A couple of things have happened to me in the last couple of weeks which have triggered me. Pushed a button I have and didn’t necessarily know I had. Or a button I thought was under control, aaaaand it wasn’t.

How do I know? Suddenly I’m overwhelmed with different thoughts, feelings and body sensations which I don’t know what to do with. Anger, fear, guilt, confusion, excitement, uncertainty. My stomach is churning and my thoughts are racing all over the place, wondering how something will work out, what will happen next. When I’m in the middle of that it feels overwhelming, I can’t tell when or if it will end.

It can be as small as someone who I thought was going to say yes to being a client, saying no. Completely normal, and yet it’s like someone accidentally falling into the big red emergency stop button on the escalator. Suddenly nothing functions properly anymore.

What I’ve realised is it is not about blaming me or anyone else for hitting that big red button. They don’t even know it is there, so how can they possibly avoid it? And, they tripped, they fell, it is no one’s fault. As I am learning to be responsible for those triggers, doing the work to reset them, and owning that I have them, that’s where things start to change. From responsibility I get to choose how it goes next.

Now I know what to look for and how to recognise it I let the feelings run for a bit, but I don’t let them make decisions. I let the emotions flow, and then forgive myself for being triggered, so the emotions don’t call the shots for ever more. Then I can recreate possibility, and be 100% responsible for shaping how my life goes.