Your triggers are your responsibility. It isn’t the world’s obligation to tiptoe around you.
Your triggers are your responsibility. It isn’t the world’s obligation to tiptoe around you.
We all have triggers. Some of us have even more than we might be willing to admit. And when these triggers are stimulated, we are more than likely to devolve into less than what we desire to be.
Suddenly, with the authority that only a cranky toddler can command, we are instantly more than willing to make the world know that we are not happy with whatever has just transpired. Often times, we communicate this with far less decorum than we would communicate almost anything else.
Why is this?
When something is a trigger, do we allow it to be a trigger or are we incapable of disabling whatever aspect of it causes a trigger inside of us?
My experience leads me to believe it is voluntary. This is not to say that I personally have contained all of my triggers and I never allow any of them to be known. Sometimes, the right driver, in the right circumstances, is more than able to prove I do not have the self control I profess in this discussion.
But… I would say that as I have grown older, and recognized that the triggers, are in fact, voluntary, I have been able to install a mental blockade that sees the trigger and stops it in its tracks.
Sometimes, it is having suffered a significant loss over a trigger experience in the past that enables us to put up the blockade. You allow something to be communicated, it creates a horrible experience and you swear to yourself, “I will never do that again!”
Surprisingly, that proves to be the case in many circumstances. We have suffered something of significant value and that loss provides the proper catalyst to prevent that trigger from being enabled once activated. We still feel it inside, but if we are wiser and capable of self control, that trigger is silenced internally and the feeling is quelled through proper self control.
A perfect example might be seeing someone you do not know posting something you totally do not believe on social media. I would be willing to bet that since the advent of social media, many of us have found ourselves in a useless discourse with a stranger whose mind we will never change.
And the bigger truth, is why should we? Allow them to post what they want. It is not our responsibility to be the world police, and the act is fruitless anyway. If you feel strongly about the issue, there are places to use your feelings and energy that are valuable, productive, and likely to evoke change. But having a senseless text screaming match with another stranger is most certainly not one of them.
Finding your triggers is a process that happens over time. Once identified, your opportunity to install blockades to those triggers is completely voluntary. I have worked for years to take the majority of mine and sequester them where they belong, while simultaneously trying to learn why I trigger on such stimuli and what I might do to reduce or eliminate the trigger in my mind entirely.
In either case, the world is full of contrary experiences. You are never, ever (did I say never?) going to stop or control them…. So your ONLY CHOICE is to stop and control yourself.
Happy Sunday!
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