Handling Triggering Conversations

Welcome to This Daring Adventure podcast where we work on bridging the gap between where we are and where we want to be in order to live a bigger and bolder life. In this podcast, we will provide inspiration, tips, and skills need to make your life the adventure you want it to be. Here's your host, mindset mentor, and life coach, Trista Gertin.

Hey everybody. Welcome back to This Daring Adventure. Thank you so much for joining me today. I am still on vacation in Canada and have been enjoying my time, catching up with family and friends. It's been busy, but it's been a lot of fun. And the weather has been good, although everybody here is kind of complaining about it. But I enjoy the cooler weather. There's been a bit of rain. It's been a nice change from the Middle East and the intense heat that I left. So I am just trying to enjoy that and I still have one more week and I'm gonna try and make it a little bit quieter to get a bit of a rest before I head back to Lebanon, and I'm looking forward to that today. I wanted to talk a little bit about shifting perspectives, particularly when you have a conversation with someone or you receive an email or a text message that sort of, I hate to use the word trigger, but I guess it's trigger, it upsets you and you can't let it go, and I obviously this happens to everybody at some point. It's something that I've dealt with. You know, somebody says something and you just can't let it go, and you keep ruminating on it. You have it on a thought loop in your head over and over again, and I have found ways to help me manage it and to let it go. I share these with my clients and I thought I would share that with you today. It is possible with some mindful strategies to help you let it go and to start to feel better, and I have 10 ways or 10 steps that you can use in order to start to feel better and let things go. The first is, Pausing before you react. If you open up a message or somebody says something to you and you read the email, You have to take a moment to breathe and to pause and resist the urge to react immediately. You want to make sure that you're not sending something that is emotionally charged in the heat of the moment that you may regret later. You may not mean, and that will only escalate the situation in order to pause. It will be a practice. Our, obviously, our inclination will be to react quickly because you will feel that you have a point to make. You will feel that you need to respond. If you can generate awareness around this, that this is your impulse. If you can stop, notice this, take some breaths, breathe. Allow yourself to feel that urge to react and to respond. Remind yourself that this is normal. Of course, you wanna react, of course, you wanna respond quickly, and it's okay that you can take a moment to catch your breath and to gather your thoughts. Know that your. Prefrontal cortex has gone offline. Your nervous system is, has been dysregulated, and so you want to give yourself a few minutes to bring it back online and to collect your thoughts. And sometimes it might take five minutes, it might take 30 minutes. It might take a day or two. Remind yourself that your response here, The urgency, the feelings. If you're upset, if you're angry, it's all perfectly normal, but that you don't have to act on it. And that there's plenty of time if you want to respond to do so later when you've collected your thoughts, then. You might want to empathize, consider their their perspective. Know that they have their reasons for saying what they've said, writing what they've written, shared what they've shared for their, for some reason, for something that's going on in their mind. That makes sense to them and that it probably has nothing to do with you, but it's their interpretation, it's their understanding, it's their perspective, and it's not about you. And if you can imagine that reason. Have some compassion for them and, and their perspective might help you to let go a little bit. Next, you wanna focus on the content and not the sender, so you wanna be shifting your attention to whatever was written in the email or in the message, or whatever the person said, rather than making it personal. And about the person who sent it, right. Evaluate the relevance of the message and perhaps see if there are some points that they've raised that, that are true, that makes sense to you. How they could possibly be true that you could see. How they could see that. How they could think that, right? And don't make it about the person and any personal bias that you may have against them. Typically, if it's your boss or your brother or your parents, you have a very long history with them, and so, You, it's very easy for us to drag this bias into our thinking and into our reaction. So you just want to be conscious about that and whether you are, you're dragging that into the present for yourself. Next, and this is one of my favorite steps is to detach emotionally. And so this is where you get a little bit of perspective and a little bit of objectivity, and you put some space between you and the message that's been sent or the words that have been said. This is not about you. It doesn't define your worth. It doesn't define, define your value as a person. And one of the best ways to detach is to think of it as just words, just characters or as one client put it, punctuation. And so just telling yourself that a person said words. You can say A man said words, A person said words. Words were said, or a woman sent a text message. A woman used punctuation, A man wrote a letter. Using that, I find is such a great way to give yourself some space and some objectivity. It's just words, it's just characters. It's just some letters on a page. Next, can you see any positive aspects? So even if you have a contentious relationship with the sender or the person who said the words, is there really any valuable information or constructive feedback in the email? Again, it goes back to my