“Power is not power if you don’t realize you have it.”
- Shonda Rimes.
We tend to think power looks loud and dramatic. It shows up on stages, in speeches, in sweeping decisions made by people far removed from the consequences. In reality, power often moves quietly. It lives in ordinary, everyday choices made by people who don’t realize they have any power at all.
In a recent podcast, Shonda Rhimes (writer, director, and creator of Grey’s Anatomy) was talking about her career growth trajectory and said, “Power is not power if you don’t realize you have it.” The line stuck with me. Not because it was new, but because it named something I’ve seen in my own career and in my work with lakes.
In my own career, I didn’t feel very powerful in the beginning. I was often the youngest and only women in the room. I especially remember one presentation I gave 19 years ago to a lake association like it was yesterday. After the presentation a man questioned my data and said I needed to do more to fix their lake. I had no response (luckily one of the lake board members stood up for me, which I still appreciate to this day). I went home and cried after that meeting. But as I gained confidence and cultivated respect through relationships and expertise, people listened. I now have the power to also safeguard younger early career people in meetings so they don’t experience the same thing.
We have the power to protect our lakes too. We don’t usually think of ourselves as powerful when it comes to water. We picture pollution as something distant or catastrophic like oil spills or pipes discharging waste. But most lake degradation doesn’t happen that way. It happens slowly, cumulatively, through thousands of small decisions: how close we mow to the shoreline, whether we keep native vegetation on our shoreline or replace it with lawn, how we manage runoff from roofs, driveways, fields, and trails, and whether we clear out a large swath of trees.
Each of those choices carries weight. Each one nudges a lake toward clarity or cloudiness, resilience or vulnerability.
The problem is not that people don’t care. It’s that many don’t realize the influence they hold. When power goes unrecognized, it often gets used unconsciously, and over time, that can add up to real harm.
Understanding this changes the story. It reframes stewardship not as sacrifice, but as agency. When we recognize that our actions matter, we’re no longer passive observers of lake decline or recovery—we’re participants. Power becomes something we can choose to use responsibly.
That responsibility doesn’t require perfection or grand gestures. It starts with awareness. With asking better questions. With seeing a shoreline not just as property, but as part of a living system that responds to what we do. Think of your favorite lake as a family member. What would you do to ensure your family member’s health?
Lakes don’t depend on any single person. They need a community of people who recognize the quiet power they already have—and decide to use it well.
Moriya Rufer is a lake biologist with 20 years experience working with and loving lakes in northern Minnesota.
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