73. What to do when you feel triggered

Ever feel like everything is going fine - then something happens and suddenly it's like a mist has fallen over you?

You feel overwhelmed with negative emotion - maybe anxiety, or frustration - and then you start acting in ways you don't particularly like? Creating unnecessary drama and arguments in your relationships?

We've all been there!

In this episode I'm talking you through 5 steps of what to do the next time you feel triggered.

Mentioned in the episode:

• MYRMD - Group coaching waitlist & info

Transcript

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Hey guys - how’re you all doing! I hope you’re all having an amazing week and you’re excited for the weekend. I’m having my bridesmaids over tomorrow to try on bridesmaids dresses, which I’m so excited about! We’re having those infinity dresses that you can style in loads of different ways, so we’re going to have some fun trying to work out what goes where and how to make them look good - but I’m sure we’ll manage it!

And other than that I’m excited to chill and relax for the weekend! So I hope you have some nice relaxing plans too! And for today’s episode, we’re talking about the opposite of relaxing (interesting segway there - I know!) But today’s episode is all about what to do when you feel triggered. And I want to start off by saying, I don’t mean triggered in clinical PTSD sense - I am not a clinical psychologist, I’m a mindset coach, so when I use the word triggered - I mean, when you feel a sudden negative emotion about a current event or circumstance. So just want to clear that up - if you suffer from PTSD in any way, I definitely recommend you seek support from a therapist or psychologist that specialises in that so you can get the help you need.

So what I’m talking about is when you’re going about your day, something happens, and you feel this very sudden feeling of a negative emotion - like anxiety or frustration or insecurity. Maybe your partner brings up a holiday they went on with their ex. Or your mum makes a comment about your weight. Or your friend tells you they’ve been hanging out with that person you don’t really like. And you’re suddenly filled with negative thoughts and feelings.

So - this topic is a really important one - because a lot of clients when learning this work find it really easy in hindsight to understand their thinking and where their thoughts lead them a stray - and they’re even practising new thoughts regularly - but then when something happens and their old thoughts pop back up and they feel triggered, they feel like they’ve taken a step back. 

And that was actually something a member of my group coaching programme said to me this week - he said he’d been doing really well and using the tools and then he’d had a moment of insecurity and anxiety and believed that meant he was back to square 1. 

First I want to talk about the biggest mistake I see people making. So a lot of my clients - both from my group coaching and my 1:1 programme, and of course myself - I did this when I first learnt about this work - is they try to frantically change their thoughts when they feel a negative emotion. So something happens, they have a bunch of thoughts about it, they feel anxious or angry or frustrated - and they remember - OH Rebecca says my thoughts create this, QUICK I need to change my thoughts ASAP!

And they feel in this urgent rush to escape the feeling. Because as I’ve said many a time on this podcast - we don’t like feeling negative emotion. Shocking I know! But we’re biologically programmed to try to avoid and escape it - so when we feel negative emotions in our day-to-day life, we’re hardwired to want to do something immediately to relieve it or escape it. And it’s obvious when we’re doing that in an unhelpful way - maybe when we feel anxious and automatically want to down a bottle of wine to numb the emotion, or when we feel anxious so we ask our partners again, for the 3rd time that day, if they definitely still love us. 

We can kind of see that’s not a useful way to respond to the emotion. But the thing is - rushing to frantically change your thought, using these tools, is also not helpful. Because when you’re in a rush to change your thought - so that you can change your emotion - you’re resisting feeling that emotion. You’re still trying to escape it. And you’ll have heard of the phrase ‘whatever you resist persists’ - which is really true here - if you’re resisting the emotions in your body, they’re not going to quietly go away and simmer down - NO. They’re going to persist. And they’re actually going to grow in intensity and feel even worse.

So being in a rush to escape the feeling that’s been triggered - is the biggest mistake I see people making. And if you’re doing this in a different way, maybe you’re not trying to change your thoughts frantically - maybe you’re trying to escape the emotion by calling your partner 5 times or asking a bunch of your friends for reassurance or stalking the person’s Instagram account - whatever action you’re taking, just consider: Am I trying to escape having this feeling right now? If so - remind yourself that isn’t going to help.

