Insights from the Couch - Real Talk for Women at Midlife

Ep.57: Stepping Out of Victim: How to Get Out of the Drama Triangle with Friends, Family, and Co-Workers

• Colette Fehr, Laura Bowman • Season 5 • Episode 57

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Hey friends! In today’s episode of Insights from the Couch, we’re exploring one of our favorite (and most handed-out!) psychological models—the Drama Triangle. If you've ever felt stuck in dysfunctional relationship dynamics, unsure why you're constantly the “rescuer,” “victim,” or “persecutor,” this one's for you. We break down how these roles silently fuel relational chaos and emotional suppression—and most importantly, how to get out.

We also introduce the Empowerment Triangle, the powerful antidote that helps you reclaim your agency and transform your relationships. We’re not here for surface-level chatter—we’re all about taking personal responsibility, getting real about what’s not working, and building healthier, more honest connections. So grab your coffee and settle in—we’re getting real about emotional growth, boundary-setting, and stepping into your truth.

 

Episode Highlights:

[0:02] - Welcome to Insights from the Couch and intro to "The Chat" community
 [1:47] - Why we love teaching the Drama Triangle model
 [3:24] - Defining the three core roles: victim, rescuer, and persecutor
 [5:34] - The puppet-master energy of the victim role
 [7:50] - The shift from victimhood to Creator mindset
 [10:57] - Personal stories on family dynamics and feeling disempowered
 [13:19] - How rescuers unknowingly uphold dysfunctional systems
 [16:33] - Gender, parenting, and the over-functioning rescuer
 [18:26] - Emotional discomfort and the fear that fuels rescuing
 [22:46] - The persecutor: the role no one wants but everyone needs
 [25:07] - Why breaking the triangle means risking being “the bad guy”
 [27:56] - How emotional suppression drives the Drama Triangle
 [32:54] - Shifting to the Empowerment Triangle: Creator, Coach, and Challenger
 [35:51] - Taking personal accountability and validating our feelings
 [38:24] - The difference between rescuing and coaching with compassion
 [41:05] - How to offer support without enabling
 [42:06] - Embracing the Challenger role to live in truth
 [44:33] - Join our new community space “The Chat” at insightsfromthecouch.org

 

Links & Resources:

·         Join the conversation and community at: https://www.insightsfromthecouch.org/the-chat 

·         Learn more about the Drama Triangle and Empowerment Triangle: The Power of TED* by David Emerald

·         Recommended reading: The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck

 

If today's discussion resonated with you or sparked curiosity, please rate, follow, and share "Insights from the Couch" with others. Your support helps us reach more people and continue providing valuable insights. Here’s to finding our purposes and living a life full of meaning and joy. Stay tuned for more!

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👉 [Join The Midlife Chat here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/795863256460970/?rdid=QDc8ryzocgFpBrbm#]

Colette Fehr:

Sarah, Hi guys. Welcome back to insights from the couch. This is where real conversations meet real life, especially about midlife. We are Colette and Laura, as many of you already know more, two therapists who are going through the very same things as you at this midlife stage. And so we just want to let you know that whether you're feeling stuck restless, you want something more and you just haven't figured out what it is. This is a space for honest conversations, getting real, digging deeper, and hopefully figuring it out and getting into action. And because that's what we want for this podcast, we have created a new space called the chat. Check out our website, insights from the couch.org, where you can join the chat to keep the conversation going after these podcasts. And it's a space where we as women can all talk about these issues openly, safely, with curiosity and support. So don't forget to join our community. We really want to be here to support you at insights from the couch.org the chat that's going to be so much fun that we'll be able to field your questions in real time. And so today, we're going to get into a really fascinating topic, the Drama Triangle. If you're new to this, hang on to your seat, because it's going to blow your mind. It's sort of the hallmark model of dysfunctional families and dysfunctional relationship patterns doesn't have to be a family, oftentimes, pertaining to addiction or CO dependency, but anyone can run a Drama Triangle on you and you don't want to participate. So we're going to talk about recognizing if you're in one of these unhealthy dynamics, and then how to get out of it? The answer being the empowerment triangle. So let's dive in.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, I love this. I think this is one of the great lessons that I got from my own therapist. That was an aha moment. And, and I think, I think I give out the Drama Triangle, more than I probably give out any other piece of psycho ed in my practice. Me too, because a lot of times when people come in, they're captivated in a Drama Triangle, usually because somebody in their life isn't changing or is doing something to them, making them feel something that they feel they're hooked, right? Yeah, they're

