Understanding Triggers and Finding Ways to Cope

So, you got triggered. You saw, heard or thought of something and now your mind and body have gone haywire. What happened?

A “trigger” is a common word in pop culture, but the psychological meaning has a level of complexity. A “trigger” is anything either internal or external that activates a strong emotional or physiological response connected to past trauma, stress, or unresolved emotional wounds.

Triggers can be:

  • External cues: sights, sounds, smells, or situations reminiscent of past experiences (e.g., a slammed door reminding someone of past conflict.)

  • Internal cues: thoughts, body sensations, or emotions that feel overwhelming or unsafe.

When triggered, people may feel a surge of fear, anger, panic, or numbness. Some of you may experience flashbacks or intrusive thoughts, while others might shut down or dissociate. These reactions are not intentional, they are automatic survival responses driven by the brain’s protective mechanisms.

Common Types of Triggers

Triggers are very personal and vary widely, but they often fall into certain categories:

  • Sensory triggers: loud noises, certain smells, physical touch, specific places.

  • Relational triggers: rejection, criticism, abandonment cues, arguments.

  • Emotional triggers: feelings of shame, helplessness, or anger.

  • Internal triggers: intrusive memories, flashbacks, physical sensations like a tightening chest.

  • Situational triggers: anniversaries of traumatic events, medical procedures, or authority figures.

Understanding our personal triggers is an essential step toward healing and managing them effectively. But before we get to that, let’s look at why a trigger occurs. That’s an important step towards compassion towards ourselves and others.

The Neurobiology of Triggers

To understand why triggers happen, we need to look at how the brain processes threat and memory. Several key brain regions and systems are involved:

1. The Amygdala: The Alarm System

The amygdala is the brain’s emotional alarm. It scans for danger and reacts instantly when it perceives a threat. Even before conscious thought kicks in, the amygdala can trigger a fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response.

When someone is triggered, the amygdala may be responding not to a real danger, but to something that resembles a past traumatic event. For example, the raised voice could elicit fear in someone who grew up around an abusive caregiver.

2. The Hippocampus: Context and Memory

The hippocampus helps organize memories and place them in time and context. When trauma occurs, the hippocampus may not fully process the experience, leaving fragments of memory stored in sensory form (sounds, images, sensations.)

Later, when something similar arises, the hippocampus may fail to distinguish between past and present, leading the brain to respond as though the danger is happening again right now - even though it isn’t.

3. The Prefrontal Cortex: Regulation and Reasoning

The prefrontal cortex (PFC) is the brain’s rational control center. It helps us reason, soothe emotions and regulate behavior. Under extreme stress or trauma, the PFC goes offline, leaving the amygdala in charge. This means that you may find it nearly impossible to “think your way out of it.” (And a reason why talk therapy will not resolve triggers.) When your body is flooded with stress hormones, your PFC cannot effectively regulate the response.

4. The Nervous System and Body

The autonomic nervous system (ANS) plays a central role in triggers. It has two main branches:

  • Sympathetic nervous system (SNS): mobilizes fight-or-flight responses (rapid heartbeat, sweating, hypervigilance).

  • Parasympathetic nervous system (PNS): restores calm. Within it, the dorsal vagal system can also trigger shutdown or dissociation when danger feels overwhelming.

Being triggered is essentially the nervous system reacting as if survival is at stake, even when logically, the situation may not be dangerous.

Why Some People Are More Easily Triggered

Not everyone reacts to triggers in the same way. Several risk factors make people more vulnerable:

1. History of Trauma

Trauma sensitizes the brain’s threat-detection system. Repeated or unresolved trauma can leave the amygdala hyper-alert, the hippocampus less effective at contextualizing, and the PFC less able to regulate. Survivors of abuse, neglect, or violence of any sort often develop heightened sensitivity to cues reminiscent of their trauma.

2. Stress and Fatigue

Chronic stress depletes the body’s regulatory capacity. Sleep deprivation, burnout and exhaustion reduce the ability of the prefrontal cortex to modulate emotional responses, making triggers more likely.

3. Mental Health Conditions

Conditions such as PTSD, anxiety disorders, depression and certain personality disorders increase vulnerability to triggers. These conditions alter brain circuitry and stress responses, amplifying sensitivity.

4. Environmental and Social Factors

Living in unsafe environments, experiencing discrimination, or facing ongoing stressors (like financial insecurity) can keep the nervous system on edge, making triggers more frequent and intense.

How to Cope with Triggers

Let’s look at some ways you can cope with triggers. It’s useful to identify immediate strategies for calming the nervous system and long-term therapy approaches to rewire the brain’s response patterns.

Immediate Coping Strategies

  1. Breathing Exercises
    Slow, deep breathing activates the parasympathetic nervous system. Techniques like box breathing (inhale 4, hold 4, exhale 4, hold 4) help regulate the stress response.

  2. Grounding Techniques
    Grounding helps anchor the mind in the present moment, reminding the body it is safe. Holding onto a textured object or pressing feet firmly into the ground while you take long slow breaths can help you to ground.

  3. Self-Soothing Through the Senses
    In the moment, naming five things you see, four you touch, three you hear, two you smell, one you taste can help you regulate through the senses. Using calming sensory input such as listening to music, sipping tea, taking a bath or wrapping in a blanket can reduce physiological arousal.

  4. Movement
    Light exercise, stretching, or even shaking out the body helps release adrenaline and restore regulation.

  5. Affirmations
    Simple statements like “I am safe right now” or “This is just a memory” can help engage the prefrontal cortex and reorient the mind, although these are most effective when paired with a body based intervention.

Long term solutions

  1. Therapy
    EMDR and Brainspotting are both excellent modalities to target triggers thereby reprocessing the underlying trauma so that you reduce reactivity to triggers.

  2. Building Emotional Awareness
    Journaling, mindfulness, and body scans can increase awareness of triggers and early warning signs, allowing earlier intervention.

  3. Developing a Strong Support System
    Safe relationships provide co-regulation by calming the nervous system through presence and empathy. It’s helpful to explain to a trusted other what your triggers and their symptoms are.

  4. Lifestyle Factors
    Adequate sleep, balanced nutrition, exercise and stress management strengthen resilience against triggers.

Reframing Triggers: From Shame to COMPASSION

Being triggered can feel embarrassing or overwhelming, leading people to criticize themselves for “overreacting.” But it’s important to remember:

  • Triggers are protective responses—the brain’s attempt to keep you safe.

  • They are not signs of weakness but evidence of how past experiences shaped survival strategies.

  • Healing involves rewiring the brain through safety, compassion, and consistent practice.

Shifting from self-judgment to understanding is an important step towards building self-compassion, helping significantly in fostering resilience.