Talking With Each Other, Not About
The Songa f(LAW) to face conflict, reclaim truth, and protect relationships.
Part 1. Talking About
“I confronted him about his behavior, but Wyoming dismissed me as a joke and attacked my character. Don’t tell him I told you this. I would just be careful if I were you, Cheyenne.”
She came to me not for honest advice, but for blind empathy.
“Have you considered your role in the situation?” I asked. She was taken aback, having approached me for the complete validation of her experience after one of our Songas.
But Songa isn’t just a musical theater company. Here, we learn not just how to perform on stage, but how to navigate the drama of life. The Songa Way wasn’t designed to teach us how to play a role—it was designed to help us recognize the roles we play in the grand social play of life.
“I haven’t done anything wrong here,” she said.
"Well, I’m sure that’s not how he sees it. If you want to repair the relationship, isn’t it worth considering his perspective?"
"You’re supposed to be on my side," she said, her voice tinged with hurt.
"There are no sides—only the roles we play in any given moment: Victim, Villain, and Hero. I encourage you to see all three."
“And which one are you?” she asked.
"You’ve come to me as The Victim, expecting me to play The Hero," I told her. "But I don’t want to be The Hero. That would make me an accomplice—jeopardizing my own relationship, and warping my view of someone in our shared social circle, turning our mutual friend into The Villain. None of us are angels, so instead, I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate. If we looked at the situation from their perspective, we might say, ‘That makes sense.’"
"Why should I be the one to initiate the conversation?”
“You’re the one who brought this issue to me. And now, here we are, two people speaking in the third person. But it only takes one person to initiate a constructive and healing dialogue. Why not you? If we don't plant the seeds of open communication, and get to the root of our behaviors, the virus of disconnection and judgment will spread unchecked – not just within our community, but into future generations as well.”
“Okay, but he’s the one who should apologize. He constantly criticizes me to make me feel unimportant and elevate his own standing. I’m not the only one who feels this way either. I’ve heard others call him a bully and a manipulator."
I’d been here before—an entire life reduced to a declarative pejorative.
"Let’s label behaviors, not people," I said with a smile.
She was ready to object but stopped. She could accept that. "Okay, you’re right."
"It’s much easier to reduce someone to a caricature—shaped by a mistake, a rumor, lie, or innuendo—than to put in the hard work of understanding the messiness and beauty of an individual. Society is a master storyteller of false narratives, drafting gossip faster than it can be disproven, passing it along like messages in a never-ending game of telephone. But the truth of a person is found in speaking directly to them, cutting the cord on distortion. When we do that, we transform our black-and-white world into color.
So, let’s see if we can not just repair, but strengthen, the dynamic between you two. That is The Songa Way."
“But are we not allowed to vent to a friend about someone?” she said, worrying about losing an outlet for her anger, as if there was only one way to let off steam.
“Sure, but if someone comes to you wanting to talk about another person instead of talking with them head-on, we need to follow some guidelines. Gossip is often dismissed as the lowest form of conversation, but it can also be an opportunity for deeper connection—if approached with the right mindset. The goal is to reach a place where we can genuinely see where the other person is coming from. If we get to that ‘aha moment’—recognizing our own contribution to the situation—we can begin to address the problem head-on and face-to-face.”
“So, you’ll be my sounding board?”
“That’s exactly right,” I said with a nod and a wink. “But if we do this, I’m going to insist you speak to that person in twenty four hours and report back to me. Deal?”
“Deal,” she said.
“Let’s model the behavior with a trial run. I’ll play the role of Wyoming.”
She took a deep breath, grounding herself in her intentions. “Wyoming, I feel like I can’t do anything right in your eyes. You never take my feelings into account. It’s like you use shame as a weapon. It feels like manipulation.”
I tell her,
“What do you mean? Oftentimes an accusation can also be an admission. Have you ever thought about how you might have used manipulation as a tool in the relationship?”
She hadn’t. “Sometimes it’s easier to step into ‘The Victim’ role and feel right, making those around us permanently wrong. It sounds like you’re shaming him for not being able to ‘do anything right in your eyes.’” She seemed to be time traveling back to previous interactions, reframing her perspective to create a different future.
“Do you mind if I edit your words?”
“Sure,” she responded.
“I feel like you haven’t taken my feelings into account, but maybe that’s because I haven’t spoken them clearly. Instead of saying ‘You don’t care about my feelings,’ try saying, ‘I feel hurt when my concerns aren’t acknowledged because I need reassurance in difficult moments.’ If your emotional needs aren’t stated, they won’t be met.”
“There’s a saying in The Songa Way that goes:
‘Make Requests, Not Complaints.’
She considered the f(Law) of this shared (son)GA.ME of ours that shapes the behaviors to make us better husbands and wives, daughters and sons, coworkers and friends. And she said, “I think I can do that.”
“If we don’t speak directly to someone and give them a chance to respond, resentment builds. We start scripting their motivations and dialogue in our minds, casting them as The Villain. But what character doesn’t see themselves as The Hero? Without empathy, curiosity, and a willingness to receive feedback, we lose the plot. When we take the time to understand their motivations and backstory, we can rewrite the relationship’s narrative—and in doing so, reshape our own.”
She couldn’t help but laugh. "Cheyenne, were you playing Wyoming just now, or was that your character talking?”
“That was me,” I admit.
Part 2. Talking With
“There was a time when I played Victim, Villain and Hero,” I continue. My friend sits up, leaning forward.