Colette Fehr:

hooked. Liz Phillips, who is the big ifs and if I O therapist, always says, Don't be hooked to someone else's speed boat, because then when that boat takes off, right, and it's whipping around the waves, you're getting dragged drowned, maybe you come up for air for a minute, and then the next thing you know, you're submerged. I agree with you, Laura. I just give this to a client the other day. I give this out like Halloween candy for almost 15 years. And no matter how many times I've read the original article, this construct goes back to the 60s, and we're going to define it in just a second. But no matter how many times I read it? Every time I read it, I'm like, oh yeah, oh yeah, be alert to this, because these are the dynamics. The whole bottom line about this is not just theoretical. Is that when you're in these dynamics, you're miserable. Everyone in the dynamics miserable, and this dynamic runs on guilt, lies and manipulation. So let's get into explaining to people what the Drama Triangle is.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, I mean, like, maybe the best way we explain it is by talking about the different positions on the triangle.

Colette Fehr:

And just to set the stage, this is developed by a psychologist named Cartman back in the 60s to identify how originally it was how unhealthy families operate. And these are families in which so it can be any system, it can be a friendship, it can be with coworkers, it can be in your marriage, or it could be a family. But that's how it first arose. And the whole structure of it, as we get into the roles, is that all of these people have different positions, the victim, the rescuer and the persecutor, and that they're all playing a psychological game together. The construct runs because nobody is willing to tell the truth about their feelings or express their feelings or take responsibility for themselves. So there's not one bad guy, even though one guy's called the persecutor. There's Yeah, they're all keeping this dynamic in the triangle alive, and their depiction is an upside down triangle with the victim at the bottom, because the victim's so important. So let's start there, and I'll let you have the floor on victimhood, not because you're a victim,

Laura Bowman:

but I mean, everybody can find themselves playing victim once in a while in their lives. There are people who tend to live there and in in this triangle, the victim has two different qualities. They can be an. Angry victim, feeling like people did something to them and it's so unfair, or there's the pathetic victim, and people bounce between angry and pathetic victim, but usually people like, prefer one brand or the other, and the victim kind of like, holds up the triangle like the victim is the one who feels like they've been wronged, that they are going to get like attention and that their needs met by click, by like going deeper into victim.

Colette Fehr:

So the victim, to me, is, in a way, a puppet master, because the victim, and this is a pup, that's a great way to put it, yeah, because the victim is keeping the persecutor and the rescuer dancing. And let's give an example in a second. But what I just want to say about the victim, first of all, I hate the victim thing. I really hate it. I hate the energy of victim. I don't like the story. I don't like the energy. I think it's one of the most psychologically unhealthy things that a person can do. And I'm not saying I've never been there, either to your point, we've all been there, and they all these roles. We have a favorite role from time to time. But I think the goal of this, and us doing an episode on this, is that if you're finding yourself getting pulled into one of these patterns with someone, then the awareness that you're in it, you want to snap out of it, because it doesn't do any good for anybody. But the victim thing to me is that, in order to see doesn't mean something bad doesn't happen to you, don't deserve to feel upset that something bad has happened. Of course, not. Everything's in your control. However, we want to shift the ideology of the victim from other people. Did this to me, life did this to me. I have no locus of control, and that tends to be a hallmark of the victim, is that things happen to me. It's somebody else's fault, and there's nothing I can do. And so anyone who doesn't do what the victim wants to rescue them is seen as the persecutor, or anybody who has those unfair life advantages that the victim thinks they should have had, or who, in any way, you know, didn't do what they should have, or got good fortune without working as hard as the victim. You know, it could go on and on. That's a persecutor,

Laura Bowman:

but the whole thing in the victim is that they're like, abdicating their personal responsibility to take action for creating the life that they want. And that is like, if you were to, like, flip the roles, and we'll talk about the opposite of the Drama Triangle, which is the empowerment dynamic. If you're to flip the role of victim and get out of it, it's the Creator. When you start creating the life that you want, right?

Colette Fehr:

No matter what's happened to you,

Laura Bowman:

yeah, no matter what's happened to you, the role of victim dissolves. I think about this in my own life. I don't like to talk about my brother often, but I think about him as angry victim a lot in terms of, like, our relationship, one of the things that he always thought was that he was, like, going to build my house, and for a lot of reasons, we went into business together. It never went well. I didn't use him to build my house, and he moved to another state, he had all kinds of choices, like he could have gone and gotten a contractor's license. He could have started his own business. He started some version of an own business, but in my story with him, he's always the victim, like I screwed him somehow, right? Yeah, and it negates all the power that he's had in the last like 20 years to do like, whatever he's wanted to do. It's a

