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The Consequences of the Drama-Filled Lifestyle

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Are you living life to your greatest potential? If so, you are living the life that you were created to enjoy. If not, you should be evaluating everything about your life, including you the person, your relationships, your environment, what you are doing to achieve your greatest potential, and those things you may be doing that are preventing you from living the kind of life you desire. Evaluation is necessary in order to prepare and position you to start pursuing and claiming the optimum human experience that every human being is entitled to enjoy. In order to pursue, claim, and enjoy anything in life, you must identify those road blocks that may be restrictive or prohibitive. In order to identify these road blocks, you must have vision. If you cannot clearly see the path to the enjoyable life that you desire, you will continue to stumble around aimlessly wanting to enjoy a certain lifestyle, but never achieving this particular goal. One of the most crippling impediments that prevent people from achieving their goal of enjoying a power-packed, purposeful, and fulfilling life is the chaotic/drama-filled lifestyle. The drama-filled lifestyle, over a period of time, will drain the very life out of those people who allow drama to rule their personal journeys. Yet, it is not unusual for people to confuse the excitement they seek in living a fulfilling and enjoyable life, with the drama that sucks the life out of them, as well as their relationships.

In case you think drama is exciting, you should be aware of some descriptions of the drama-filled relationship. Then consider how the following descriptors could be roadblocks that are keeping you from getting optimal enjoyment out of life:

• Addictive
• Exhaustive
• Victimizing
• Unstable
• Emotional chaos
• Co-dependency
• Erratic
• Irrational
• Deadly

Toxic relationships are “Sick Attachments” and one of the dominant ingredients in sick attachments is “drama”. In order to fully understand the devastation of the drama-filled relationship, a person should be knowledgeable about the truths and myths when it comes to drama, and how drama affects relationships. You may wonder why I’ve attached relationships to the optimum living experience, so let me explain. Since our relationships revolve around everything that goes on in our lives, it is important to understand the outcome when drama affects every part of our lives. While drama can be defined as excitement, it is critical to reject the notion that “drama” in the negative context should have a place anywhere in the abundant lifestyle.

When an individual embraces and accepts drama into his or her personal life, he or she can be certain that it will eventually spill over into other parts of his or her life. Drama left unchecked will not be contained. For example, when personal drama spills over into an individual’s professional life, and it becomes governed by chaos, focus is lost; mistakes are made (unnecessary and/or minor errors, as well as colossal oversights); excessive absenteeism becomes a problem preventing the timely completion of projects, if at all; excessive personal telephone calls are distracting to the workplace and become a problem; or the person whose lifestyle is dominated by drama may become erratic in his or her attempts to hide the drama. This person wants to be viewed by his or her employer in a certain way (e.g. held in high regard) and is embarrassed when those in authority become knowledgeable about their drama-filled lifestyles. Once personal drama starts to affect job performance, regardless of skill set or talent that may have been of value to the employer in the past, the current poor performance that is the result of the drama-filled lifestyle now has the employee viewed as incompetent. In most workplace cultures, compensation is based on performance. So once personal drama takes a toll on job performance, it directly affects income. When considering employees for advancement opportunities, employers want people who will represent them well.

They want to be assured that those who are promoted will handle pressure well; they will come to work on a regular basis and will not frequently call in for unscheduled days off; and that they (the employer) have entrusted valuable assignments to people who are focused, pay attention to detail, and will deliver peak performance. The drama that an individual brings into the workplace can lead to demotion and/or dismissal. There are countless stories of careers destroyed, homes lost, family and friends lost because of drama-filled relationships that wind up in divorce, a break-up of a relationship, or some other adverse life-changing experience.

The individual who attempts to seek solace in a place of worship, but again, leaves the drama-filled lifestyle unchecked, will find that the chaotic spirit spills over into attempts at spiritual relationships. The very nature of chaos is antithetical to the nature of spirituality, which is peaceful, harmonious, loving, and religious. Those people who allow drama to impact their attempts to connect with the Higher Power of their understanding usually suffer from continued discontentment or torment; the inner peace they so desperately seek continues to be elusive; and a connection with other people at their place of worship is impossible because others who value spirituality will not want to be connected with the toxicity of drama.

When drama rules your life, it prohibits you from having relationships with balanced people, people who refuse to embrace any type of negativity. Men and women who are not accustomed to drama, who were not brought up in drama-filled environments have no stomach or patience for it. You may be an attractive man or woman; you may be a man or woman who is financially well off; you may be the man or woman who offers excitement in some form. However, the individual who values peace, tranquility and balance in a relationship is capable of overlooking those things (e.g. physical attraction, finances, etc.) that the drama king or drama queen believes secures a substantive and lasting relationship.

We must learn to distinguish healthy loving relationships from toxic relationships or any element of a toxic relationship. The distinction makes all the difference in the world, and the distinction may wind up being the difference between life and death. Pay attention to even the smallest elements of a toxic relationship because as they accumulate, they eventually wind up becoming a mass of destruction and confusion that is capable of taking out the most stable-minded, able-bodied man or woman. Drama may have your adrenaline going for a period of time, but eventually it will eat away at you, your character, and your reputation. It will deny you of healthy loving relationships. Have you ever met or heard of someone who was proud of a legacy of drama? I doubt it because there is no honor in being a drama queen or drama king.

