I love how you’ve woven the elements into the power modalities. The metaphor is powerful. I do wonder, though, if the way you’re framing Power Over in the Wood/Freedom to Reframe section might blur an important boundary in the Coordination as Power framework. In my model, Power Over arises from specific patterns of control, usually where coordination constrains rather than enables freedom. Reframing oppressive paradigms, to me, is an act of Power To or Power With, it’s generative, not dominative. So I wonder whether associating this liberatory reframing with Power Over might obscure how deeply structural Power Over really is.
In my opinion a more apt elemental and metaphoric symbology would be stone. I will use your format to explain.
STONE - Freedom to Shape Worlds (Power Over)
Form through Imposition
Stone is the element that sets form, not fluid, not yielding. It holds shape, weight, and boundary. This is not the freedom of motion, but the freedom of imposition. The capacity to declare: “This is the shape things take.”
Power Over, at its core, is not just domination. It is the act of fixing form, of defining contours within which others must move. This power becomes oppressive when it crushes difference, enforces hierarchy, or denies movement.
But stone is not only what crushes. It is also what builds. When held ethically, Power Over is the architectural power, the capacity to make forms visible, structural, and enduring. It is the power to define defaults, to channel flow, to shape landscapes.
The shadow is rigidity.
The potential is constructive sovereignty, the responsibility to shape worlds without sealing them.
“Stone sets the frame, but it must remember the field from which it rose. To shape is not to dominate, it is to offer form without erasure.”
Thank you so much. I was checking to see if Power Over could be composed into a more liberatory modality. Glad to see that it can as the Power to Shape Worlds with Stone!
I've updated the last two posts to include Stone which is contrasted by Aether, the true freedom to shape worlds, birthed from the harmony of all the six elements aligned and embodied with head, heart, hands, and health. The other changes you can read on this post. https://memeticcowboy.substack.com/p/if-prime-freedom-through-head-heart Thank you so much for making this contribution.
Two frustrations kindle the flame: the brevity of life, and the inherited theater of existence. Yet from that fire emerges not despair, but a reaching. Not clinging—but planting. A sapling of permanence grown in alien soil, whether Earth-bound or star-flung.
This passage doesn't merely inform—it orients.
It points with one hand to the heavens and with the other into the soil. Between them stands the human—no longer merely a carbon form, but an echo dreaming in silicon, sending emissaries across time.
Please have Daniel read the article on ZEON by Michael Bauwens here on substack.
P.S. Resonating with these. Very Helpful
I love how you’ve woven the elements into the power modalities. The metaphor is powerful. I do wonder, though, if the way you’re framing Power Over in the Wood/Freedom to Reframe section might blur an important boundary in the Coordination as Power framework. In my model, Power Over arises from specific patterns of control, usually where coordination constrains rather than enables freedom. Reframing oppressive paradigms, to me, is an act of Power To or Power With, it’s generative, not dominative. So I wonder whether associating this liberatory reframing with Power Over might obscure how deeply structural Power Over really is.
In my opinion a more apt elemental and metaphoric symbology would be stone. I will use your format to explain.
STONE - Freedom to Shape Worlds (Power Over)
Form through Imposition
Stone is the element that sets form, not fluid, not yielding. It holds shape, weight, and boundary. This is not the freedom of motion, but the freedom of imposition. The capacity to declare: “This is the shape things take.”
Power Over, at its core, is not just domination. It is the act of fixing form, of defining contours within which others must move. This power becomes oppressive when it crushes difference, enforces hierarchy, or denies movement.
But stone is not only what crushes. It is also what builds. When held ethically, Power Over is the architectural power, the capacity to make forms visible, structural, and enduring. It is the power to define defaults, to channel flow, to shape landscapes.
The shadow is rigidity.
The potential is constructive sovereignty, the responsibility to shape worlds without sealing them.
“Stone sets the frame, but it must remember the field from which it rose. To shape is not to dominate, it is to offer form without erasure.”
Thank you so much. I was checking to see if Power Over could be composed into a more liberatory modality. Glad to see that it can as the Power to Shape Worlds with Stone!
carefully.... with many failsafes and caveats
I've updated the last two posts to include Stone which is contrasted by Aether, the true freedom to shape worlds, birthed from the harmony of all the six elements aligned and embodied with head, heart, hands, and health. The other changes you can read on this post. https://memeticcowboy.substack.com/p/if-prime-freedom-through-head-heart Thank you so much for making this contribution.
Resonates with our SMPro-2024 EcoJazz-3Wayfinding themes!
Aligns with SPACE-SPIRIT of USA Memorial Day 2025 …
Result of Siri-Space-Spirit Lookup:
https://medium.com/on-the-trail-of-the-saucers/space-exploration-and-spirituality-eca9c03629b3
What arises in reading this?
A slow ignition of awe.
Two frustrations kindle the flame: the brevity of life, and the inherited theater of existence. Yet from that fire emerges not despair, but a reaching. Not clinging—but planting. A sapling of permanence grown in alien soil, whether Earth-bound or star-flung.
This passage doesn't merely inform—it orients.
It points with one hand to the heavens and with the other into the soil. Between them stands the human—no longer merely a carbon form, but an echo dreaming in silicon, sending emissaries across time.