What is Sovereignty?

‘Sovereignty is the supreme power to self govern and it is the core of a life lived well‘ – Christina Pratt

Sovereignty is, to me:

• truly knowing and understanding yourself, including your shadow side;
• accepting, validating and loving yourself, this makes you autonomous;
• fully owning your ‘story’: who you are, what you can do, what you cannot do, and being able to express this in a sincere way;
• living your life knowing that only YOU are in charge of it;
• designing your life in a way that creates balance (physically, mentally and spiritually) and supports fast recovery when you get imbalanced;
• knowing your Work, your unique way to serve the world and living it;
• being able to connect to your core, your inner Self at any given time;
• holding (and even strengthening) the connection with other people, while you are speaking your truth;
• embracing the principle that how your are has more impact then what you do.

Sovereignty has a royal air to it, and I fully embrace that. People who live their Sovereign Life, have a natural presence. They don’t go around apologising for who they are and they embrace the possibilities life offers.

This doesn’t make them haughty or feel superior to other people. That – to me – has absolutely nothing to do with sovereignty.

Just like a sovereign country, a sovereign person has warm relations with their surroundings and he or she fully accepts the responsibilities that come with being a powerful*.

* Just a little about the word ‘power’, as I use that a lot. Many people react strongly to the word power. Many see it primarily as ‘power over others’.

Power the way I use it,  isn’t a negative force at all. To me, personal power is about fully claiming your value in the world and living by that claim. Power and Love are two combined forces, as Martin Luther King Jr. said:

The process to a Sovereign Life: 4 pillars

1. Claim who you are and what you stand for (reclaim your Self)
   Through understanding who you were, what happened in your life and what you learned, you start to understand who you really are and who you can be. You’ll start to recognize and understand the grander scheme of your life and the teachings in the experiences.
2. Validate and love yourself (autonomy)
   By really seeing who you are, also the shadow parts of us are becoming visible. This pillar is about acceptance and about learning to see yourself as the source form which you can always draw validation and love. This makes you autonomous and independent from the opinions of other people.
3. Align your life with your story and your sense of self-love (allignment)
   This pillar is about alligining your life as it is now, with the life as you want it to be based on the larger image of your life (I) and your autonomy (II). Elements that aren’t fitting anymore fall away and you draw to you the things you need.
4. Aligning ‘How you are’, including how you interact with other people (personal presence)
   Brining into practise what you’ve learned in daily life is the focus in this pillar. Interaction with other people and daily stuff coming up challenge you in living what you know. This is about fully owning body, mind, values and potential, while at the same time being connected to others (presence).

To establish personal sovereignty takes time. Sovereign Living is a continuous process. Your awareness and skills grow and you will recalibrate your life again and again.
This process is like a circle, or a wheel. The wheel needs some time to get going, but when it’s spinning and gains momentum, it will go faster and faster. You continuously move through the same steps, but it will be easier with every ‘turn’ and you’ll move through them on a higher level of awareness every time.