Once upon a time, there was a princess, and the princess had an evil stepmother, who made her life miserable and the princess suffered. But one day, a prince came and rescued her.
This story, apart from being the plot of snow white, is an excellent summary of a model of social interaction developed by the psychiatrist, Stephen Karpman, known as ‘The Drama Triangle’: Karpman noticed that there are three main roles we can fall into playing in our lives and relationships, which do not benefit us in the long term and should be avoided to stay healthy.
1) The Victim: this is the person who feels helpless and powerless to do anything about all the difficult things that happen to her. She hopes that someone will come and save her. She always has the raw deal and it’s always someone else’s fault.
2) The Persecutor: this is the person who tries to control other people. She tells others that they aren’t doing things right, that they are the problem and punishes you when she doesn’t get her own way.
3) The Rescuer: this is the person who thinks they are the ‘good guy’, but they need to be needed so much, that they are willing to keep other people helpless, so that they can swoop in and fix all their problems. They appear to be helping the victim, but are really just keeping the victim powerless to help themselves feel heroic.
We often move in and out of these roles, sometimes all in one conversation, and if we’re not careful we can even form long-term co-dependent relationships, where one person is constantly validated through ‘one upping’ the other.
In the movies I watched growing up, good women were often portrayed as the victim, and bad women, as the persecutor. Men were there to rescue.
I want you to focus in on the victim for a minute. Does that sometimes feel like you?
In real life, No one is coming to rescue you. No one. No one is coming to do the work for you. No one is coming to take responsibility for your dreams. No one is coming to improve your relationships. No one is coming to rescue you. No one is coming to push you, to make you apply for that job you’ve dreamt about. No one’s coming to tell you to stop scrolling or turn off your video game and get out and get some exercise. No one is coming.
It’s kind of scary, maybe. But the amazing thing about it, is that your life is up to you. There is a lot about your life and your circumstances you didn’t get to choose. A lot of the challenges and opportunities you will encounter are just plain bad luck or good fortune. There is really only one thing you are in any meaningful sense, in control of, and that is you.
So, be an active participant in your own life. Be intentional in your choices, actively shape your experiences and pursue your goals, rather than passively letting life happen to you. Facing and actively taking on responsibility for your own life takes courage. It means being willing to risk failure.
The British poet William Ernest Henley understood this principle well. He suffered for most of his life with painful tuberculosis. When he was younger TB infected his bones so badly that he ended up losing his leg to amputation at the age of 12 – an operation that would have been life-threatening at the time. He suffered most of his life with the disease and yet he wrote about how he would not let the circumstances of his life conquer him. The poem he expressed this in came to be known as ‘Invictus’, meaning unconquerable or undefeated. He wrote:
‘Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.’
Take a moment to reflect: What circumstances do you find yourself in? What do you want for your future? Will you take responsibility when it is easier to blame others? Will you be fearless and become the captain of your own life?
Henley’s poem was hugely influential in the life of Nobel Peace Prize recipient Nelson Mandala. Mandala lived in apartheid SA – the legal segregation of the white minority from the black majority, lasting over 40 years. After fighting for 20 yrs against the racist laws as an activist, he was arrested and jailed for 27 years. Whilst in jail, reciting the poem kept him going. It gave him hope and determination to continue the struggle and never give up trying to change his fate. After Mandela was finally freed, he was voted President of South Africa, and overturned the racist laws, encouraging black and white people to work and live together peacefully.
A minute a go I said No one is coming, but that’s not quite true. People are coming for you – not the Prince of your dreams coming to whisk you away on a white horse, and not necessarily the people you hope for. There are persecutor-rescuers waiting in the wings to take control of your life if you don’t take control yourself. There are people who would manipulate you to further their own interests, who would use you as a tool for their own profit and ambition. Of course we will all encounter good people and benefit from being around them too. In the empowerment triangle – the opposite of the drama triangle, we see the roles these supportive people will take. We can take these on ourselves too. There will be good people who wont prosecute, but who will challenge us. People who wont rescue, but will coach us. In the healthy, empowerment triangle, the victim becomes ‘the creator’. Creators see themselves through a lens of possibility. They take charge of their lives. And believe in their own potential.
Dr Tina Seelig talks to entrepreneurs about ‘Creating your own luck’. You’ve probably heard the phrase ‘turning lemons into lemonade’. Well she took it a step further and tells a short story about how she created her own luck by talking to a man in a supermarket about lemonade and ended up taking a trip on a private helicopter across Chile for free.
Richard Wiseman, of the University of Hertfordshire, studied luck and found that lucky people share traits that tend to make them luckier than others. Being observant, open-minded, friendly, and optimistic invites luck your way.
- Lucky people take advantage of chance occurrences that come their way. Instead of going through life on cruise control, they pay attention to what’s happening around them and, therefore, are able to extract greater value from each situation. Seelig calls this ‘looking at the world as opportunity-rich’.
- Lucky people are also open to novel opportunities and willing to try things outside of their usual experiences. For example, they’re more inclined to pick up a book on an unfamiliar subject, to travel to less familiar destinations, and to interact with people who are different from themselves.
How will you respond to what life throws at you? When life pelts lemons at you, will you be a victim of circumstance, or will you become the hero of your own story?
Kimberley Jest, Head of Philosophy and Theology
