Eliminate Drama: The #1 Time & Energy Suck

I believe drama is our #1 most unnecessary time and energy suck. In order to eliminate drama, it’s important to understand your role in its creation. Because when you do, you can choose to step into a more empowering role and change the dynamics of your situation.

Let’s look at a tool used for psychotherapy that Dr. Stephen Karpman coined as the Drama Triangle in 1968. Imagine the shape of a triangle pointing down (as shown below). The bottom point of the triangle represents the victim, the central role of the Drama Triangle. As you move clockwise to the upper left corner, the persecutor is represented. The final point on the upper right represents the rescuer.

The victim has a “poor me” mentality. She feels helpless, hopeless, powerless, and oppressed. She is unable to make decisions, solve problems, or take pleasure in life. If she’s not currently being persecuted, she will, consciously or not, actively seek out experiences that will put her into persecution. She blames: It’s someone or something else’s fault for the woe in her life.

The persecutor is also known as the villain. She is critical and controlling and insists that “it’s all your fault this is happening to you.” She keeps the victim oppressed through threats and bullying. She’s superior, rigid, and an angry authoritarian. The persecutor may present herself if resentment has built from rescuing being underappreciated.

And finally, the rescuer: The rescuer soothes the victim and says, “Let me help you.” She’s the classic enabler. She needs to feel important and feels guilty if she doesn’t go to the rescue. The rescuer’s main motivation is to avoid confronting her own issues or problems, so she shifts attention to a different victim.

If you choose to play one of these roles, you will stay stuck in the Drama Triangle, and the drama will never end. So it’s critical you become aware of when you are falling into one of these roles and shift into the empowered creator role instead. Think of the creator like your highest self who is in action creating what you desire out of life.

When I was stuck in the victim role of resenting my husband’s job (as I wrote about in this June blog), all my energy went into keeping me in that role. I thought about passive aggressive ways I could ensure others knew how much he was working and how that impacted me. Most of the conversations with my husband turned into me complaining about his work, instead of connecting with him. I even spent my morning runs – sometimes all 30 minutes of them – fuming about his schedule, rather than enjoying being outside in nature and allowing inspiration hits for my blog or coaching business to download as they usually do. It sucked my life away.

Once I got the wake-up call in meditation and I could finally shift out of victim-hood, I was able to create again. I used my energy to plan fun things for the boys and I to do while Mike was working. I brainstormed ways to get more support from others when I needed it. And Mike and I had fruitful conversations about his career and what that looks like for our family. I accepted what was, and from there, used my creative power to choose responses that worked for me.

Where in your life are you playing the victim?

Where are you being the rescuer or persecutor?

How can you shift out of these roles and into the empowered creator role?

You got this, girl! Cheers to creating what you want out of your life!

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