Another reason why rushing to try and change your thoughts when you’re triggered won’t help is - your rational thinking brain is not online. When we’re triggered - and feeling that fight or flight or that intense emotional response - it’s being driven by our primitive brain. So that’s the oldest part of your brain, and it’s in charge of your emotional impulses. It isn’t like the pre-frontal cortex which is the rational part of the brain in charge of reasoning and logical thinking. So trying to do thought work, and challenge your anxious thoughts, when your primitive brain is mid-meltdown and your nervous system is activated is not going to work. Because the rational part of your brain needed for that is offline. 

I remember talking to a coach once who described this in such a good way - she said, it’s like trying to have a conversation when the smoke alarm is going off. Thinking of your primitive brain and its thoughts like the smoke alarm screaming at you - trying to rationally talk when it’s going off is pointless - it’s not going to hear you. 

So if you’re not going to rush to escape the sensations or try to argue with your primitive brain - what are you going to do instead? The first thing is to notice and acknowledge what is happening. For example, literally saying to yourself ‘I’m having a lot of thoughts right now creating a lot of emotions’ ‘I’m feeling anxious right now’ ‘I’m feeling angry’ ‘Because of sentences in my mind - and that’s okay’. Doing this sets you up for the next few steps, and most importantly it breaks the cycle of you just instantly responding to the sensations and believing the story your brain is telling you.

The second thing is to normalise the fact that it’s happening. What most of us tend to do is feel triggered and then believe our brain's interpretation that the alarm going off means we’re in danger and there’s a threat. So we jump to believing OMG something bad is happening, what I’m thinking must be true, this is all going terribly wrong - and panicking! But again, let’s think about you being triggered as like a smoke alarm going off. Your brain will sound that alarm as if the entire house is on fire, when really it’s just burnt toast. So we don’t need to freak out and panic - and we also don’t need to be surprised.

This is another thing a lot of my clients do - we’ll have been working on a certain thought pattern for a couple of sessions, and then when something happens and their brain repeats that same thought to them - they’re shocked! And I’m not laughing at my clients here, me too! I do the same thing! But we have to stop being shocked when our brains repeat their favourite patterns. If your brain has a habit of telling you your partner is cheating on you or that they don’t really care about you or that people are mad at you - the last thing you want to be is surprised when it says that. Because then you start taking it super seriously and like a reflection of true reality, instead of what it is - which is your brain’s favourite anxious story.

So this is why we have to normalise the fact we’re triggered. You could say things to yourself like - ‘This is my brain’s favourite anxious story’, ‘It makes sense this is being triggered right now’, ‘Here anxious Annie is again’ (that’s what I used to call my anxious brain, Anxious Annie). So you see instantly by doing this - you’re placing yourself as the observer of the trigger, instead of being swept up by it. You’re just noticing it. I did an episode on thought defusion a few episodes too and one of the things I mentioned on that was saying to yourself ‘I’m having the thought {and then say the thought}’ or ‘I notice my brain is telling me [this - whatever it is]’. Again you’re observing the fact you’re having thoughts and feelings, which creates some distance between you and them.

And part of this normalising step can include you being compassionate to yourself. I remember when our smoke alarm went off once, and me and my fiance knew it was just because of something we’d burnt - no big deal - no fire. But my cat was beside herself, she looked so alarmed, and she was running around frantically, she was so confused and scared. And that’s kind of how you might feel when you’re triggered - like my cat, overwhelmed, scared, unsure what to do - so offering yourself compassion and kind words in this moment is important - ‘It’s okay, I know you feel scared right now’, ‘These are just thoughts and feelings, nothing has gone wrong.’ Just like I tried to tell my cat we weren’t all about to die, I don’t think she understood me but hey! I tried!