Colette Fehr:

disempowerment strategy, because even if something happens that's disappointing or creates hardship or isn't what you want or hope for, let's say someone did wrong you, the longer you stay in the fact that you were wronged, the less you take responsibility for your life and do whatever it is you can do to deal with that situation to the best of your ability. I mean, I hate to even bring this up too, but like, I'm thinking about my brother, and now this is through my parents, so maybe he would say he didn't mean it this way, but where he used to say things like, you know, why I had an easier time in school and, like, he couldn't do blah, blah. I mean, my brother's a genius, or that I was mean to him when he was five, and he would come in my room when I was on the phone with like, my boyfriend when I was in the 10th grade, and yeah, I'd be like, get the fuck out, you little shit. He'd run in naked, and I'd scream at him like a normal 15 year old, or at least, I think, a normal 15 year old. But this was then later given as like reasons why my brother's life didn't launch in some way, which if. That's true. I'm hearing this through my parents. It's just ridiculous. Number one and number two, like, Wow, talk about disempowerment, whatever is not according to radical accountability, right? And really taking responsibility whatever is not working in your life is on you.

Laura Bowman:

Yes, and I hope that that comes through loud and clear in our podcast, because I was just listening to one of our episodes today where I said, like, the one of the first steps is, like taking responsibility for your life. That's where the power is, yeah, like nobody want, who wants to live a life of like, calcified victimhood, right? I mean, I think some people get a tremendous amount out of it because it props up their story. But who wants to really be there and as a therapist, and I think you would agree with us, we're constantly trying to, like, help people out of victim if that's where they're stuck,

Colette Fehr:

and see that they have agency. And why this is so bad on a relational front, is that oftentimes, somebody who's been in victimhood their whole life, it may have been part of their family of origin, if they grew up in an alcoholic, any kind of addictive or any kind of CO dependent family, which is a lot of people, you know, then there is a belief of How unfair something is, and somebody else, some designated person, a parent, often or a spouse, should get me out of this. I'll see in couples, sometimes a spouse will feel like their self esteem isn't great because they're not having sex with their partner. They're not getting attention from their partner. Is it normal to want to have sex and feel important to your partner, of course, but you can't run your entire self esteem on another person and blame them that you don't feel good about yourself. That's a recipe for disaster. So I think it goes way too big and way too deep, and it is about reclaiming, okay, I don't like what's happening here. I don't like how I feel. It's about telling the truth about how you feel, feeling your feelings, this is the way out, and then assessing your choices based on the reactions you get and the facts as they are. But the whole thing with the Drama Triangle and this rescuer, persecutor, victim is that there's nobody's telling the truth about emotions. It runs on lies, emotional lies, distortions, manipulation, a lack of genuine expression of feeling.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah. And a lot of times these systems, when they finally do break apart, and you would hope that they would, they would, like, kind of heal through, like, honest conversation. They usually degrade into cut off. Yeah, right, yeah. And that's the set. That's the sad piece. Is like that very few people, like navigate this well to get to get out of them in a healthy

Colette Fehr:

way, right? And cut off means that you end a relationship, you sever it completely. We'll see a lot of that in therapy. It tends to be intergenerationally transmitted, meaning, if there were cut offs earlier, people end relationships when it feels too fraught to work through or too intense, they just bail.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, so should we talk about the rescuer? Because, like, yeah, the rescuer is a problem. That doesn't seem like a problem, but the rescuer role is huge. I think a lot of people love the role, or think that they're like, the good guy, yep, for being in rescue role. And I, I'll raise my hand on this. If I've screwed this up, I have definitely tried to over rescue, and it just sucks you right into the triangle and in an alcoholic family system, this is like the CO dependent personality who is, like, really trying to buffer everybody from having to see anything or feel anything, and like spinning a bunch of plates, yeah, having consequences, narrating the whole thing, like it's just not that way, or, you know, you don't see what you see, and you don't feel what you feel. So the rescuer really holds the triangle up just as much as the victim, in some ways, especially people who are just committed to being a rescuer.

Colette Fehr:

Yeah, and this is where also it goes on the lie like the victim is saying it's your job to do this. You need to get me out of this. And I see a couple of things that really fuel the rescuer engine. One of them is this belief that many people grow up with that you're a good person when you're a helper. And I'm not saying you're not, but it goes too far. And so people think, Oh, I'm supposed to help. If someone asks me something, I'm not a good person. If I say no, right? There are values for some people. They're religiously linked, but to be. Being a helper, and we're praised and rewarded. The second thing is, I think a lot of people run their own self esteem on that they need to be needed. That's how they feel good about themselves. Fortunately, I'm not in that category. I have gotten sucked into rescuer a lot, especially with my daughters, not to their benefit or mine, and I too, am trying to break out of it, but I don't fall into the category of like, Oh, I get off on being needed, but a lot of people do. They really do

Laura Bowman:

well, I think I'm, like, definitely recovering from that. I've, I've taken that strategy to the end in a lot of my relationships, and have had luckily, lucky or unlucky for me, have gotten to see how that goes. So that has like precious little pull for me at this point in my life, still with my kids. I think I'll always be a little there with my kids, but outgrown adults, not so much. So I this is always like a goal, like a blaring street sign. For me, when I see people coming in with and very often the rescuer can certainly be a man, and very often is but this is very like, really synonymous with women and the caretaking role. And when I see a like a woman coming in, accepting way too much responsibility for family relationships or relationships in their life, you just know she's operating from this part of the triangle.

