41 Trigger and Mindfulness Reflection – Kari Swoboda

Triggers and mindfulness undoubtedly go together and are intertwined. An important mindset that Tara Brach shows us throughout her mindfulness video is that you should respond to anger appropriately rather than overreacting through emotions. Neuroscience also plays into how our brains function, so it is an essential aspect to consider when discussing reactions to triggers and mindfulness. Triggers need to be identified by us and understood; without this, our emotions can spiral out of control and have drastically devastating effects. Lastly, our book offers a multitude of different ideas focusing on mindfulness and understanding the effects of triggers. Mindfulness plays a huge part in not only identifying our triggers but coping with and understand the effects of our triggers.

Brach’s Breakdown of Anger. Tara Brach, as we have seen last week and now this week, has a lot to say when it comes to mindfulness. I think that her ideals are extremely calming and eye-opening, and these mindfulness tips have already had a big impact on my thoughts. In her YouTube video, she states that, “when you are pricked, when you are hurt, [being] responsible means you are a hundred percent able to respond to yourself and the others in the situation in a way that at least, you can take care of your own experience” (Brach, 2017, 22:29). To me, this is an extremely amazing mindset that I need to adopt for myself. As a young adult, I need to claim responsibility for my own actions and react in a positive way. It is so important to be cognizant of your own actions and emotions, which Brach emulates through this. Even nowadays, I tend to react in a harsh manner to my parents’ criticism and hatefulness. While my dad has grown a lot, my mom and I often butt heads. In these scenarios, I need to recognize my emotions and rope them in before they run away from me like usual. Brach also talks about barriers and having walls up. She says that “there are times when the only way to bring down barriers is to set boundaries.” (Brach, 2017, 43:41). Setting boundaries for me is so important. I grew up with parents that had extremely different ideals than I did, and now, living as a transgender woman, my parents do not accept me a ton. Therefore, I must set boundaries about discussing certain topics to avoid added stress and arguments. By setting boundaries, I think it most definitely shows growth and attention to mental health. If you can recognize your negative triggers and set healthy boundaries limiting the exposure to these triggers, I only see positive outcomes possible. Overall, I really enjoyed Brach’s video, and she taught me a lot.

The Effects of our Brain. Overall, a lot of the scientific background behind the brain and neuroscience confuses me quite a bit. While I do understand some of the talk behind it, I overall much prefer to study the social science side of things, rather than the scientific background. Nevertheless, I think that this chapter, “Looking into the Brain: The Neuroscience Revolution,” says a lot of great things about trauma and how this can affect people later in life. For example, the book discusses how “even years later traumatized people often have enormous difficulty telling other people what has happened to them” (van der Kolk, 2015, p. 43). This is important to bring up because you never know what somebody has gone through. Their trauma could be very damaging, and this damage can be affecting how someone acts and holds themselves. Not only does this apply when you are talking and perhaps arguing with other people, but it also applies to ourselves as well. For me, I feel like I never give myself enough slack. I think that I am pretty understanding of other people’s emotions, but when it comes to my own, I often disregard them and tell myself to push through. This is an unhealthy habit that I have, but I am working on being more understanding and forgiving myself. This chapter also talks about the different sides of the brain. It says that the right side tends to be more feeling-based, while the left side is more fact and logic based (van der Kolk, 2015, p. 44). I know that I am more right-side based, as I often think and act with my emotions and feelings rather than being analytical through logic. However, I do think I should try engaging the left-side brain a little bit more to give me more diversity. While the scientific side can be confusing, I think that these two topics really stood out to me, made sense, and taught me that I can work to actively make changes in my thinking patterns.

