I made a connection during this section, especially the idea that power is usually unspoken but predictable. The examples about the types of rules reminded me of groups that I have seen in school and at work. It is when certain peoples preferences automatically get prioritized even when they dont have an offical supirior title like professor or manager. It connects to the idea that power doesnt come from a title, it can come from personality, populatirty, or confidence. It helped me to better understand how informational power show up everyday settings. It also made me realized how easiy it is to follow this pattern.

I also made a connection to cumulative stress and identity based harm. The sections on micro affirmations and micro interventions stood out because they go beyond just identifying harm and instead focusing on smaller, more practical actions people can take. That makes the topic feel more like action, instead of just theoretical , especially for people in this field.

Question 2: What steps can a leader or counselor take to balance their power leadership style?

Question 1: How can leaders or counselors realize when they are relying too much on coercive or legitimate power instead of expert or referent power?

One connection I made was interpersonal power and group dynamics that I’ve seen in real life. These sentences explain that power doesnt have to be formally put into the world to exist, but it can show up through unspoken rules and patterns. I’ve seen this in classrooms and peer groups since being in college where certain student's opinions carry more weight even when they are not professors or TA's. This connects to social hierarchies and sometimes even bias, where influence can be socially constructed rather than formally stated like how a professor and student are explicitly laid out. It helped me see that leadership responsibility has to include noticing these invisible power patterns, not just formal authority roles that are laid out obviously.

Question 2: Would changing the terminology of microaggressions alter the way that people respond, or would the behavior still be minimized regardless of the term we use?

Question 1: How should a counselor address a microaggression that happened in the life of a client, while validating that the "micro" aggression may have not had a "micro" effect on the client's life?