noun
definition
The state or character of being powerless; absence or lack of power
synonyms
Examples of powerlessness in a Sentence
This powerlessness translated itself into elaborate funeral rituals to assuage the grief of those left behind.
Because of this powerlessness, some lastborns may be grandiose, with big plans that never work out.
We have never affirmed the utter powerlessness of the voluntary principle, and more especially when it assumes the form of voluntary liberality.
True strength lies in a fearless powerlessness, that is not assertive but is equally not pliant to another's will to domination.
Some lastborns transfer this powerlessness into a personal asset by becoming the boss of the family, coyly eliciting or openly demanding their own way.
Other common emotions at this stage of development include loneliness, grief, anxiety, and a sense of powerlessness.
The result was a cabinet, strong much beyond the average in its individual members, but weak to powerlessness in the diversity of its composition.
Nothing points more to the helplessness of the natives' condition than their powerlessness against these foes.
In the 12-step program, there is an element of admitting powerlessness over the addiction, surrendering to a higher power, and refraining from using the drug.
It is very remarkable that, in spite of the powerlessness of the confederacy, the last recorded event in its history is the steady loyalty of Tenedos, which gave money to Athens about 340 (Hicks and Hill, 146).
Mahratta invasions from central India, piratical devastations on the sea-board, banditti who marched about the interior in bodies of 50,000 men, floods which drowned the harvests of whole districts, and droughts in which a third of the population starved to death, kept alive a sense of human powerlessness in the presence of an omnipotent fate.
The fact was that between the kings inability to defend the kingdom, and the powerlessness of nobles and peasants to protect themselves from pillage, every man made it his business to seek new protectors, and the country, in spite of Charles the Balds efforts, began to be covered with strongholds, the peasant learning to live beneath the shelter of the donjon keeps.
Champagne; while the treaty of May 20th, 1186, was his first rough lesson to the feudal leagues, which he had reduced to powerlessness, and to the subjugated duke of Burgundy and count of Flanders.