Usually the powerlessnes comes from societal expectations and my unwillingness to break them, or my reliance on other people; e.g. having to stay in school and get good grades, or not being able to make someone like me (respectively). So a lot of times I try to counter this explicitly, like when I sought leadership of our high school government and then set it up in such a way as to be a de facto dictator. But more pervasively, I also tend to do favors for people or act kindly to them not purely on the merit of those actions, but also to establish a sort of personal debt that I can then invoke in situations where I feel powerless. So it becomes like a safety net. I've occasionally tried embracing powerlessness, but something deep within me just can't stand it. If I can do something to improve my situation I feel that I must, and if there's nothing I can do, I feel absolutely suffocated.