Five Commitments for Ending Drama

The main cause of unconsciousness is believing that the solution to our problems is outside ourselves, which leads us to attempt to manipulate, influence, and control the outside world for it to match the way we believe it needs to be. 

Our sense of security, approval, and control becomes completely dependent on outside circumstances, so any change to our desired state of the world becomes a threat.

As long as we hold this belief, we’re in a constant state of threat, because the world is always changing and is largely out of our control. 

This is the primary driver of all drama in our lives, and by drama, we mean the following:

• Unnecessary and unproductive waste of energy

• Recycling and repeating issues and problems

• Broken, dysfunctional, and unhealthy relationships

• Emotional overwhelm and losing control of our inner state

• Stress, unhappiness, guilt, shame, and some forms of depression

Here are the five commitments to ending drama in our lives*. 

1) Taking radical responsibility

By radical, we mean fundamental in that without it we’ll never really be in control of our lives, and extreme because it’s so counter to the way most of us live our lives. 

To take radical responsibility is to locate the cause and control of our lives inside ourselves rather than on any outside person, situation, or circumstance. 

We adopt the belief that there’s no way the world should be, it just shows up the way it is, and it’s our responsibility to learn from what it gives us. 

We can begin to take radical responsibility by asking the following questions:

• How am I creating or keeping this drama going?

• What do I have to believe?

• How do I have to behave?

• What do I have to say or not say, feel or not feel?

"There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them." 

~Denis Waitley

2) Choose curiosity over being right

When we source our sense of security, approval, and control from the outside, the outside world becomes a threat and our priority is to survive. 

We fight to survive by fighting to be right, because being right gives us confidence that we’re safe and secure, makes us feel valuable and worthy of approval, and provides a sense of control.

The problem is that being in a constant state of threat means we’re closed off, defensive, and committed to being right, which cuts us off from the possibility of learning and growing. 

Curiosity goes beyond our current knowledge, past experiences, and perspective, which puts us in a high learning state. 

We can shift into a state of curiosity by asking the following questions:

• How could the opposite of my story be as true or truer than my story?

• How is the person or situation the opposite of how I perceive them to be?

• How am I like the person or situation I am judging?

“I have no special talents, I am only passionately curious.” 

~Albert Einstein

3) Find what is unarguable

We’re making up stories all the time and we believe our stories to be true, but they’re not true, they’re only our perspective, which is the result of our unique experience of life, for which everyone else’s is different.

This makes all of our stories arguable, meaning someone can always and likely will argue with them. Almost all drama is the result of saying what is arguable and fighting to prove that it’s right. 

What’s unarguable are the facts, which people can’t argue with. Your story is arguable, but the fact that you’re telling yourself a story is unarguable. 

Distinguishing between facts and stories allows us to hold our stories lightly, which means we acknowledge that our stories are only that, OUR stories. They’re not facts, they’re not true, and we don’t have to be right about them. 

Holding our and other’s stories lightly is a surefire way to end drama, which we can begin doing by asking the following:

• What is actually here now?

• What sensations do I notice in my body?

• What emotions are here now? (sadness, fear, anger, joy, creative/sexual)

• What thoughts are crossing through my mind? (The thoughts are arguable, but the fact that I am having them is not)

4) Listen consciously

We all have listening filters, which are like an internal lens that influences what we hear and how we respond. It translates a statement and gives it additional meaning, which usually influences the way we respond.

One of the most common listening filters is listening to fix the other person’s problem and responding only with solutions.

Fixing is problematic for several reasons including the assumption that the problem on offer is the real problem (it often isn’t), that we know how to solve the problem (we often don’t), and that the other person isn’t capable of solving it themselves (they often are).
At the end of the day, people have three basic needs: to be seen, to be heard, and to uniquely express their most authentic selves. 

As long as filters are being used, we’re not understanding the true expression of the other person and we won’t be considered as someone who’s open to others authentically revealing themselves. 

It takes courage to listen consciously because it forces us to allow our own thoughts, emotional states, and sensations to arise, and then let them go.

Listening consciously starts by asking the question, “What is the other person saying, feeling, and wanting?” and then doing the following:

• Reflect back on the content just as they described

• Reflect back on the emotion(s) you imagine they are having

• Reflect back on what you imagine they are most wanting at the core

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place."

~George Bernard Shaw

5) Appreciate generously
We often operate from a place of entitlement and when we feel entitled we play certain roles that perpetuate drama.

We play the victim, where we are at the effect of someone else providing something we think we deserve. 

We play the villain, where we blame someone else for our dissatisfaction, believing that if they would just provide what they were supposed to, the problem would go away.

And we play the hero, where we provide the entitlement to make people happy, at least temporarily, and avoid having to deal with any underlying difficult issues.

One way we can cultivate a sense of appreciation is by adopting the belief that the world doesn’t just show up as it is, but rather it gives us a custom-ordered curriculum for our highest development as people and as members of a community. 

This perspective provides us with a sense of appreciation for whatever is occurring in our lives and leads us to further learning, curiosity, and wonder. 

Start by asking the following questions:

• What is one thing I can appreciate about this person/situation just as it is?

• How is this in support of my evolution in consciousness?

• How is this valuable?

"Happiness is found in the absence of expectation and a continuous focus on appreciation."

~Tony Robbins

Drama is a natural and normal part of our lives, but it’s also optional. 

By making these commitments to yourself, you end drama and in doing so reclaim the energy wasted on drama so you can redirect it towards achieving your life’s vision.

*This model comes from the book “The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership,” which is also the basis for our coaching program. We highly recommend reading the book, but we know that reading a book doesn’t usually spark dramatic change, which is why we created our conscious leadership course. Our course takes the concepts and practices from the book and helps you implement them into your daily life through support, guidance, and coaching. We want conscious leadership to stick so that more people can lead more productive and happy lives and create environments for others to do the same.