point earlier saying, you know, is there anything that is a little bit true in the email that you can own? Is there something that can be learned from this? Are there any positive elements? Can you, can you use them? Check to see whether there might be some valuable information in this, in these messages. Next, you want to practice gratitude. Can you take a moment to appreciate the fact that you receive communication and that you now have an opportunity to address any concerns or misunderstandings? Gratitude can help you shift your focus away from any negative emotions, and We can use this opportunity to build intimacy, to build a stronger connection, to foster greater understanding. This may be the starting point of a conversation that helps you to get there, and if you can be honest and compassionate and kind and have these conversations or these exchanges when you're ready. It is a great way to build that intimacy and that and that stronger relationship with this person. Next, number eight, you want to consider the long-term implications without taking a pause with, and when you respond quickly, reacting negatively or impulsively can have long-term consequences. And so you want to think about how you want to show up, how do you want to think about yourself and how you've handled this situation. And you can also consider how you want the other person to think about you for handling this situation, especially if it's professionally in a professional context and, and whether you're handling it professionally and respectfully. Think about how you want to show up Next, you can take a few minutes to vent to a friend or a colleague, like you need to be careful about this, especially in professional settings, but it can help to vent and to get things off your chest. You wanna be careful that at some point you vent once and then you stop venting. You don't want to be carrying this on and on and on and just be it. Let it be the one thing that you keep talking about. So that's not healthy, but that initial venting can be really helpful. The other way to do that if you don't wanna involve another person, is to write it down. Taking five or 10 minutes to write right, do a thought download. Get everything off of your chest. Don't edit yourself, don't censor yourself. Just pour it all out on a page. You can always tear it up, get rid of it afterwards, but that release can help you to let some of that initial emotion go. And to calm your nervous system, it can also help. And this is number 10, to practice self-care. Engage in some activities that might help you to relax and reduce stress. Taking five minutes to do some breathing exercises to meditate, go for a walk, get some exercise. Take care of yourself. To first of all release some of the stress and if you can do this on a regular basis, it helps to build resilience and the more resilience you are able to build in yourself, then the less of a response of a triggered response of an emotional response you will experience as time goes on. I found this for myself the more I am able to meditate and regulate my emotions on a daily basis. It helps that when something happens, I'm not reacting in the same way that I used to. I have less of those emotional highs and responses than I used to. Finally, I think it's really important that you understand that whatever emotion you feel as a response, it's normal. It's okay. There's nothing wrong with it. You want to be able to allow yourself to experience that emotion, name it, and maybe just sit with it for five minutes. You can tell yourself, I'm, I'm feeling frustrated, and that's okay. I am allowing myself to feel the frustration. I'm frustrated, and that's okay. Nothing has gone wrong. Whatever emotion you are feeling is perfectly normal, and if you can allow it, allow yourself to experience it without trying to resist it, without trying to push it away, without beating yourself up or making yourself wrong for experiencing it. It will lessen, it will diffuse. It will dissipate a little bit so that you can start to let it move through you. And then as that emotion decreases and moves through you, then you will be able to start to think about whether you want to respond. And if so, what response do you want to to have? Maybe you don't want to respond. Maybe you can just let it go, or maybe you want to have a conversation. Again, collect your thoughts and approach any discussion from a place of curiosity, from a place of compassion and kindness. The goal here is, again, to reach an understanding and to build. Intimacy and a greater, or to build intimacy or to foster intimacy and to strengthen your relationship. How you respond to the situation can greatly impact your wellbeing. And of course, in a professional setting, your professional relationships. So taking the time to consciously shift your perspective and maintain or regain some of the calm, the level-headed approach, you will be able to. Get through and navigate these situations more gracefully and constructively, and it all comes down to how you want to show up. I hope that helps. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out. I would love to hear from you if you're interested in trying coaching for yourself. The link to my calendar is in the show notes. You can sign up for a private one hour coaching session, and this is a great opportunity to invest one hour in yourself and your life. if you have a moment to review, share, and subscribe to the podcast. I would greatly appreciate it. Otherwise, I will see you next week. Take care everybody. Bye-bye.

Thank you for listening to This Daring Adventure podcast with your host, Trista Guertin. We hope you enjoyed the tips and conversations on how to get excited about life Again. As always, you can head to tristaguertin.com for additional resources and to book a one-on-one coaching session. You can also follow Trista on Instagram at tristavguertin. Don't forget to subscribe, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll see you next time.