When you refuse to give into drama; when you refuse to let others draw you into their drama, you are exerting power. When you feel empowered, you feel good about who you are. When you are empowered, you are capable of controlling certain outcomes. When you are in control, you are at peace; your voice is the voice of calm and reason. On the other hand, in most cases, when the drama is over, someone is left to feel inferior, not loved, taken for granted, victimized, misused or abused in some way. When you take the time to exercise critical thinking rather than falling for the drama, you are taking control over your life and your environment. Those around you know when you are in control of your life; when you walk in power; what you will accept and what you will reject. In return, they respond to you with something called “Respect”. Now that you are drama-free, well-respected, empowered, and have the vision necessary, every part of your life is aligned to reach its greatest potential.

Pamela Reaves November 23, 2011

SLR Photography Tips – 4 Secret Tips From a Professional

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Having used a single lens reflex (SLR) camera for well over a decade, one of the best advantages that the camera gives a photographer is the huge amount of control he or she has over the various picture settings, including: shutter speeds, ISO settings and the aperture. Another, is of course, that you’re not restricted to using just one lens like most standard digital cameras. Due to a lot of SLR cameras becoming increasingly more affordable, it’s popularity has risen sharply in recent years and because of this, the SLR camera is drawing much attention. This article will explore a handful of my top SLR photography tips learnt from numerous years appreciating the art.Play Around with the Camera Settings: People who are new to the SLR camera tend to neglect this important step to the detriment of their photo’s. Learn to use each of the settings effectively, play around with the ISO settings and alter the shutter speeds. Just ensure you have a solid understanding of the different picture settings an SLR camera has to offer.Look After Your Lens: The same goes for each and every other part of the camera. Although lenses should be given special care and attention since they are so easily scratched and can be rather expensive to replace. Try to avoid changing your lens’ outside, especially when it’s windy. Trying to remove dust from a camera sensor is not easy and it’s definitely not fun.Follow the ‘Rule of Thirds’: The ‘Rule of Thirds’ is a compositional rule of thumb followed by countless photographers across the world. When capturing a photo, try to imagine dividing the image by two equally spaced horizontal lines and two equally spaced vertical lines. The rule is then applied by aligning a subject of the photo or even the horizon on one of these lines (for example: third the way up). This always seems to add a valuable sense of energy and tension to the photograph.When Photographing Moving Objects, Keep Both Eyes Open: Whether you’re taking photographs of fast moving animals or even a sports event, keeping both of yours eyes open will dramatically increase your field of vision, making it less of a risk that you’ll miss something exciting that’s happening just outside of the viewfinder.With any luck, these SLR photography tips will have helped boost your confidence and no doubt will improve the photos you take with your SLR camera.

Top Business Management Skill – Managing Up

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One area of management skill that is not talked about at the level of importance it deserves is “managing-up.” What is this concept about and why is it so important to career development?For the vast majority of managers and executives, there is at least one or more management levels above their current position. A new manager will have multiple levels above them, and even the CEO has a Board of Directors to answer to let alone powerful shareholders. So, building your credibility by managing your reputation, credibility, visibility and influence with your direct manager and key people several layers above is managing up. It is a career advancement, must have, skill set.Any manager who aspires to move up in their company, or even in their industry, must take charge of their career development. Managing up is one of the most important keys to affect a managers career. It needs to be purposeful, credible and skill based. You need a regular and consistent plan. You can move in and out of it. You must manage-up as a regular part of who you are within your organization.It is important not to confuse blatant self promotion with managing up. When effectively managing-up, you will very often get others above your level to do the promoting for you. This result is almost a natural outcome of managing-up correctly. It can be compared to positioning yourself successfully. Managing how you are looked. It is about managing and controlling how you are perceived by people in positions of importance at management levels above yours. This positioning is at the center of managing your advancement.When promotions are available, when another division or line of business needs a manager, you want to be among the first considered. The higher the level of management, say executive vice presidents for example, the fewer the number of managers exist at that level. These managers know each other to varying degrees. They likely see each other at senior manager meetings or company functions. It is almost like a “club” in a positive sense. If you are at that level, you have peers that are known to you at the same level.When positions come available in one area, other managers will know about. The may even be consulted about the opening. Who do you want them to talk about when they are thinking about potential candidates? That won’t happen unless you have managed up with people at that level. Most aspiring managers do not take absolute charge of their own career development. They miss the advancement boat often times, not because they are not qualified, but because they are not known as “someone of interest.”There are a number of techniques for managing up. For the purpose of this article there are three to consider.1. Build a Career Development Plan. Think about where you want to be within your company and industry. where are your best opportunities? What are the trends and strategic directions of your organization? Read everything you can written and communicated by senior management that will shed light on the future direction. Ask questions of those at higher levels.2. Pinpoint your Skill Set. What skills do you possess that could be value added to those above you. this is not about what you do now, necessarily. This skill assessment should be broader. Every manager has things that they bring to the table whether they use them now or not. We are looking for things that you could offer to do/share with senior people above you when the opportunity arises.3. Net work, net work, net work. You have to identify senior people above you that could be approached to build a sincere relationship with as part of your development. Perhaps there are senior people that you could visit with to discuss ‘how best to develop your career.’ You can usually spot those that are open and approachable. In other situations, you can find someone to be a “mentor.” Perhaps you career development plan calls for a certain skill set to be expanded. Find a senior person known for that skill and meet about mentoring. You will often be surprised how open they may be to the idea.In the end, your career depends greatly on managing-up. Every manager needs to build a plan and pro-actively pursue it.