Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. ~Albert Einstein
Many of us have drama cycles that recur in our lives. It might be a situation we often find ourselves in that causes a great amount of stress or pain. It might be a particular type of person or significant other, who repeatedly enters our life at key moments and messes things up for us. Perhaps it’s an automatic reaction we have to a situation that we inevitably regret each time we do it.
It’s hard for some of us to accept, but the crazy thing about these drama cycles and the drama in our lives is that we are usually the ones responsible for it. We might attract the drama into our life to fill some void for attention, or we might be stuck in some pattern that once served us well, but is no longer doing us right. Since we are inevitably responsible for our own lives and our own situations, we must be the change we wish to see in the world. Blaming others for our drama not only disempowers us by stating that it is outside of our control, but it also empowers willing crisis actors to fill the voids we leave for them. Feeling shame for our drama is no better because it wallows in the past, when we really just want to stop it and move forward to the future.
The first step in reversing old drama cycles is to enter into new ways of thinking about old problems. This starts with awareness. Most drama cycles are triggered by unconsciously reacting to situations instead of consciously responding. Other times, our brains are short-circuited with incorrect assumptions about how the world works, and so we act in a way that is with these old ways of thinking, and this results in the same old pattern of insanity.
None of us like to be involved in drama cycles, but that’s not to say that drama cycles don’t have any value. These cycles are trying to tell us something. Think of them as life lessons, and each time we fail the lesson, we must repeat it. Once we learn what the lesson is trying to teach us, we can move to the next grade.
The first meditation on the new album and iOS app from Guided Meditation Treks is to cleanse an old drama cycle and enter new ways of thinking. This exercise will help you get a handle on this concept, as well as help you work through a drama cycle in your own life. In the process, you might even move on to the next grade and save yourself a little bit of insanity!
People say that using your smartphone too much will keep you awake at night and distract you during the day. Russell Eric Dobda -- software engineer, certified yoga instructor, and meditation technie -- explains how guided meditations and a technology called binaural beats can enable your smartphone to turn any space into a temple. Russell uses technology to help people meditate in the hustle and bustle of modern-day life. He is available to speak about ways you can use meditation, technology, and mindfulness to reduce the stress of your job, eliminate the boredom of waiting at a doctor's office, and seize opportunities to realize your dreams.