Okay so let me recap - so far we’ve covered noticing the fact you’re triggered, acknowledging the feeling - then step 2 - normalising it, not freaking out - then we move onto the most important step of all the steps. And that’s - feeling the emotion. I can almost hear you groaning and rolling your eyes on the other of this - ‘WHY Rebecca.’ ‘I HATE this feeling, it’s horrible’, or maybe you’re thinking ‘I feel it enough thank you very much! I don’t need to feel it even MORE’. But let me remind you, that sitting having an emotion, while wishing it would go away and desperately trying to escape it is not feeling your emotion. Because what is it? You guessed it - it’s resisting the emotion! And when you’re resisting the emotion you’re making it 10x worse. So what you’re experiencing right now is likely what it feels like to resist the hell out of your anxiety, not feel it - and that’s 2 very different things.

So what do I mean by feel the emotion? What I mean is give your brain a break from all it’s many thoughts for a moment, you can promise yourself you’ll come back to them. But for a moment, but all your attention onto your body and where you can feel the sensations. Where are they? Locate them. Are they in your chest? Your stomach? Your throat? Your arms? Just notice where they are. Then get really curious about how the sensations actually feel. Imagine for a moment that you’re just an observer of them, maybe you’re a scientist whose job is to study what anxiety, or frustration, or whatever emotion it is - feels like in the body. So just watch the sensation and then describe it to yourself.

Is it hot or cold? Somewhere in between? Is the sensation moving or is it totally still? Is it a heavy sensation or is it light? Is it tight or loose? Imagine you’re describing it to someone who’s never felt anxiety before, an alien perhaps. Does it have a texture? Sometimes I imagine it’s like a blade stuck in my chest or a pile of heavy books on my chest - so imagine it. Does it remind you of a certain object? Does it have a colour? Just stay present with the sensation, noticing it and observing it.

Then - with every breath, I want you to imagine that you’re relaxing around the sensation - you’re making room for it. This is what I imagine when I have anxiety in my chest, I imagine with each breath my chest is expanding to make a little space around the sensation - giving it some room. I’m not tensing up or trying to get rid of it, I’m allowing it to be there. And this is the key thing here, mentally being willing for the sensation to be there as long as it needs to. If you do these steps while thinking - okay if I do this for 10 minutes I can make this go away - you’re still resisting it. So do this with the only agenda of making peace with the sensations being there.

Sit and repeat these steps for as long as you want or feel you need to - and what you should start to notice is your body will feel calmer. The sensations will likely change - they may even dissipate completely - because instead of being resisted, they’re being allowed to be there, to rise - peak - and dissipate. I like to talk to myself while I do this and say to myself ‘this is just anxiety - it’s okay that it’s here.’ ‘These are just sensations of anxiety.’ Which really helps me to stop resisting them and make space for them.

And most importantly, what this does is it calms your nervous system down enough for your prefrontal cortex - the rational thinking part of your brain - to come back online. Which then allows you to use some of the thought work tools that we talk about on the podcast. And granted - if you’re live in the middle of a situation with someone, you may not be able to grab a pen and paper and do this - I understand that.You can still consider the steps though and work through it a little in your mind. You can also return to these steps afterwards to clean up your thinking around the situation - which is really really important, because it means you can then learn something about your brain and get awareness and plan ahead for the next time something similar happens. 

So this is where you can then move on to step 4. Which is separating out the facts of what has happened from your thoughts about them.Remember - your primitive brain is a meaning making machine, leading it to often jump to conclusions, and it is often driven by fear. It’s obsessed with your safety and protecting you from negative emotions. And it thinks of everything in very black and white terms, offering you unhelpful thoughts a lot of the time, but presenting them as if they’re facts. So really consider - what are the neutral facts here?

And I’ll use an example here from one of my clients. Her partner was on a night out and she’d asked him to text when he got in. But when she woke up in the morning, there was no text from him. So she felt instantly triggered - her brain instantly jumped to the story that he must have done something bad, he’d cheated on her, he probably wasn’t even at home, he was probably in someone else’s bad - this entire anxious, terrifying story. So coming back to the neutral facts is important - it’s 7am and there is no text from my boyfriend since 10pm last night. Those were the facts. Everything else in that moment is an anxious story. There is no proof of it.

And again - this is where normalising is so key. Because being cheated on was a very real fear for my client, so it made perfect sense her brain would jump to that conclusion - it’s the biggest threat her brain is obsessed with detecting and protecting her from. Making it see a lot of circumstances through that lens. 

