Once again I am going back to the past, this time over a year ago to a post I wrote about triggers on February 28 2013, it was a turbulent year in terms of stuff coming up and it helped me to grow and evolve very quickly indeed. The particular trigger who was in my thoughts when I wrote this turned out to be highly manipulative and knew exactly what he was doing, in spite of that I bless him for all the deep trauma he helped me to uncover and to let go of, allowing me to become the happy and fulfilled person I am today! The title was “Point Your Trigger To My Heart”, particularly catchy I thought but only one photo in the whole post so I have added a few, nice to see how I’ve evolved over time.
I’d like to have a bit of a yarn about triggers, not the kind that help you to blow your brains out when attached to a gun, the ones that help you get your stuff moving. They tend to be the people you care about, or hate, the ones that annoy you on a regular basis, and of course when desire is involved stuff tends to come flying up from every which way!
The important thing to remember about triggers, is that most of the time the reaction you are experiencing is way out of proportion to what has actually occurred. In fact a lot of the time they have nothing to do with the feelings that are coursing through you, but the temptation to point the finger of blame and to project is very powerful. Not only are you dumping on an innocent, you are missing out on the opportunity to take responsiblity for your own feelings and let go of old patterns that are no longer serving you.
I’m the first to admit that I tend to go a bit unconscious when something nasty is moving through, but it doesn’t take me too long these days to realise what’s going on. If the situation seems to show my unwitting trigger in a bad light, I immediately cease any and all speculation about what was actually going on. After all, if it’s my own stuff coming up, then it’s inside my inner world that I will find any answers. And once I understand what my feelings are connected to, the situation that set it all off generally makes a great deal of sense, and I offer a prayer of gratitude and blessings to the one who has helped me into this space of greater clarity.
Now I’m not excusing bad behaviour here, if someone is rude or unkind or unfair, you have every right to respond in an appropriate fashion. There are people who have to be separated from the rest of the community because they are dangerous. But as Kabir said, “Do what you do with another human being, but never put them out of your heart.” When you harden your heart against another, you hurt yourself as much as the other person, choose to be in your loving heart and you have instant protection. And the response you make is much more likely to be non-judgemental and appropriate to the situation.
Wherever I ramble it is always my heart that I come back to, in that still space full of love and acceptance, I feel welcomed and held. In these uncertain times when our inner beings are being flung around in the storms within, the heart is our safe refuge, the port that I call home.