The Role of Drama

Have you ever noticed that life gets dramatic sometimes?? By this, I simply mean the stream of people, objects, things and circumstances that arrive in our orbit, sometimes by invitation but oftentimes not. Human beings are fascinated by drama – we watch TV shows, plays, and operas of the fictitious kind and the news shares human drama on the local, national and global stage. It’s everywhere.

So if drama abounds, how does understanding the underlying mechanics of our minds help us understand the purpose of it?

We live in a mind powered by universal intelligence, universal consciousness, and universal thought. These facts are present for every single human being on earth. Without them, we could not experience life and they work together to create experience from the inside-out. The more you understand this, the more joy, peace, creativity and productivity you have.

Sometimes drama arrives to illustrate these facts with clarity. Let me share an example.

One morning, I received an email from my neighbour letting me know that my son parked his car partially blocking her car. A few moments later, my husband texted a photo of my son’s car to myself and my son with a comment of “WTF?” My son fired back, declaring it was “not his fault,” and on we went. You get the picture – a bit of drama for 8am on Monday morning. I didn’t create it, it just arrived into my awareness.

While all of this was going on, my mind was flooding with thoughts: was my neighbour angry? Why wasn’t it my son’s fault? I didn’t imagine the car was parked as it was in the picture. What should I do? And so on.

I could have reacted to (and acted on) any of these thoughts. On many occasions, I might have. However, this time, for whatever reason, I was able to observe my own mind. Rather than getting reactively involved in the drama, I paused to reflect and see what was needed. An email to the neighbour apologising and letting her know I would speak to my son would help. I also needed to have a discussion with my son about what happened and what he might do differently.

But those solutions aren’t the point. Not really. This little drama created an opportunity in all of us to learn.

You could say there is an intelligence to life. It presents dramatic opportunities to learn and re-orient ourselves. Knowing this, combined with an understanding of the inside-out nature of life – lessens the “grip” of the content of the drama. Instead, as we wait for insight and learning to arrive, the drama fades away and the learning becomes more and more ingrained.

I also have started to notice that when I focus on the drama and don’t take the learning, the drama shows up again and again until I have really taken the learning. It’s almost like the universe wants to teach us something. You may have noticed this for yourself too!

I now see I have the opportunity to have insight and learn from every experience in life. The more I see the inside out nature of life, the more old patterns fall away and the more dexterity I have to handle drama with grace and ease, leading to the happier and more fulfilling life I certainly spent a lot of time looking for. I’m starting to wonder: is anything even really that dramatic? Or are things happening around me, and I’m coloring how dramatic they look?

Wishing you much, peace, joy and learning.

Julia Rebholz