I sigh. “I didn’t talk withpeople, but about them. I didn’t just create breakdowns in my relationships, I destroyed them.” She’s silent, giving me the space I need. She’s not just listening, but I can tell she’s hearing me too.
"I didn’t talk to people; I talked about them. It didn’t just create breakdowns in my relationships; It destroyed them.”
She stays silent, giving me the space I need. She’s not just listening – she’s hearing me.
So, I continue, “Wyoming and I had been together for years, madly in love. But like any relationship, we faced our share of challenges, and there were moments of doubt. I thought I was insecure in our relationship, but really, I was just insecure about myself. Low self-esteem is a tricky thing, isn’t it? It distorts reality, making you question things that were never in question. But there’s a quote I once heard: ‘No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.’ But by the time I understood what it meant, it was already too late.”
“So, what happened?” she says, urging me on.
“We had a child together, a little girl. But I felt I was losing the person I was, when I’d never discovered her in the first place. We took a break from the relationship. Or rather, I did. At first, I stepped into The Victim role, telling any friend who would listen that Wyoming was emotionally distant and that I wasn’t sure if I still loved him. I told them he was using our child to keep me in the relationship. I stated a feeling as a fact. I didn’t realize then that I was the one pulling away—because deep down, I didn’t believe I could be loved. How ironic it is that when we talk about someone instead of to them, it often reveals more about us than the person we’re tearing down.”
“What did your friends say?”
“They were all too happy to pile on. I’d give them a greenlight to attack his character, validating any negative thought they harbored about the father of my child. It’s why we recommend at Songa that it’s always best to seek perspective and advice from someone who doesn’t know the person or isn’t likely to meet them. It’s why people go to priests and therapists, isn’t it?
But because they knew Wyoming, and weren’t trained facilitators in The Songa Way, they offered me unconditional support—but not the pushback I needed. No one ever asked, ‘Have you considered…?’ or ‘What would he say if he could respond?’”
I sigh. “So, I went on feeling I was absolutely right, making him permanently wrong. My friends relished the social power and validation of being confidantes, basking in the honor of holding someone’s trust. But my story was no longer my own—I had deputized others to tell it for me.
Rumors about Wyoming spread like wildfire, and I couldn’t extinguish the blaze until it threatened to consume not just his reputation, but mine as well."
“How?” she asks, worried about where the story goes next.
“The story of our relationship became warped with each telling. Until, it got back to Wyoming that I’d called him ‘emotionally abusive’ and ‘unfit to be a father’.”
“But you hadn’t,” she objects, upset on my behalf.
“It didn’t matter,” I shake my head. “My friends turned on me when Wyoming shared his side of the story, the one I never knew about, because I hadn’t asked.
These ‘good’ friends loved to talk with me about ‘the other’. I should have known they’d have no problem talking about me amongst each other.
They called me crazy. A liar. A gaslighter.
I was cancelled by my community.
How easy it is for those in the in-group to find themselves on the outs.
I was then faced… with the Hero’s Dilemma.”
“What’s the Hero’s Dilemma?” she asks me.
“It’s when a person steps in as the intermediary, reinforcing the Victim’s dependence instead of empowering them to address the conflict themselves. As the months went on, the only friends who would talk to me were those who wanted an ally in a disagreement with Wyoming.
I could have regained a sense of belonging if I gave in.
I could have felt a sense of worth if I surrendered to self-righteousness.
But I was done with the drama.
I set out in search of a new way of life, not knowing Wyoming had done the same. He was writing a novel for the life of his dreams—which is a novel way to live indeed.
I was writing too. Not a novel, but a playbook—a new set of rules and laws for families and communities to actually communicate.
It wouldn’t be easy.
Because before we shit-talked about bosses to our co-workers at a bar, ranted about our parents to friends in a group chat, or spilled the tea about our spouses over charcuterie, we were doing it on the playground, weren’t we?
It was a matter of social survival: if the focus of ridicule was on someone else, it wasn’t on you.
It had been hardwired into us since birth. But what about before then?
Long before then—over 300,000 years ago—when our ancestors knew that becoming an outcast in the tribe didn’t just mean social death, but literal death. If members of the tribe had been cast aside as easily as they are today, they wouldn’t have survived. In a group of just 130 people, social cohesion wasn’t just an ideal—it was essential.
Reconciliation, reinvention, and redemption were all possible because, well…
They weren’t hiding behind screens. They were sitting around the village fire, where there was joy instead of judgment. They told stories about the human condition – not gossip about their neighbors.
It’s time to return to the fire.
And it was time for me to return to Wyoming.
Together, we created… The Songa Way.”
I finished speaking. I hadn’t realized my friend had been crying. She wiped tears from her eyes and told me, “I’m ready.”
“Do you want me to come with you?” I asked, placing a hand on her shoulder.
She hesitated. “You’d do that?”
“At Songa, if you feel you need a mediator, we can provide one. We recommend a guided conversation by one of our certified Songa Way Guides – to make sure there’s no gaslighting or shaming, labeling or projecting in the conversation. I can help ensure a safe space for you, if you’d like.”
She nodded and took a deep breath. “Okay. Let’s get going.” She said, standing. “I’m tired of talking about him. Let’s go talk with him.”
Some characters appear in other Substacks too—like Lewis Blues from The Happy Studio, a partner in the world of Songa at 🎙️ thehappystudio.org
Follow his blog and more:
🧢 ex-billionaire.org
🌍 theworldofsonga.com
For more of Songa’s RULES and f(LAWS), check out the full list below.