Both Sides of Triggers.  Triggers can cause either a negative or positive reaction, which we learned within the class video. One of the distinctions mentioned within the “Identifying our Triggers” chapter was the idea that triggers can be “encouraging” and “productive” or vice versa (Goldsmith & Reiter, 2015, pp. 46-47). I think this directly circles back to triggers causing an either positive or negative reaction. Triggers could have many beneficial effects, like remembering a loved one or reminding yourself of positive attributes. If these triggers are encouraging and productive, they may inspire us to take action within our lives or perhaps the extra boost of self-confidence that we needed. These triggers, as many know, can also be negative and can bring about many upsetting feelings. They may make us feel more depressed or upset with ourselves. Being able to decipher these feelings and evaluate them can make us more self-aware; it can also help us be more aware towards others’ triggers. Another distinction that stood out to me was that “a trigger can be internal or external” (Goldsmith & Reiter, 2015, p. 45). I feel as though people do not realize the internal causes of triggers. It seems that people are aware of the external things that can cause a trigger, but our minds can cause a trigger as well. For me, I often let my perfectionist ideals trigger me into not thinking that I am doing enough and that I am worthless. I know these things are not true, but it’s hard to realize that sometimes.

Mindfulness Exemplified in our Text. The book offers a lot of ideas for working on both mindfulness and triggers. One of the things I highly relate to is featured in Chapter 9. One of the topics covered here is “over-attention to the negative in the moment” (Rogers, 2016, p. 85). Focusing on the negative has always been one of my biggest struggles. Part of this is my aforementioned issue with perfectionism, but I’ve also had problems with mental health (i.e. depression, anxiety) that have made me also focus on the negative features of what happens in my life. My dad famously calls me “Negative Nancy” and has for the past few years. This is not something that I want to be my staple; I want to rid myself of this bad energy. Buddhism has helped me do that a lot, but I also need to make more progress to push myself to be better. Chapter 11 also ties into my Buddhist ideals. One of the main ideas of this chapter is that “acceptance decreases suffering.” (Rogers, 2016, p. 100). This is one of our Four Noble Truths in Buddhism. These are that life has suffering, there is a cause for suffering, an end to suffering, and the way to end suffering is The Eightfold Path. These ideas of mindfulness and acceptance of suffering are, as one can see, very integrated into my religion. I love how the book says that “accepting the behavior means recognizing reality” (Rogers, 2016,p. 100). I think that life naturally has suffering, so it is so important to acknowledge and accept this fact of life. Lastly, the skill of happiness covered in Chapter 16 also spoke to me. In an extremely stressful time in my life, this reminded me that I have a lot to be happy about. I had a connection with these chapters about mindfulness, religion, and happiness.

Personal Experience with Triggers. Triggers, for me, have always really have been a touchy subject. I have dealt with a lot of bullying and abuse throughout my late child and teenage years. This has unfortunately followed me into my young adult life as well, but I do my best to eliminate as much of these negative feelings as possible. Sometimes, when people use a pointed tone with me, it definitely triggers a part of me that is always ready to “clap back,” as one might say. I was raised in a house where I had to stand up and fend for myself because nobody else would. Unfortunately, this has caused some bad habits when it comes to communication. However, taking Communication and Conflict last semester with Dr. Halliwell helped me a lot. It helped me realize that everything can be settled in a healthier, more positive way if you try. It made me feel a lot more stable, and I’ve already started implementing these things into my life.

Conclusion. Overall, this was an eye-opening week with materials that showed me how triggers and mindfulness go hand-in-hand with one another. Tara Brach illustrated how our anger can be reeled in and responded to in a much better way than reacting negatively. The left- and right-side brains have different functions that can affect how we process things, and trauma can be stored in our brains for years and years. Triggers can have a positive or a negative effect on people, so it is important to have an awareness of what these are and what they do. Our textbook also offers some great tips about connecting mindfulness and happiness. Triggers can be difficult, but they are far from undefeatable. Using mindfulness, one can recognize and realize their personal triggers and their effects.

References

 Brach, T. (2017, October 31st). Tara Brach on Anger: Responding, Not Reacting [Video].

YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEtNXyYubB0

Goldsmith, M., & Reiter, M. (2015). Identifying Our Triggers. In Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts — Becoming the Person You Want to Be (pp. 41–51). chapter, Crown Business.

Rogers, H. B. (2016). The Mindful Twenty-Something. New Harbinger Publications. https://reader.yuzu.com/books/9781626254916

van der Kolk, B. A. (2015). Looking into the Brain: The Neuroscience Revolution. In The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma (pp. 39–47). chapter, Penguin Books.