Getting To Know The Buttons

A friend can press one, a picture, or even a smell.

These buttons, when pressed, can remind us of memories or thought patterns that will, of course, have emotions attached, and they immediately be recalled whatever emotion you’ve associated with that memory or thought pattern.

Patterns can be things like beliefs, values, morals, and narratives.

Narratives are probably the most common form of trigger buttons. We easily allow the little voice in our head to start in-depth stories about the world and how we expect it to interact with us. We can associate memories with feelings and, in turn, create more triggers for those memories, whether good or bad.

Why Triggers Matter?

Everyone Has Them.

Triggers are often made out to be negative buttons, but in reality, a trigger is just a button. It recalls whatever emotion you have attached to that particular button.

If you’re given a gift from a friend, you can be triggered to feel happiness or love. Your friend then brings up that you never get them gifts, and you’re now triggered with feelings of betrayal, shame, or guilt. Ultimately, triggers can not exist without your narratives that give the world personalized context.

Triggers aren’t the same for everyone, but everyone has them.

They Influence Our Actions

Triggers cause emotions. Emotions cause Action. You are being triggered by something at all times of the day. If you took a pessimistic approach, you could say you are being manipulated by triggers and the emotions they cause. An optimist would say they guide you. Either way, the triggers influence our lives.

• Clickbait works because it triggers curiosity

• Laws and taxes work because they trigger fear of imprisonment

• Junk food and drugs work because they trigger pleasure

Life is going to push your buttons, no matter what you do. It is just a part of being a human. Most of the time, we can’t even control what our buttons are mapped to. Shit happens.

We DO however make up narratives about our lives. Of course, we can do work to rewrite those stories, but there will still be a story. We can’t remove the buttons altogether, but we can only Minimize their power.

Decoding And Recoding Triggers

It is not as simple as saying XYZ no longer triggers me or some version of “I don’t care”; you’d only be lying to the external world; your emotions exist whether you recognize them or not.

Instead, you have to view your triggers as a series of steps that lead to an outcome. You can train yourself to take specific actions during one of the steps to minimize and eventually eliminate the triggers.

Triggers like habits rely on automated responses to an input. The input can be anything. Sounds, events, smells, actions by yourself or others.

It’s easy to see what triggered you; knowing why is complex.

The “why” is the stored pattern retrieved after the input.

Those stored patterns are directly linked to emotional responses. This is why we can feel intense emotions from simple inputs like that sunset or someone yelling. The event that first created those emotions is converted into a stored pattern for you to re-experience anytime your body is reminded of it.

The stored patterns are key.

Ways To Break The Stored Patterns

Stored patterns cannot be broken instantly; you must practice reprogramming your old behaviors. Focus on your “low-hanging fruit” triggers first, like irritants at work or bad motorists. Then, move on to the more impactful triggers as you’ve built a habit of breaking stored patterns.

Pause

Stop. This is the most essential step. Triggers can happen so fast that we only have a few seconds to catch the trigger before it can complete its code. When the input triggers you, let’s say someone gives you an attitude at work.

You have to stop everything.

Do not respond or react; just sit there and pause for a second. This is the crucial moment that your emotions will try to control you. Do not fight them, but also don’t allow them to force you into action. Just sit in that moment for a second or two and do nothing.

Breath

There is power in your breath.

A few deep, intentional breaths will help regulate your nervous system and center you in the present moment.

Stored patterns pull us out of the moment and compare it to past experiences.

Breathe deep into your body to come back to the moment.

Triggers are emotional, which means they will affect your body. Your body thinks a lion is trying to kill you… or something along those lines. The pause allows for your human brain to gain control of your thoughts, while the breath helps to take back your body.

Allow the fresh air to be a metaphor to remind you that you are constantly taking things in, and releasing them.

Question

Finally, after we’ve paused and breathed, it’s time to break down these stored emotions. Emotional thoughts hate rational questions, and logic can sometimes help us better understand why this input affects us.

If it was a past event:

• Is there any danger now?

• Can I improve my situation despite the circumstances?

• Why does this event make me feel XYZ?

• What is the narrative I have about this situation? Can I change it?

Come up with your own questions about your thoughts, and don’t stop questioning why you do things. These triggers have likely been installed in your life over many years, so it will take time to start dismantling them, but with practice, we will be able to take back control.

Don’t forget that triggers aren’t alone; they are one side of a coin; they can also be positive and create pleasurable feelings, aka Glimmers.