So once you’ve separated the facts - from your brain’s anxious story, it’s time for step 5 - which is challenging the thoughts. So ask yourself these questions - and feel free to pause and jot them down so you can come back to them.

Why am I choosing to make it mean that? Is that a fact? How might this not be true? What else could be true? What is my brain not considering here? What evidence is my brain ignoring that could suggest this isn’t true? What could be going on for the other person that I’ve not considered? What might their thoughts and feelings be? How is thinking this way likely to have me show up? How would I rather feel about this? And what thoughts would create that feeling? These questions should help zoom your brain out a little so that you can see more possibilities than just the automatic, anxious story your brain honed in on. 

And this is where you can offer yourself a more rational thought that feels a lot better - for example, ‘It’s possible that my partner not texting me when he got in, doesn’t mean he’s cheated’ or ‘There could be many reasons why he’s not texted me - that aren’t him being unfaithful’. ‘He could have lost his phone, run out of battery, been so drunk he totally forgot, typed the text but not hit send’ - allow yourself to see the alternatives for a moment. 

Now - your brain may still have thoughts left to deal with after this. So your brain may go to ‘Yes, but what IF it isn’t any of those things and he has in fact cheated?’ And this is where you have to answer that question in an intentional way. Because leaving questions unanswered is the worst thing you can do. Because your brain is subconsciously answering it in a way that’s very painful. For example - if you ask, yes but what IF he has cheated - what you may be answering that with is ‘then it would mean I wasn’t attractive enough and I’ll never find someone else’. And that is the fear that’s so painful to you. What you’d make that mean.

So answer the question - what IF your anxious thought is true? What would that then mean? What would you make that mean about you or your future? Then you have to repeat the part where you question that thought, just like you did before. Ask yourself - is that really true? Why would I make it mean that? What else could be true? What else could I choose to believe IF it turns out this is true? What would I intentionally like to make it mean about me and my future? How might my current story of what it would mean not be true at all? Would I say this was true for anyone else?

Challenge the story. And again - direct your brain to thoughts that create the emotion you want to feel. Ask yourself, how do I want to feel right now? Is it secure? Confident? Compassion? Calm? Then consider - what would someone who genuinely felt that way be thinking? What would they be believing? And brainstorm ideas - write them down. Keep going until you find a thought that feels believable to you and useful. And from there - you’ll find it so much easier to decide what action you want to take.

And for some of my clients in certain situations - they want to take the action of having a calm conversation with their partner about an issue, other times there is no action to take - they deal with the thought and feeling themselves and feel a lot calmer, and there’s no need to even bring it up to their partner! You get to decide. But taking action from your fearful primitive brain, without questioning what it’s telling you, is a recipe for disaster. And often creates so much unnecessary arguments and disconnection. 

So those are 5 steps for when you’re feeling triggered! Make a note of them somewhere, or save this episode and come back to it when you need it. And most importantly - don’t see your brain being triggered as a set back or as a sign that you’re doing this work wrong. You’re not. You just have a very normal human brain - and human brains are supposed to have a mix of positive and negative emotion and are programmed to have a negative bias and be fearful - it’s what kept us alive for millions of years and surviving as a species. So don’t beat yourself up for these moments. Instead - use them as opportunities to get really curious about your own thinking and understand your own brain.

Okay guys, that’s all I’ve got for you today! I hope it was useful. The next round of my group coaching is in May and when I open the doors, they’ll be a 10% discount available for the first 24 hours. So I’ll put the link for the waitlist in the information section of his episode and I highly recommend you go get yourself on the list. 

This is where you’re going to learn about all these tools and concepts on a much deeper level AND actually have my eyes on your brain to help you apply them to your own unique life, thoughts and relationships. So it’s going to be amazing! This current round is about half way through and I’m so proud of how far everyone has already come.

And, as always, If you’re loving this podcast, please could you do a little something for me? Could you give it a rating on whatever podcast it is you’re listening from? That would mean the absolute world to me and keep me reaching more and more people with this work! I hope you all have lovely weekends, and I will speak to you all next week - bye!