“Am I the DRAMA?”
Take it from the Queen of Drama, yes you are it! If you are busy being the victim, of looking for validation, needing to be seen and heard all the time and acting out in unproductive ways, then YES! YOU are the DRAMA! It’s time to accept your Oscar and star in a new story.
The truth of life is that every human being has experienced some level of trauma. How we respond to it is what has us either be a victim of it or a victor.
For the past fifteen years I have been doing the work of stepping out of the victim role and into the victor role and now I get to use my experience and expertise to help others do the same. Recently, I have blended my use of energy work through Reiki and my Life Coaching skills to support people just like you to move from victim to victory.
What’s interesting is that most victims don’t know that they are playing the victim. When you’re in the middle of your life, it’s difficult to see how you are impacting the results you’re getting. The most difficult barrier I faced, and that my clients face, is taking responsibility or accountability for how life is right now. When I say responsibility or accountability I’m not saying that something in your life is your fault or not your fault. What I am saying is that we must look at what we have control over that can impact us and what we don’t have control over. Where I start with my clients is by asking questions to know which side of the coin you’re on of the victim-or-victory paradigm. The first thing to do is to ask yourself is:
Am I blaming other people for my circumstances?
If you said yes, you want to look at where you have given up your control to someone else. For example, I was working with a client who was struggling with her relationship with her husband specifically, but generally with all the people closest to her. She was blaming everyone around her for how her life occurred to her, and they just weren’t good enough for her standards of how life should go. The most triggering, poignant and life-altering question I asked her was: Who is the common denominator in these situations? When she realized that it was her (and by the way she wasn’t ecstatic when she first discovered this) and she could do something about it, she saw the power in taking responsibility because she got that she is in control of how she thinks, feels, and acts. My job as her coach was to be a mirror, to show her that what’s happening in her life was a mirror for how she was being. The fact of the matter was that she was holding herself up to a very high standard of excellence. (This is nothing more than disguised perfectionism, the root of which is disguised fear, which got created when she was very young as a response to a traumatic time in her life as a young girl.)
The truth is that old trauma and hurts we experience as young children that don’t get healed have us play the role of victim as adults. The key to removing the drama is allowing ourselves to heal.
Now healing is an ongoing process, and I take a two-pronged approach with my clients. I work with the mind and with the body, marrying my skills in coaching and energy work. The first tool I use with every client when we start working together is the Life Compass. It’s a favourite for both clients and me. This tool gives us both a clear snapshot of where you are in the important areas of your life. (See picture below for an example.)
How it works is that you choose the important areas of your life and then scale between 1 and 10 your level of joy, satisfaction and happiness in those areas.
Just imagine the power of being able to see which areas of life are working for you and which are not. From here the work begins. I remember that one of my clients was so shocked at what she saw. She then realized that most of the important areas of her life weren’t working as she would like them to. You might be thinking to yourself, how on earth does this circle lead to healing? Like I said before, it’s a process. I have a 5 C system that I use with my clients:
- Consider where you are now (using the life compass).
- Create where you would like to be. (What would you like to work towards, what area do you want to see a shift in?)
- Construct the plan to get to what you want.
- Conquer all the obstacles that will get in your way. (I use a risk mitigation approach and Reiki energy healing as this is where the healing process begins. A lot comes up during this time and this is where the most powerful transformations happen.)
- Charge forward. (The power of accountability kicks in here to keep the momentum going.)
Moving from victim to victory is a process, one which takes time and effort. Below are three actions you can take towards your victory journey.
- Stop fighting what was. Accept what has happened. No matter how hard you try, you can’t change the past (well, unless you time travel), so please stop trying. Just for a moment, think about all the energy and time you have spent wishing, hoping, thinking about what if things had been different? The reality is you have no idea what would have been. And just to drive it home, you can’t change the past. So whatever you are doing there, get out now! All kidding aside, so many of us are on a loop in the past that we miss the beautiful gift of the present and the freedom of creating the future.
- Forgive yourself and others. This is the true pathway to freedom. It’s simple but it’s not easy. When we can come from forgiveness for what was and what wasn’t, we begin to flourish in the beauty of what is and we release any ties to the pain, hurt and trauma of the past. It takes practice though. It’s a conscious decision to forgive. Every time you are in the space of the past and you are feeling disempowered, forgive the situation or person and yourself. This is not absolving people of bad behavior or circumstances that didn’t work out. What it does is cut the cord that keeps pulling you back and allows you to move forward with an open heart.
- Show yourself some LOVE! We all know that analogy of the safety rules on an airplane. Put your oxygen mask on first, help someone else with theirs. Part of being drama-free is knowing who you are and standing in that truth. The way you do that is through the magical power of love. So, stop everything you’re doing right now, even reading this blog, and give yourself a great big HUG! Like really hug yourself and breathe in the energy of it, smile and say to your self “Self, I love you!”
There’s no time like the present to begin your journey from victim to victory, to stop the insanity of your drama. You have the power at anytime to accept, forgive and love. It’s all in your control. So what new story are you going to write?
Nina Ganguli: Victor, Life-Coach, Energy Healer
Find her here: MiraclesDirectory.com