Ever heard of the Drama Triangle? Stephen Karpman thought it up nearly 4 decades ago. It describes how we get caught in pattern of changing roles when relating to people. Imagine a triangle with the roles of Victim, Persecutor, and Rescuer at each corner. The rules of this unfortunately real game is that we start at one corner and move around the Triangle changing roles as we relate to others.

Example: After a long day at work your spouse is having trouble managing the cooking of your birthday dinner. As Rescuer you volunteer to help. Your spouse burns a finger in spaghetti water and leaves to nurse it. You, now feeling like the Victim, are left to cook the meal. You start wondering why your spouse hasn’t returned to help. As time passes you get angry about having to cook your own birthday dinner. When your spouse finally returns you, the Persecutor, snap in an ugly tone, “It’s about time.” Now your spouse is feeling the Victim of both the burn and your scalding jab and feels justified Persecuting you with, “I don’t care about your stupid birthday anyway.” After a little while the Persecutor may start to feel guilty and become a Rescuer. Around and around we go, where we stop nobody knows.

I find myself assuming one of these roles and moving around the Triangle all the time. It’s scary. My first step to escaping is realizing I’m in the Triangle.

There are many schemes that have been devised to escape the Triangle, and some can be found on the web. Basically, we need to define a new response and a new role that isn’t part of the Triangle pattern. I find the victim role the most dangerous place to be in the Triangle. If I see myself as a victim, I find it pretty easy to rationalize bad behavior that makes me a persecutor. Without the justification for persecution self restraint is a lot easier.

None of the Triangle’s roles are healthy. Even the high minded Rescuer tends toward co-dependency. It’s a challenge to define and live with healthy roles and appropriate responses.

What are your ideas about escaping the Triangle?