One of the leaders I coach, a President working closely with her company’s CEO, took a week off this summer. Before she left, she would have told you she was the person decisions ran through. Not because she wanted it that way. Because years of being useful had built it that way, one small rescue at a time.
You already know you are in the drama triangle. That is not the hard part anymore. The hard part is finding what you specifically have been doing that keeps it running. Here is what it actually feels like when the trigger lands.
My daughter is capable. I have always known this. I have said it out loud, written it in cards, meant it completely. And then I have walked into the kitchen while she was figuring something out and fixed it, because I could see the faster path and the hour was late and there were other things still waiting.
You do not need difficult people to sustain a Drama Triangle. You need good ones. People who care about the work, show up early, and take the mission personally. The triangle does not thrive because people are broken or ill-intentioned.
I remember the phone call clearly. This was pre-texting, which tells you something about how long I have been at this work. She was someone I admired. Several steps ahead of me in her career, accomplished in ways I was still reaching toward, and she had played a teacher’s role in my life for a while.
I sat across from two business partners recently. They have spent the last few years growing their firm fast, and they have grown tremendously as leaders along with it. I have watched them find their footing, trust their individual voices, and learn how to navigate each other with real maturity.
Early in my career as a trainer and leadership coach, I used to come home from sessions and lie flat on the couch. Head fuzzy. Energy gone. A hollow tiredness that sleep didn’t fully fix. I was doing work I loved, with people who were genuinely engaged, yet I was running on empty in a way I couldn’t explain.
I was apartment hunting recently in the middle of a chaotic quarter. It was the only time I had, which is how these things usually go. I had a ten-day vacation on the calendar. Instead of looking forward to it, I was treating the trip like a logistical failure.
I was on the phone with a client last week when she said something I’ve heard a hundred times, in a hundred different ways. She had delegated a project to a team member, the result had fallen short, and she was frustrated.
There was a period in my life when I thought I was holding it together. I was managing. Functioning. Showing up to work and teaching the very frameworks I’m about to share with you. On the outside, I looked like I had it handled.