Colette Fehr:

Yeah, I see a lot of men who fall into this, a lot, so I definitely, I think there's a lot of people that fall into this, and you might be a rescuer in some relationships and not others. But just to clarify this, this doesn't mean that you're never supporting or helping anyone or doing a nice thing. It's when you abandon yourself, you do something that isn't good for you. You're taking on responsibilities that don't belong to you, like regulating someone else's emotions, preventing someone else from having consequences. You know, one of the examples in the article is this guy who lends his car even though it ruins his job situation, because the victim is demanding that he needs to borrow a car. And it's that wanting to be a good person, believing it's right to help, believing that you're not going to be a good person if you don't help. And also, I see this fueled tremendously, and I know you see this too by fear. People are afraid, and they can't tolerate the discomfort of letting the victim sit in their consequences. Yes, so we know this with kids, right? People don't want their kid to get a bad grade, they won't get into a good college. What if the kid at school is mean to them? What if their kid isn't okay? It feels intolerable. And in adult relationships, what I see a lot is just the emotional contagion of people who are even slightly co dependent. They're so activated by their partner being upset, their partner being upset means they're failing, or their partner being upset means they should be doing something. So it's all coming down to this mistaken belief, too, that we should always be in positive emotion and in these dysfunctional drama triangles, that somebody's got to rescue and prevent everybody from feeling badly. And that's actually exactly what causes it

Laura Bowman:

that is such a great point. Like you just, like, hit the nail on the head. It's like that inability to sit with emotion and feel feelings, and it gets people stuck. And I and I think there are certain people that are just very I have one son that like, really can't handle when anybody's in a bad mood, and he just is checking and scanning, and I'm always trying to give him skills to cope with that, but it's just he can't handle it. Yeah, and I think there are a lot of people who find it very intolerable to be around people who are feeling strong feelings, and they want everybody to be okay, and they don't care what piece of themselves they have to abandon to make sure everybody's feeling okay,

Colette Fehr:

right? Because of it's and this, people probably know this to a degree, but it's really not altruistic. It's not about helping. It's about avoiding the discomfort you feel in yourself. It's about feeling good, feeling needed, feeling valuable. Many people are afraid not to rescue or enable, because they'll lose the relationship. I hear constantly, people who grow up from neglectful childhoods, who feel like if they don't have a role, if they don't add value, they won't be loved. I

Laura Bowman:

resonate with that. You do, yeah, oh yeah. I had that belief for like, I still, you know, I think I've even hinted at it in here where it's, like, you know, having radical belief of self is like, hard for me. I need evidence. I need value. I need proof. Proof of worth very often. What do you think

Colette Fehr:

that's from? Like, early childhood dynamics?

Laura Bowman:

I think I was definitely in a relationship with my mom and my brother, and I've, I've talked about it before in the podcast, where it was like I was really wanted around if I could be useful in some way, you know, like, I did a lot of helping my mom regulate her emotions. I did a lot of, like, being my brother's sidekick. And like, if I could provide value space was made for me, and I don't know is, and I think I probably, like, picked up on that very early, and then wondered, like, if I'm not in this job, am I still? Do? They still kind of want me around, right? I This is what I think my child mind was probably like, learning Exactly,

Colette Fehr:

yeah. And I think that's the exactly the kind of dynamic we hear from clients, too. So then you grow up feeling like, obviously you're shedding this, and have shed it to a large degree, but you know, it's a hard thing to let go of when love really feels in your early years like it's connected to the role you provide and what you do for others. So this, we're not suggesting this is easy to get out of, but I do think it starts small, you know, saying no feeling your feelings. And we're going to talk about that more in a minute, because I want to make sure we also talk about the persecutor.

Laura Bowman:

Love the persecutor. Yeah, yeah. Go for it. Let's talk about the who is the persecutor to the system.

Colette Fehr:

The persecutor is the bad guy. This is the person who's blamed for what's not working, and the person who actually, ironically and interestingly, in order to exit the Drama Triangle, you have to be willing. This is the escape hatch place. You have to be willing to be seen as the bad guy. You have to be willing to play that role. Doesn't mean you are the bad guy, but the victim and maybe even the rescuer are going to see you that way because the persecutor, maybe it's the one who has done something wrong, let's say but the bad guy in the Drama Triangle is really the person who is refusing to rescue the victim.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, yeah. And let's just say that people like think they can rescue themselves out of a Drama Triangle. That's the most. That's the, probably the biggest thing I see in therapy, people who think that if they can rescue better, they'll get themselves out of a Drama Triangle.

