My emotional triggers came to surface after I got married. I remember the day I noticed them. It was early, around 6:00 am. I slipped out of bed to brew some coffee and get some writing done before the day began. I’ve definitely just romanticized getting up at 6am, but this is my truth. I LOVE the morning. The time of day when the orange rays from the sun encompass the sky and silence is louder than noise is where I thrive most.
As I took the 10-step walk from our bedroom to the kitchen, because it’s LA people, we have small spaces, I found myself feeling angry and hot-tempered. I’m talking about the kind of anger that sits deep in your bones and effects your entire body.
In less than a minute, my breath shortened, my heart started to ache, and my jaw locked up. What happened during my 1-minute walk from the bedroom to the kitchen? I was emotionally triggered.
On my brief walk to the kitchen, I saw two things that spiraled my emotions FAST: My husband’s excess, unkept electronics on the floor and a stack of dirty dishes in the sink. For those new to the world of mental health, electronics and dirty dishes, should not skyrocket one’s emotions to a place where their heart starts to hurt. But this is what happens when you have traumatic memories associated to something.
If you start to feel anxiety, panic, discouragement, despair, or negative self-talk around something or someone triggering, you most likely have a traumatic memory attached to it aka an emotional trigger.
Why are EMOTIONAL TRIGGERS so powerful?
Triggers spark powerful emotions inside a person because they involve the senses. (Source). Sensory information such as site, sound, and smell play a huge part in our memories. The more sensory information we have associated with a traumatic memory, the easier it is for us to recall that memory and get triggered. To help you better understand emotional triggers, let me explain what memories I have tied up to excess electronics and dirty dishes in the sink.
Trigger Example 1
Excessive electronics spark the traumatic memory of when mom walked out on our family.
When I was 9-years-old, my mother left my father. Prior to leaving, she complained constantly about my dad having too many electronics. She demanded he get rid of some of his film equipment. He never did. Then one day she was gone. After mom left, my parent’s once shared bedroom transformed into dad’s film warehouse. Computers lined against the wall, camera bags covered the floor, and USB cords were everywhere!
My rational adult mind is totally aware the root of their marital problems had little to do with my dad’s memory cards. Nevertheless, sometimes, when I stumble upon scattered, unorganized, and way too many electronics on the floor in the house, it transports me back to that 9-year-old girl wandering would mom have stayed with one less digital camera?
But remember every emotional trigger to something has a powerful emotion underneath it. So, what’s the real emotion being felt here?
The core of this trigger is fear.
Trigger Example 2:
Dirty dishes spark the traumatic memory of living with my mentally unstable Grandfather.
I was 9-years-old when I went to live with my Grandpa. The day after my mother, brother, and I settled in to Grandpa’s house, my Grandfather assigned a list of daily chores for me to do. My job was to scrub, clean, and put away the dirty dishes after every meal. Not too bad, right? Wrong. If my Grandfather stumbled upon one dirty dish in the sink, then my TV time was taken away for the rest of the week. If my brother left his cereal bowl in the sink, and I didn’t catch it in time, I wasn’t allowed to swim in Grandpa’s pool for the day. Really Pops??
I have sense learned my Grandfather’s constant up and down behavior was directly correlated to an untreated mental health condition. Nevertheless, till this day, dirty dishes in the sink that aren’t my own, have an unusual hold over me. When I see somebody (like my husband) has plopped his dishes in the sink, and not cleaned them, I am instinctively filled with rage, remembering all the weeks my privileges were taken away because somebody left a dish in the sink.
So what’s the mega powerful emotion that has taken hold of me on occasion here?
The core of this trigger is not feeling good enough.
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I encourage you to take some time to observe what things, objects, places, smells, or even colors (yes, even a specific color can trigger a person) may skyrocket your emotions to an intense degree. Once you realize what triggers you, take some time to reflect on what memory you have attached to it. The answer will reveal what you are still carrying from your past. Once you learn what memory needs to be healed from your past, then you are in a wonderful position because now you can embark on your journey to healing it!
