❝ The discomfort isn’t the enemy – it’s the path.
There’s a moment –
a tightening in the chest, a flush of heat, a sting of shame.
Someone says something.
Your tone changes.
Your body responds.
You explode.
You shut down.
You run.
We’ve all been there –
that sudden inner surge, that uncontrollable current.
A problem? No.
It’s a portal – an entry point to a part of you still longing to be met.
Triggers get a bad rap – labelled as inconvenient, embarrassing, even dangerous.
But what if we’ve misunderstood them?
What if the discomfort is the very place we’re being asked to look – not because something is wrong, but because something inside us is ready to be reclaimed?
What if the discomfort is the very place we’re being asked to look – not because something is wrong, but because something inside us is ready to be reclaimed?
Triggers are not evidence of brokenness.
They are pointers to unhealed wounds, and the breadcrumbs leading us home, back to ourselves.
Most of us were never taught how to safely feel. We adapted – too well.
We shut down, people-pleased, got louder, got smaller, froze, ran.
We learned how to survive the danger – but at a cost.
Every time you’re triggered, your body is trying to complete a story it never got to finish – a trauma response it never got to express. It’s like a scratch on a wound that’s still raw and gaping.
That rise of panic when someone ignores you? Or speaks over you? Or reprimands you?
That could be a younger version (or part) of yourself remembering how it felt to disappear.
The deep visceral reaction when you’re told to “calm down” or “quieten down”?
Perhaps it’s your inner fire pushing back against decades of being silenced or dimmed.
Your nervous system is wise.
When it senses danger – even perceived danger – it moves into fight or flight, freeze, or fawn.
It’s not a flaw.
It’s a signal.
And when we begin to understand our window of tolerance, we realize that some of us live constantly outside of it – either hyper-aroused (heightened, anxious, reactive, overwhelmed) or hypo-aroused (numb, checked out, frigid, shut down).
The goal is not to eliminate our triggers – but to meet what they’re showing us with curiosity and compassion.
When we slow down and listen, we begin to see the gift in the activation.
A map to a younger part of us that didn’t feel safe.
A mirror to a belief that no longer serves us.
An invitation to rewire how we relate to ourselves and others.
This is the essence of shadow work – not to fix or shame what rises, but to acknowledge it and re-integrate what was split off or fragmented, denied, or buried under layers of conditioning.
There were times I was easily triggered – spiralling into self-loathing, blame or guilt, either retreating into a sulky silence – throat slamming shut like a bolted door – or spewing out tirades of spitting criticisms. I remember moments where flames of heat surged up through my veins from the pit of my gut adding fuel to the fire of my thoughts; energy draining from my limbs and waves of shame drowning every last part of identity.
I thought it meant I was not enough –
too much, too loud, too quick, too little, too sensitive.
But over time, I learned to turn towards the discomfort – the shame.
To ask –
What is this here to teach me?
Whose voice am I actually hearing?
Which exiled part of me is effected by this?
Every activation became a gift.
And now, instead of shame, I feel gratitude.
Because every time I notice a charge that’s triggered by something someone says or does, even just a little, I know I’m standing on the threshold of a deeper truth and healing.
Take this bit with you.
Your triggers are not proof that you’re not enough.
They’re not another reason to turn the arrow inward and beat yourself up.
They are invitations to become more whole – more natural – more you.
As you learn to pause, to breathe, to witness the part of you that’s hurting – you, once again, become your own way back to yourself, and find the wisdom in the wound.