Colette Fehr:

You mean they rescue like the victim better, then it'll be over.

Laura Bowman:

No, like, somehow they're going to be better, yeah, like, rescue the victim, or like, they're going to do the right the rescuer is going to do the right thing. Be better. Do it better. Communicate it better. And they're going to be able to, like, save the victim, right? So neutralize the persecutor, whatever it is they're wanting to

Colette Fehr:

do right, like, right, prevent the adverse consequences. So if it's a child, it's like, okay, I can do it better. I will communicate with the teacher. I'll be the my kid can't do this, and this is too much for my kid to handle. I mean, listen, I don't think anyone would read about this and say, Sign me up. I think it's largely unconscious until we make ourselves aware. But I know as therapists, what we see so much is people have just a foundationally distorted perception of what they're responsible for with other people they love. Yes, you know, it's not just the consequences and rescuing someone who is an addict and they can't pay their bill, and you go pay and you're enabling. It could look like that, but it also can be that you don't speak your truth, because it might upset your partner, even though all you're doing is telling the truth about how you feel, and then you're resentful and angry and you blame them or someone else. So this also brings up a key point, which is that people are not one fixed thing in this Drama Triangle. People move around positions, and you might be a rescuer with one friend, and you might be an angry victim in your marriage,

Laura Bowman:

or you can shuffle around these roles in one scenario just to get different needs met. Like, oh, if I, if I fall into victims, certainly somebody will come and rescue me. You know, people try all strategies like, make it work, because, to your point, like, nobody wants to move to persecutor and be that seen as the bad guy, right? So like to to leave a relationship, you have to, you have to move to persecutor and risk being seen as the bad

Colette Fehr:

guy. And that's part of why the underlying psychological dynamics are big reason why people stay, yeah, big reason handle it. No, you're seen. That way often by society, you hurt someone, you broke their heart. You're seen that way by the person who doesn't want you to leave.

Laura Bowman:

How many times have you heard in therapy Colette where somebody says, I just wish they'd do something? So I had, like, a reason, so it didn't like I could leave. Yeah, I wish they'd cheat. So I

Colette Fehr:

had a reason. Oh, I hear it all the time and and we've talked about this before, I wish they'd just die and I don't have to be the person feel it. Yeah, I hear that all the time. And these are not callous or unemotional sociopaths. These are people that so don't want to be the one to hurt someone, to rock the boat, to leave, to have people look at them and thank God What an asshole. They'd rather stay in something that makes them miserable and hope the person dies. So it takes balls to be seen as the persecutor. But the reason it's so important is that in order for the Drama Triangle to collapse, which doesn't mean the relationships are effortless, but it does mean they're healthy, is when people tell the truth about what's happening. They may have different perceptions of the truth, but you whether anyone is willing to listen or not, you speak your truth. You feel your feelings. You don't suppress them, because emotional suppression is a huge part of the Drama Triangle. People want to feel the positive emotions, and often want to suppress the negative emotions, but in order to feel the positive, you have to also feel the negatives emotions are giving you messages. So let's just use like a common scenario where someone doesn't like a friendship that their spouse has with another person. They it bothers them, and, you know, one partner dismisses it and is like, You're ridiculous. There's nothing happening here. And they even get sort of ego defensive, like, how could you? How dare you suggest I'm not doing anything wrong, you know? So that other partner either can, like, see themselves, you can be an angry victim in your head. Well, this is bullshit, and I don't like it, and I'm mad, but I'm not going to say anything, because it's not going to go well. But I'm going to either subvert this person behind the scenes, look in their phone, I'm going to go do it myself. I'm going to go flirt with people, right? All kinds of passive aggressive behaviors. All of that is Drama Triangle, because then, in that case, your spouse is both the persecutor, you know, and the rescuer, if they won't rescue you with their behavior. But if you're breaking out of the pattern, you're saying, Look, when you do this, this is how this makes me feel. It doesn't work for me. It's a boundary for me. I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong or that you're a bad person, but I am trying to tell you how I feel about your behavior, and if you're not going to listen, then here's what I'm going to do. As a result, the whole triangle collapses when that feelings are expressed and the truth is told,

Laura Bowman:

ding, ding, ding. Like, yes, and this is like, your book, right? I mean, this is, like, the reason why it's so important to, like, tune into feelings, know what you feel, and then be able to express them clearly. And sometimes, you know you are risking the relationship. Yep, you know, sometimes your choices aren't that great, but it nobody wants to live in this triangle. You do that. You live in this triangle for long enough you're going to be in one of our offices, yeah, because it becomes so untenable,

Colette Fehr:

yeah, and you're miserable. I mean, that's, I think the biggest thing is that people, maybe they're numbing out through some kind of like addictive behavior or distraction behavior or whatever it is, but it is not healthy, mentally or physically, and it's terrible for relationships not to feel and express feelings. It's really foundationally important to the human experience, and

Laura Bowman:

it's one of those things that, like, once you learn this, this is like, one of those cornerstones of being an adult and being a really functional adult and attracting really good relationships. If you can be like feel your feelings and communicate them honestly, you're going to attract a whole higher level set of people, and

Colette Fehr:

you're going to feel so good inside, maybe at the beginning it will feel uncomfortable, and sometimes you won't get a good response, and you'll get rejected and but you you're going to start to see that actually you can handle it, and that gives you more information about what people will and won't do. I think the most freeing thing for me, just to segue before we get into empowerment, I think the most freeing thing for me that I've let go of from Drama Triangle, is not feeling like I have to care, take other people's emotions, or feeling responsible for other people's emotions, and this is part of why. So you know, if somebody is upset, I can care, I can be supportive and loving, but I don't feel like, oh no, oh no, or it's my job to make them feel better. Or if they feel bad. Lee, it's because of me. I I'm separate. They are the primary caretaker of their own individual system and their own feelings. And if I love them, I can be there to support and to reassure and to comfort, but I'm not responsible for it. That is free, a

Laura Bowman:

huge journey. And I'm like, I'm still on that one I've like, I said, I've extricated myself from doing that with a lot of my adult relationships, my youngest children, like they are. I struggle a little bit to like, not feel the visceral sense of like, needing or wanting to jump in, but I refrain a lot more. Like, one of the things I say to myself, and I say to my clients a lot, is like, give people their lives back. That's a rescuer strategy of like, do not try to go in there and run people's lives thinking that somehow you're going to do it better. You're going to save them from themselves. Let people feel the gravity of their own life and solve their own problems and create their own solutions

Colette Fehr:

Exactly. And just to be clear, I really, I think it's a big shift, but I still struggle with this too. You know, I feel, I feel like I really am an empath, and I feel things very deeply, and it can be hard when you're wired that way, not to step into this role. And I played this role to some degree in my family system when I was young, and I think I felt very effective, because I could understand people and understand dynamics and feel what they were feeling and put words to it. I think I felt like I played this role a lot for male friends when I was younger, for female friends, for my parents, for, you know, so it's not like, oh, I need to be needed, but I just felt a source of effectiveness.

Laura Bowman:

I love that you said that, because I want to clarify that, like there was some of that with me too, like, you know, not only needing to feel useful, like, I guess that was part of it, or feeling like I wasn't gonna be loved if I wasn't useful, but that I actually felt very potent and very effective, and that there was something heady in that. So I probably like contributed to my own role as much as anybody put me there,

Colette Fehr:

right? Me too. You feel successful. You feel powerful. It's like, Oh, I'm so good at this, right? We have, like, something you're good at, but what happens is, it can just walk you into a lot of CO dependent relationships, because, you know, narcissists love a personality like mine, which is why I've had so many tangos. You know that the empathic nature, all those qualities, and it's just a perfect dance. It's easy to get sucked into, but I think awareness is the key. And then and feeling your feelings, speaking up and telling the truth. And then let's talk a little bit about how these roles shift in the empowerment triangles.

Laura Bowman:

Because I love this. I love the empowerment triangle. So these are the if you were to flip the role from like victim to the healthy version. We'd already talked about that. So the opposite of victim is the Creator. I mean, that's just such a powerful message to myself, that whenever I get into the victim state of mind, I'm always I say it a lot, even with anxiety or worry or poor me, I'm like, out of my head and into my hands. Like, what can I build? What can I create? What can I do? Not to like, distract myself from my emotions all the time, but to go, okay, here I am. I'm stuck, right? I feel like shit right now. But when you move into creator, like, you just it's it unlocks something. I

Colette Fehr:

agree and I think it's okay. I'm struggling, but I have choices. I have choice. It's remembering that you have choices. And you know, another thing, going back to Scott Peck's book, right? What is it called? Like the road less traveled. So good, so good. I need to reread that I haven't read it further along the road, less traveled. And okay, well, that one I just loved. It's like every sentence is brilliant. So if any of you haven't read it, it's like an oldie, but goodie. But, you know, he talks about how some people, and we see this as therapists, so blame themselves. They overtake responsibility, and some people take no responsibility. So I used to be the type that I would overly blame myself. I see everything as I feel like I have so much locus of control. Everything was my fault, right? And also this can be inner critic, wired, but now I don't beat myself up. I've really changed the way I talk to myself, but what I do when I catch myself feeling victim, like a victim. First of all, I don't punish myself for that. I acknowledge it that, like this situation sucks, there's a part of me that really does feel like it's not fair, right? It doesn't feel good. And I validate my own emotions, because that tends to allow them to like, exist and and expire. They get expressed and then they drift and. Then I also am quick to say, Okay, what part of this, if any, can I take accountability for, not from a place of blame and self loathing and criticism piling on, but from a place of like, Okay, how did I play a part in what unfolded? And usually, there is some way. Obviously, if a tragic thing happens, you know, you're in like a plane crash. I mean, I'm not, you didn't participate in that, right? But there's almost always in some of these situations, something that's recognizing, even in that it would be, look, life has a certain degree of chance, and I was living and a bad circumstance happened to me, like, I got on the plane knowing the best, doing the do most due diligence I could and like a terrible thing happened. But then back to the locus of control. Okay, what do I do now?

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, well, you die, right in that example, but if you

Colette Fehr:

survive, not if you're an 11 a like our friend in India, that like, God, did you see that? Oh, I've, I've watched it because I have a serious flying issue, as you know, flying phobia. I feel like I'm in recovery, and I've come a long way. But every time there are these incidents, I get knocked back a little. I was in the air at the same time, and actually on takeoff, I had that very thought, and I was kind of chiding myself for being so catastrophic and how silly it was. And then I landed. I'm like, oh, it just wasn't my turn. And now I've heard people are wanting, everyone wants to sit in 11 a and people are like, saying they'll pay more for that seat.

Laura Bowman:

Did he like propel himself out of the exit? No, no.

Colette Fehr:

I read his I've read everything. Oh, my God, let's talk later about Yeah. So anyway, any random example, but the idea is to get back into Okay, I am not a victim, even if something happened to me, that's not fair. I'm not a victim because I have choices now. And those choices are, how do I respond? Yeah, to what's happened?

Laura Bowman:

I think that's the greatest question. Is, like, I have choices. What are my choices? Right? I mean, I say that to clients at least 10 times a day. So what are your choices? You know, right? Because you've got to always be oriented. It's

Colette Fehr:

poker. Maybe you got a shitty hand, but it's going to be how you play the hand. There's always a way to play your

Laura Bowman:

hand. There's always a way to play your hand, but now when to hold them and know when to fold them, know when to walk away and know when to run.

Colette Fehr:

Okay, so many times that I haven't. So let's talk about rescuer, because this is a big one in the empowerment triangle. The rescuer is a coach, and this is what we alluded to before, which is not that we say, Oh, screw off. It's your problem. Those are your emotions. That's your choice. Like, I don't care about you. I mean, you can do that, but when you love someone, you can be a coach, you can encourage. You can support, hey, I care about you. You can have boundaries that are healthy for you and don't cause you to self abandon. Maybe a friend's going through a hard time, and it doesn't cost you too much to say, hey, you know, call me anytime if you need to talk. And that's a way you can support and you're not taking responsibility for that friend's feelings or circumstances, and maybe you're able to coach her a little through something that you also went through just a healthier way to support without fixing or taking responsibility.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, and coaching, surreal art form. I mean, coaching really happens when you're standing outside the system. You're really like respecting the autonomy of the person, and you're really facilitating them, getting the answers from themselves, yes, you know, and you we see this go wrong, and counseling and in coaching, where people, like, I'm in a coaching program right now, which is, like the funniest thing, because a lot of these women, I think they thought they were there to provide answers for people, you know, because, like, they were gonna, like, tell people what to do. Because this is, like, a very satisfying role sometimes. And coaching is not that, you know, it's a lot of motivational interviewing, it's a lot of rolling with resistance. It's a lot of like, asking well placed questions, and like, I think, much to their chagrin, it's like, oh, shit, this isn't what I was signing up for. Yeah.

Colette Fehr:

And I think a lot of therapists struggle with that too. I agree,

Laura Bowman:

but I I always use the metaphor of like in this is like, it's the difference between showing somebody how to serve a ball, like, I'm going to show you, I'm going to, like, practice with you, I'm going to model it, or whatever, versus taking the ball from the student, yeah, and like, doing it for them. Well,

Colette Fehr:

it's, there's an expression, and of course, let's blame menopause. I can't remember how it goes, but it's like, Teach a man to, like, take a man fishing and you give him one meal, but teach a man to fish and he eats for life. I don't think that's it, but it's something like

Laura Bowman:

that. I know exactly. Yeah, you're right. You're right. Same thing. It's the same. Same thing, yeah, yeah. But most people can't settle with themselves, of, like, the process, of like, being with somebody to coach. So they end up, like, ripping the ball out of their hand and, like, let me do it, or I'm gonna just catch the damn fish for

Colette Fehr:

you. Or they want to feel needed, or their ego gets involved and they like being the person. I mean, there's a lot of that. Yeah, there's so people are fascinated to know that, you know, we're not in the business of giving any advice. You know, there are times that it's appropriate to provide your opinion, but to be very clear that that might be your opinion, and that ultimately, people have to choose what they do with their own lives, and mostly it is trying to help people get at their own truths. Because what is right for me isn't going to be right for 10 other

Laura Bowman:

people. Yeah? And I do the same thing, like when I offer an opinion in therapy, I will say, Listen, you're going to have to play this the way you feel it I said. But what I'm going to say right now is just me. I'm a woman with an opinion. Yep, take it for whatever it's worth. Yeah,

Colette Fehr:

no. Impact. I love that expression exactly, but you got

Laura Bowman:

to separate yourself, because I'm not here to tell people how to run things. No, no, no. I don't want that responsibility,

Colette Fehr:

right? And also, we know how delicate and damaging that can be, that there's really is such an intersectionality of every human being, their personality, their family, their race, their ethnicity, their age, that like to be offering solutions. I don't care who you are. It's just ridiculous. It's overstepping, and it's not helpful. It's not helpful. Ultimately, people have to connect with their own power and agency. And so just to finish up with the persecutor, you know, it's really, I don't remember what the guy, it's the Challenger, okay? Because I was going to say it's the truth teller. It's just somebody who says, But same thing, same as somebody who says, I'm not going to do this crap. I'm going to just say, what is I'm going to challenge unhealthy dynamics, and I'm gonna live my life. I'm not gonna blame but I'm not gonna be quiet either,

Laura Bowman:

as a powerful, powerful person in the system. And I like, I love those people, because I think they just model how it it can be, yep. And I try to be more like that in my life. Me too.

Colette Fehr:

Yeah. And I was going to say, I think what we want to leave everyone with today is, yeah, this is even motivating me, because I think this is where I have tried to move to being the challenger in a healthy way, you know, healthy version of the Challenger, someone who says, I'm not going to blame you. I'm not going to make you the bad guy, but I'm not going to shrink and cower and abandon myself, either or play these dysfunctional games where we all pretend or we lie or we rescue I'm going to stand in my own truth. I'm going to say it, and then you're going to do what you're going to do, and I can hold that. So I think what we want to leave you all with, too, is that anyone can move in this direction. This isn't about you have to have had this kind of empowerment in childhood. I think most people didn't. There's not that many perfectly healthy systems, or we wouldn't have jobs. But it is something you can develop the capacity for today, and it really does start again with small actions. Examine your relationships. Pay attention to how you feel around certain people in your life who are close to you, who do you not feel like you can tell the truth about your feelings, and then what do you say to yourself about why you can't? Are you blaming someone else that you can't? Because that's what I hear. Oh, I would say, but the way he or she reacts, no, that's Drama Triangle. Or he or she couldn't handle it right, right? Or, well, that will only create this, this and this, okay,

Unknown:

which I can't handle,

Colette Fehr:

right, and maybe, but that's what we've got if we're gonna be in the healthy challenger role, somebody who tells the truth and feels feelings. We have to develop that emotional muscle to tolerate some of the discomfort, to do it, and then knowing we're gonna feel more powerful, we're gonna be more clear, we're gonna feel healthier. You're gonna attract better relationships because you don't collude with this bullshit.

Laura Bowman:

Yeah, 100% like that. That is the outcome. Because when you get into that challenger role, like, and you don't accept living in the Drama Triangle, like, you'll just kick on healthy people out. It won't last. Yeah, it won't

Colette Fehr:

work exactly, exactly. So this is a beautiful place to end on, I think. And, you know, I encourage all of you guys to read more about this and also to check out our website. Like we said at the beginning of the episode, we really are building community this year that is like the word of the year. Laura and I already have a great community with each other, but we want to build that with you, too. People, and we want to have these conversations after the episode. You know, we want to hear what you think. And so many of you have emailed us and asked us questions when we see you or text us things, but this chat that you can find on our website, insights from the couch.org We're just calling it the chat, you know, this is going to be a way that we can all share our voices and our stories and ask questions and get curious and learn and grow together. So join us there.

Laura Bowman:

We're too old to not like, say the true thing. I mean, I know I am like, I don't have a need to like, patience for it anymore, and all I want to do is, like, talk about the real stuff. So let's do that together.

Colette Fehr:

Yes, let's be anti Drama Triangle and all about empowerment triangle in the chat. All right, thanks everyone. We'll see you next time, and we hope you got some great insights from our couch. Bye.