She muses

When we’re first training a dog to walk on a leash, it pulls and pulls, trying to run off until we firmly yank the leash back. The untrained puppy tries to run off again and again - until one day, it realizes that it’s not going anywhere, and ceases trying to run off.

So it is with our triggers.

For much of our lives, when our triggers have been activated, we have acted out - instinctively, like a dog running off after a scent.

The day we commit to not acting when triggered, we begin a training period. We’re letting our emotional “wiring” know that it is no longer in charge. We’re taking charge of our own reactivity. The repeated process of learning to restrain our words and deeds, starts to correct old habits of acting out.

If we stay with this practice, at some point we actually establish a new habit. It becomes no longer second-nature to act when we’ re triggered, but rather we learn to instinctively pause rather than react. Our “inner gyroscope” kicks in more and more quickly.

We break the self-reinforcing patterns and we begin shifting our behavior, beginning to impact the social “reality” around us.

Here’s the real gift. As we choose to become non-reactive in our outward expression, and more and more frequently use the state-shifting techniques to come back to our place of inner power - over time, we actually get less triggered in the first place. Just like the dog that no longer pulls so hard on the leash.

The four-step process is a profoundly powerful tool for retraining, to radically shift the cycle of reaction-action-reaction.

Managing Your Triggers Process
Step I: Name it.
Step II: Create space appropriately.
Step III Shift state
Step IV Respond to situation

For the remaining days of this practice, make an absolute commitment to not act when triggered.

The Practice
Take note of each and every time you get triggered.
Commit to not acting when triggered.
Really!
Use the four-step process to recenter yourself in your place of power.

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass.