany fell?  Any act that seems like justice to those who have felt themselves wronged is a wrong that needs to be avenged by the side receiving what is seen by enemies as justice.  All too often justice is just another name for revenge, but often people do not realize that in avenging themselves on others, they create the circumstances by which others will be motivated to return the favor at the earliest convenience.  We tend to think that accounts are balanced when others feel themselves deeply wronged, and this retaliatory aspect of existence drives conflicts to continue year after year, generation after generation.

It is obvious, in light of the problems of coercion, that hard power has some serious problems.  It is not difficult to see that hard power is not something that can be relied upon if we are looking for long-term success in avoiding bitterness and retribution and acts of revenge.  Yet it is important to realize that there are often reasons why people seek hard power in the first place as opposed to soft power.  Hard power does allow one to get what they want, at least if one has enough power, and people are often concerned only about the here and now when it comes to the use of power and do not think about the long term.  The point is to rule and win and dominate today.  Tomorrow will take care of its own problems.  If we profit by some sort of force or fraud today, that is enough, because if our enemies ever match or exceed our capabilities we will simply change the rules of the game when it suits us to whatever it suits us.  That is how people behave when they are concerned with the acquisition and use of hard power.  They do not care about the consequences or the repercussions of what they do—they only care about winning and about dominating now.  If we do not feel like this or act like this, it is better for us, but we can often find ourselves at a disadvantage when we are dealing with people who have no principles, only a devotion to winning by any and all means necessary.

The use of soft power in place of hard power is difficult to manage, but it is precisely the difficulty and weaknesses of soft power that end up serving as its long term advantages.  Soft power does not seek to dominate; rather, it uses charisma to charm and persuade.  Those people who want to dominate find themselves impatient and frustrated by how long it takes to build rapport with someone and to develop the sort of relationship that allows us to have influence over others that allows us to shape opinions mildly and gradually with the full consent of the people we are dealing with.  All too often people get in a hurry and believe that they need to get things done now, that there is no time.  Yet when we think with an eye towards eternity, we see that there is indeed nothing but time.  Those of us who believe in the world to come and in eternal life for those who are given that gift from God recognize that the people we know today could be beings we interact with and whose company we enjoy forever, without end.  With such a viewpoint in mind, there is no need to hurry today and sabotage what could last forever.  It is understandable, though, that those who believe we only have this life which could end at any time are not content to play the long game, because it is only today that matters.  Those who discount the future are unable to act towards long-term benefit and are trapped in solutions that work today and create more problems for tomorrow.  And perhaps unsurprisingly, it is that attitude that led to the poopiness of existence here and now for us all.

How then do we go about getting influence?  How does soft power operate, and why is it that it does not create the sort of problems that the use and abuse of hard power does?  Influence, as I mentioned, requires us to build relationships with others, to demonstrate ourselves to be trustworthy and interested in the well-being of those around us.  It is a long slog of building a good reputation and showing ourselves to be trustworthy people.  The benefit of this time spent is that when we influence others, we do not make their decisions for them or force them to do something, but rather we persuade them, and in their persuasion they are encouraged to do things for the reasons that make sense to them, and making their own decisions, they do not feel resentment at having received good counsel and taking it the way that they would resent being forced to do something that they ended up hating. 

There are, it should be noted in brief, some situations where we can force people to do something now that we know or have a good reason to believe that they will like, and we will not be resented for it because their pleasure and enjoyment will make them forget that they did not want to do it in the first place.  Such things, though, are not counted among the poopy aspects of our existence, though.  When it comes to things that we know that others do not like and will not like, gentile influence, where it can be used, goes a lot further and with a lot fewer negative repercussions than forcing others to act according to our wills.  It is often our impatience and a lack of confidence in our ability to persuade or in the willingness of others to accept good advice that pushes us to the worse solution of trying to force our way against the will of others, thus cementing the enmity that leads to so many problems here and now.