The other day I had the experience of witnessing myself being triggered. Not a lot of fun, that’s for sure, but always a learning experience.
I find it fascinating that the term “triggered” has become so loaded. In its most simple form, it refers to a small event that causes a big one – if you press on a small piece of metal on a gun, you will unleash a power that could easily kill someone. An emotional trigger is no different – something small and seemingly insignificant will happen, and a tsunami of rage or fear will come over you, seemingly out of nowhere. It’s disconcerting, to say the least. The good news is that you are not at the mercy of these emotions.
If you think that these things don’t happen to you, you are either blessed to never have had trauma in your life, an exceedingly enlightened being, or most likely, in deep denial. That was me, not that long ago. But thanks to some excellent coaching, I am now much more likely to be able to put my finger on my triggers and try to disarm them, rather than feel like a helpless cork bobbing along on waves I can neither foresee nor control.
The first thing to do when you find yourself in that situation is to be kind to yourself. Don’t call yourself names. Don’t “should” all over yourself. Feel your feelings, no matter how big and scary they might feel. Nobody has died from feeling scared or lonely or angry. It may feel like it, but I promise that you won’t. It will go through your body, and then it will go away, and you will still be there.
The next step, once the feeling has ebbed (and it will!), is to try and name the feeling you just had. Were you angry? Sad? Lonely? All three at once? Those are common feelings from childhood that we try to squelch as adults, which is why they attack us from behind. It is much better to face them and try to understand where they came from. What happened to little you? Can you hug this long-ago little person with the arms of your adult self? Can you give yourself the comfort you didn’t get at the time?
This might be a good time to articulate those feelings in conversation with a trusted person – a life coach or a therapist. Explore those memories and feelings in a safe environment, and you will find that you can go a long way towards disarming those triggers. At the very least, you will no longer be ambushed by those feelings, and that will take away much of their power.
If this was helpful, I would love it if you would share this with anyone whom you think would benefit. In this time of physical separation, it’s so important to connect virtually!
All of this is spot-on. Also, “triggered” has become a politically weaponized term, often used in conjunction with phrases like “snowflake” and “safe space,” and even the truly pathetic “cuck” — all signs that you’re dealing with a person in deep denial of his own myriad triggers.
In Masonic Lodge, one of the first things we’re taught is “to subdue my passions.” I always worried that people took that to mean we are supposed to quash our emotions outright. Not so! Subduing the passions simply means to bring them under conscious control so that they are working for US, rather than us being overwhelmed and controlled by them. Fear, anger, sadness, joy, compassion — these are all natural mechanisms for self-defense, positive motivation, and generally coping with what life brings our way. So when I was writing about Masonic education, this is one of the things I took great care to make very clear.
And I love the maxim, “don’t should all over yourself!” I think it was one of my own Licensed Professional Brain Care Specialists who told me that many years ago. 🙂
Finally, I have indeed made an effort to talk to and comfort my younger self. I have dealt with chronic anxiety and depression literally for as long as I can remember. Even if I couldn’t consciously “hear” Older Self talking to Younger Self at the time, I feel like I have gone a long way toward healing those old wounds, and assuring that Young Self that things were gonna turn out pretty well eventually.