Drain the Drama: How to Handle Overwhelming Situations

“Drain the Drama: How to Handle Overwhelming Situations”

Defining Drama

  • Drama has been defined as “an exciting, emotional, or unexpected series of events or set of circumstances.” You enjoy watching a movie, play, or TV series filled with drama. However, the same “exciting, emotional, or unexpected” part makes drama-filled scenes that pop up at work, at home, or even out in public something you need to endure.  Until you learn to identify, and then drain, the drama.

 

  • Drama can be an ESCALATION, like
    • Arguments that become personal, begin among a team while you’re working on a project together.
    • Talking about a situation with your teen turns into screaming and crying.
    • A store clerk loses their temper when a customer criticizes them publicly.
    • Teachers or bosses start ranting loudly with no awareness of their behavior.

 

  • Drama can be a MANIPULATION, like
    • A co-worker seems to get bored when the team is quietly working.
    • Families take out their frustrations on Mom when they get home from school and work.
    • A teen who didn’t do the work flatters an acquaintance to get the answers and ignores them after class.
    • Supervisors and managers choose employees they think are least confident for the worst assignments.

 

  • Drama is NEGATIVE ENERGY that gets in the way of things going smoothly, even during challenges.

 

Women and Drama

  • Women often have very complicated lives.  When we finally elect a female president I wonder if she’ll still think about what’s for dinner, even if someone else is cooking it.  Men haven’t figured out how to carry and birth children yet, either.  Women are wired differently than men. And, we pay for when we deal with drama that’s sometimes not ours.
  • Disruptive drama isn’t helping you to get work, school, or childcare taken care of.  So, when you’re navigating a life transition, learning a new job, or navigating a communication challenge it makes progress harder to accomplish.  Those are the days when you take the two steps backward instead of the two steps ahead.  Learn how to drain the drama, and move forward.

Section 1: Recognize When It’s Too Much

  • It’s too much when you’re focused on the disruptive drama and not the situation you want or need to work on.
  • When you’re focused on drama it’s not surprising that you lose track of your perspective.  And, that’s a time ripe for not seeing there are too many trees in the forest so to speak. It’s not intuitive to stop and take a breath because you need to be moving ahead.
  • STOP is what you need to do.
  • When you stop and take a breath you can recognize that the situation feels overwhelming, and you de-escalate it.
  • Take Control of what you have control of:  your perspective and how you react.

Section 2: Steps to Regain Control of Your Perspective

  • Do this Mirror Exercise to Stop, Recognize What’s Going On, and Take Control of Your Perspective so your Reaction will De-escalate the Drama
  • Mirror Exercise: 
    • Find a mirror and look yourself in the eyes
    • Take a breath
    • State that you’re making a conscious decision to have a positive attitude about this situation,
    • State that you value yourself
    • Take a breath
    • Go back to the situation with a positive attitude

 

  • Self-Valuation: It’s important to have allies but your value begins with how you value yourself.  
    • Looking at yourself, speaking clearly to yourself, and saying simple and powerful statements declaring your self-worth to yourself are all steps to building your self-confidence. 
    • When you’re communicating, especially with your teen, your power comes from your perspective, not winning the argument
    • The most talented and influential people in the world need to work on their self-confidence so it makes sense that you do, whether you’re one of those talented and influential people, someone who’s struggling to keep it together, or in between.

Section 3: Breathing and Returning with Positivity

  • Taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly grounds you.
  • Go here and ask for the Brain Break Box Breathing Exercise
  • Focusing on your breathing returns you to where you are right now, and removes your energy from the drama occurring around you.
  • Breathing improves your overall health and well-being.

Conclusion:

  • When you find yourself in an overwhelming situation fraught with drama, STOP, and drain the drama.
  • Take care of yourself, especially if your life is complicated and pulling you in different directions.
  • STOP, even mid-situation, to fully recognize that you are overwhelmed.
  • Take control of your perspective, which will be the foundation for taking control of your reaction.
  • Use the Mirror exercise, and make sure to value yourself.
  • Use the Breathing exercise to improve your overall health and well-being.
  • Practice these steps, and let me know what happens (info@smallstepsgoplaces.com)