Strength vs Power

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Spider-Man doesn’t take his muscles too seri­ously, but he knows his strength (Photo: michele cat)

Strength. Power. As a man, these are both things we all desire in some form or another. I don’t think any man with decent self-esteem would say he’d love to “get down on his knees, clasp his hands above his head, look towards the heavens and beg to be weak and power­less”. That’s actu­ally a pretty amusing picture – it’s even better if you replace the guy with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Anyways…

Wait – actu­ally, that’s perfect. Really. Often times, when I think of strength, I think of a big man with big muscles. How about you? What comes to mind when you read or hear these two words?

Here’s a few that seem like they’d be pretty common to most people:

• big muscles
• authority
• elec­tricity
• math­e­mat­ical exponents
• ability to do something
• weightlifting

Two words, so many mean­ings – and everyone inter­prets them differ­ently. So now that you’re well aware of how many mean­ings these words can bring up, let’s discuss these two concepts in a way (and a context) you’ve prob­ably never thought about before:

What is strength? What is power?

Normally, when defining these words, I’d bring up the good ‘ol Dictionary.app or Wikipedia, but this time I’m going to do things a little bit back­wards. You should already have an idea of what these words mean to you, so let’s see if we can have a little fun with their mean­ings, shall we?

Tony Schwartz talks about energy, capacity, and how to build it. It inspired me to take a bit different perspec­tive on power and strength, and how they actu­ally relate. Many people get sloppy with language and often just think they’re synonyms – but I disagree. I think they relate to each other in a very specific and impor­tant ways, and cutting through all the crap, it comes down to this:

Strength is the capacity of power.

Think about it this way: you work out by building your muscles and lifting more weights, making you stronger, which allows you to lift more weights because you have more power stored up to exert on it. By becoming stronger, your capacity of power (or the amount of poten­tial power you have) increases, allowing you to lift more weight.

Let’s take another example that doesn’t deal with phys­ical power: learning. The more mental “exer­cising” you do by studying, or wisdom you gain by expe­ri­ence, the more poten­tial you have of solving a problem in the future. The “strength” is how smart you are, and the “power” is the ability to solve a problem.

The saying goes “knowl­edge isn’t power; applied knowl­edge is power”. That’s a good one to keep in mind if you have a habit of learning lots of things, but not actu­ally doing anything with it. If you remember way back in physics class (or earlier today if you’re reading this at NASA or Boeing), this may sound very similar to the concepts of poten­tial and kinetic energy. If not, click here and here for a refresher on each respec­tively (reading just the overview is sufficient).

So, how specif­i­cally does poten­tial and kinetic energy apply here? Well let’s ignore the energy part and stick with the general concepts. Strength (capacity) is all poten­tial – just because you’re capable, doesn’t mean you currently are. Power, on the other hand, is both. It only becomes kinetic when it’s in motion; when the power is actu­ally being applied and used.

Okay, now that science class is over, do you remember when we first defined strength and power? Good, because we’re going to break it down on the metaphor­ical definition-dancefloor just one more time. Assuming strength is the measure­ment of capacity for power, and power is the ability to do some­thing, then it all boils down to…

The capacity of ability.

(Take a moment to just zen out on this phrase for a few minutes …deep eh?)

But seri­ously, in it’s most basic form, it can be defined as the capacity of ability. The stronger your muscles get, the more capacity they have to use that power in phys­ical abil­i­ties, such as sports. The stronger your mind gets, the more powerful it is, and the more it’s able to think about more abstract ideas (like this) and solve complex prob­lems. The larger your capacity to be mascu­line, the more you’re able to perform as a man.

Whew. So as you’re there reading this, grasping these concepts, maybe you’re starting to see things differ­ently now, and are really excited for your new learn­ings …but you’re prob­ably also wondering what the hell this has to do with anything. Well, I’m so glad you asked, because as much as I like love theory, I also realize that it’s useless until it can be prac­ti­cally applied and used…

Useless until used…

Strength, power…

Potential, kinetic…

Capacity, ability…

Applied knowl­edge is power…

…are you catching on yet?

If not, I encourage you to read through that last para­graph and find the learning – it’s very, *ahem*, powerful. Once you under­stand this now, and actu­ally go out and do some­thing and use this knowl­edge, I guar­antee your poten­tial for success will increase in capacity, allowing you to become the strong, powerful man you know you have the ability to be.

Hopefully you got it that time.

Strength and power are incred­ible versa­tile words and mean many things in various contexts, and this was by no means an ulti­mate, magical defi­n­i­tion. If anything, this was an oppor­tu­nity to become aware that words can mean anything to anyone, and that a change of defi­n­i­tion can change your perception.

Oh, and maybe even a real­iza­tion that you should start keep taking action. I encourage you to take a look at your own abil­i­ties and poten­tials, and discover how you can strengthen and increase your own capacity for success.