Identifying Triggers

The thing about triggers is that they are a feeling that lets you know that there is something that you need to address emotionally. Your body telling you this, in this way, can often speak to not just the volatility but also the seriousness of this thing that you haven’t dealt with.

This is probably a thing in some social science field or in psychology and probably even has specific terminology but I’m speaking from the connections I’ve found the lay person’s way and I have found no official terminology to communicate it, so I’m kind of making up my own here; humor me.

Funnily enough, those people who don’t address these triggers seem to be feather sensitive the more they’re exposed to them when they don’t deal with the underlying issue causing that trigger. Almost like with allergies… energetic allergies. 

I’m joking; this is not funny, it’s obnoxious to deal with as an Empath and can make a terrible job worse if that job forces you to engage with the public.

Now, I’m not some kind of professional with a bunch of letters behind my name but I am an Empath who is all kinds of sensitive with a keen intuition on human behavior with trauma and I see and feel this shit clear as day every time I walk out the door of my apartment, sometimes I even feel it in my apartment. It’s been a game changing adventure turning this knowledge inward and looking at my behavior over the years too.

Observation of this is fine, but explaining my observations in a blog post doesn’t really help solve the problem when people are looking for help with this stuff..

That said, this series of posts during May are going to take a dive on this slippery slope topic called “triggers” and how to go within to heal them. And yeah; I’m going to talk a little about my own experiences and observations, it’s not because I enjoy talking about myself; it’s because my experience is the best one I have to draw from to explain this stuff without being “Piled Higher and deeper”. I recognize that not everyone will agree with me either, but that’s the beautiful thing about me discussing this in my corner of the web; you don’t have to be here if you don’t want to.

This first post aims to explain what a trigger is and it’s categories. This post will be a little lengthy too, but I promise there’s some gold in the long-windedness execution of this. There will be more posts on the trigger cycle as well after this one, so make sure you subscribe to my blog and other social platforms.

There’s a difference between acting out of wounding and acting out of entitlement, but the result of each is the same; they’re twins

Paiges of ascension

So What’s A Trigger Anyway?

I use trauma in the context of triggers because I think they manifest from the same place. Trauma is the occurrence and triggers are like the energetic leftovers of that occurrence.

Whether you blame it on your birth chart, a faulty system with incompetent authorities, or people who are only family and friends by title; the outcome is still very often the same. Trauma results from an action or event happening outside of you, that is received negatively by you. Its incoming energy. A lot of traumas, I think anyway, are avoidable, some happen unintentionally or by chance and like with many things on our planet, some are intentional and nefarious. The result of the collective avoidable trauma has amounted to a very large number of people walking around with a seething rage that they don’t know how to deal with because they don’t comprehend why it’s there. Let me explain my viewpoint a bit more.

I’m not saying that people don’t understand that what happened to them is playing out in some facet of their lives; I’m saying that many don’t comprehend why it’s playing out the way it’s playing out. I’m talking about those who understand the cause but not the effect, basically. The residual energy of trauma flows beneath the surface in the subconscious with the ego and the shadow, and many people refuse to look at this part of themselves. Can’t see something you won’t look at. This causes a perpetuation of the wounding unconsciously that ends up growing like mold. I see the ego as “fruit” the mold is or isn’t supported by.

I’m saying that unconsciousness is an energy that poisons peace. It’s this that encompasses the term “trigger” for me. Some of these types of woundings and trigger points are on like the 50th cycle here in the United States and according to the news cycle, social and “official”, we’re right on schedule for a reckoning of our own unconsciousness. Call these posts doing my part to help break the cycle.

Slowing Down For Consciousness

2020 forced the collective to take a long, hard look at itself. The deep look isn’t done either. I’ve started to call these types of events, like the pandemic for example; Event of Precedence. Meaning a whole different timeline could exist right now as your reality if you had not experienced a particular event. COVID-19 was an Event of Precedence for the collective. It has touched and changed the entire world; nothing will be the same after it. Period. It is the event that clearly marked a change for modern humankind and set the precedent for what happens next; what we build up as well as what we break down.

Now, the COVID-19 pandemic is a pretty extreme example of this energy, but I used it to help you understand what I mean when I say Event of Precedence because it’s affected everyone in some kind of way. In your own life, this Event of Precedence could be something that seems arbitrary to other people but still deeply affects you at a core level, and there can be multiple instances of these events in a person’s life that make up their overall wounding. It is this wound that we are feeling when something triggers us into anger, sadness, or even smug satisfaction. Not all triggers are bad per se, but for context, what I’m referring to is the triggers that make you feel downright icky, the ones that take you too far from center.

When something happens, especially if it’s generally something benign to most people and it causes you to feel anything other than centered, this is the open wound being afflicted. Without awareness, we often miss this and it’s this recognition that you’re being triggered that can make the difference in narrowing down what sets you off so you can heal the wound and ascend. Now, I look at this as different types of triggers that can happen. It will help to imagine a trigger as a physical wound for this next part.

The first level trigger is “The Rubbing Alcohol Trigger”. This is the trigger that comes up unexpectedly for people and often comes from a difference in opinions where the emotional reactions stem from being put in situations where their voice was ignored or they felt uncomfortably dominated in some way. Usually this type of trigger will sting emotionally and activate a fight-or-flight response, but the person can quickly return to center once they say their peace or remove themselves from the situation. In some people, the burn is slow to leave, but it does leave… kind of like rubbing alcohol.

The second level trigger is what I call “The Salt Trigger”. This is a trigger that is on a specific topic, typically related to trauma and it’s something that a person knows they’re sensitive about but have a tough time regulating their reactions to it when it comes up and can unconsciously behave spitefully to prove a point. Think classic passive-aggressive behavior and “throwing salt on the wound”.

The third level trigger is “The Gaping Wound Trigger”. This type of trigger stems from deep, suppressed trauma that hasn’t had light shined on it because the shadow is in the driver’s seat. Often this trigger has been festering in the subconscious so it plays out through the ego and leads to self-destructive behaviors. A person with this level of Trigger seems to “wake-up” with a drug/alcohol problem to those on the outside, for example, and they can be emotionally chaotic. Think walking on eggshells around an angry drunk. They can also resort to engaging in behaviors such as manipulation, narcissism, and using people to get ahead in the most negative vibrations of this trigger level. With this one it’s about the cycle of self- sabotage, which is a whole other set of blog posts at another time.

Now, it’s easy to just think that this third level person is just a grade A jackass and you wouldn’t be completely wrong, however; what I have found through personal experience with people who have the worst parts of the Gaping Wound Trigger issue is that they are incredibly insecure, so they act this way because they don’t believe they will get what they need or deserve otherwise. Kind of the classic bully profile when you think about it.

Take this next week and spend a little time each day reviewing your behavior and interactions with other people and your environment. Pay close attention to how certain places and people make you feel and write it down. It will be useful later.

Next week, we’ll cover some exercises to identify triggers when they happen and some different methods that I’ve come up with to neutralize them.

Till then

Peace, Love, & Hair Grease