Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or watch on YouTube
In this compelling episode of the Living Richly Podcast, Rob and Eric share practical techniques for identifying triggers, dealing with trauma, and turning setbacks into comeback opportunities. Find out how you can build emotional resilience and embark on a journey towards self-discovery and growth. If you’re determined to break free from your past and live your best life, this episode is for you.
You can watch the videos of all of the Living Richly Podcast episodes on the Living Richly YouTube Channel.
Show Notes for Episode 28
A number of great resources were mentioned in this episode.
Download What To Do When Triggered. This is a PDF document of the principles Eric and Rob shared on the show.
We also highly recommend the following two books:
- Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself by Joe Dispenza
- How to Stubbornly Refuse to Make Yourself Miserable About Anything, Yes Anything by Albert Ellis
Another great resource for increasing your emotional awareness is the Feeling Wheel. You can find some great examples here.
Key Concepts from Episode 28 – Dealing with Triggering Events and Overcoming Setbacks
When the drama, decibel or distress levels being felt and/or expressed are out of sync with the current situation, it’s time to lean in. Pay attention.
Be kind to yourself. Be compassionate. As you would if your best friend was going through the same thing.
Slow down. Little by little, slowly by slowly. This isn’t a race or another project on your to-do list. Don’t rush. You’re not going to out-hustle or out-muscle this.
Remind yourself that this too shall pass. “This is what’s happening right now, and I’m doing the best that I can.” What you resist, persists. Lean into acceptance.
Do something that makes you feel good. As long as it’s more of a coping strategy than an avoidance tactic. Keep your tank full. Hollow and meaningless activities may distract you from what’s happening, but they won’t help you face it.
Remind yourself that it’s okay to have bad moments and bad days. Give yourself permission to do this imperfectly, and remember that you can’t be “healing” or “doing the work” 24/7.
Your brain is plastic, not elastic.
Let yourself feel it. Give yourself permission to feel your emotions fully. Document your feelings using a tool like the feeling wheel. Get present to them. And remind yourself that they are just visitors. Let them come and go.
Believe that this is happening FOR you and not TO you and that you GET to work your way through this (instead of HAVE to). This is a major mindset shift that can help you see opportunities where you might only see obstacles.
Remind yourself that the universe is bringing this up for a reason. Perhaps you didn’t have the tools and capacity to face this pain in the past. The fact that it’s resurfacing now is a testament to your growth and evolution.
Anchor yourself in the truth that you can do hard things, and embracing this process as best as you’re able to is proof of your courage and strength.
Remember that the current actors in this triggering event are not the real issue at hand. They merely served as reminders of past programming and trauma that is now resurfacing.
Remember that this is NOT that moment or season of your life. You are NOT in that context right now. You are safe and can retreat to a secure, soothing place as necessary. You are NOT reliving the same exact situation.
Remind yourself that your feelings and thoughts are not all facts. You’re going to think and feel a lot of different things as you process this triggering event. Be very mindful of what meaning you attach to them.
Mind your self-talk and your old scripts. They will likely be out in full force as they may be the scripts that influenced you deeply during that season of your life. Label them. Don’t embrace them. “I remember you, but I don’t believe that anymore.”
Stay connected to people who can help you sort through what you’re feeling. Although you may need some “retreat” time to sort out what’s happening, try not to isolate yourself.
Trust that you will learn what you need to learn. For now. And if you miss something, the universe is sure to give you another opportunity in due time. (When you don’t deal, the universe will just keep casting a new actor in an all too familiar role until you deal with it.)
Eric Deschamps – February 2023
Episode 28 Transcript
Turning Triggers Into Triumphs: Overcoming Setbacks and Trauma
[00:00:00] Eric: What do you do when you stumble and you feel like you’re going backwards more than forward? Stick around. We’re gonna be talking about that today.
[00:00:14] Rob: Hey, and welcome to the Living Richly Podcast. My name is Rob Dale, and I am here with my great friend Eric Deschamps. It’s so good to have you here for the journey with us. And today’s topic is. Not one I can relate to because I just kinda lived, have it all together and yeah. Never stumble never.
I can’t even speak, but I never struggle in the living richly journey. No, in all seriousness, this is a great topic to dive into. Episode 28. We’re coming up on 30 episodes soon. Crazy. Crazy to think. 30 weeks. Yep. That we have been on the air and they haven’t banned us yet. No, we’re still here.
We’re still here. The miracle we have talked about the model. We’ve talked about all kinds of the principles. Looked at all these different and yet here we are, we’re gonna talk, be very open and vulnerable about the fact that listen neither of us lives this out perfectly. Not by a long shot.
In fact, I don’t think we ever will. There will be a lot of days where you’re moving along and doing really great with it. And then there are gonna be days. Not so great.
[00:01:19] Eric: There, there are moments in every journey where you’re, you feel like you’re making great strides, great advancements, other seasons where you’re following the little by little, slowly by slowly step by step growth model, right?
And there are times where it feels like you’re experiencing significant setbacks. Things happen in your life, in our lives, that, that make us stumble or that trigger. Past pain, past trauma, past fears and insecurities. And what do you do when you’re in those moments? We’ve had so many people ask us that question.
[00:01:49] Rob: It is. It, it’s a great question. What do you do in those moments of transformation? Now, I’ve certainly found that as I go through this journey certainly some of those foundational pieces are there, and we’re gonna get into that about how they’re, even when you feel like. You’ve lost all the ground that you’ve made up.
Yeah. The feeling isn’t necessarily the truth. And we’ll get into talking a little bit about that when we look at some of the principles that we can apply in our lives when we stumble along the journey. But we do want to acknowledge, and it’s okay if you’re listening or you’re part of this and maybe you’re at a point where you’re going, man, this is tough work. This is this notion of looking inward and trying to work this all out and like it, it’s tough work and it can at times you al you, you some can feel like giving up because of the failure because we fall back into old scripts. Kelly Flanagan, he was on our the the show not that long ago, and he even talked about how that recurring, sometimes that shame kind of sneaks in again and is there Yeah.
And. Something triggers, something happens to bring us back into that. Talk about maybe some of the experiences you’ve had recently or over the course of this journey where there’s been those triggering moments for you.
[00:03:02] Eric: I’ll speak of one specifically that happened about three months ago. Okay. Where a number of circumstances in my life, just aligned it seemed and triggered all kinds of old fears, old insecurities and pretty deep stuff that went right to core scripts that I’ve talked about in previous episodes. And I actually the, these events happened over the course of a Friday night, and by Saturday morning right into Sunday.
I was in a really bad place. I was anything, I was doing anything but living richly that weekend. I was I was upset, I was discouraged. I was very fearful. Actually when I look back on the entire weekend, I was probably in a fight or flight response most of that weekend. And had the opportunity to unpack that with Sherry, who’s my coach, and talk about what happened.
And it was definitely an episode where past. Trauma, past issues were being triggered by present realities. And actually a lot of what we wanna share with you today are principles or concepts that I was able to lean upon in that moment, to see me through that, to navigate through that. And something that I’ve shared with many folks since that time that have found.
Some of these concepts really helpful. So these were born out of my own stumbling, my own being triggered and not being in a happy place, but working through it and recognizing that too is part of the journey. Yeah.
[00:04:21] Rob: And so our goal today with the episode today is we’re gonna get right into it rather than a lot of preamble and talk about different concepts.
And maybe you mean you’re gonna get right to the point, is what we’re saying? We are going to get right into it. And get focused in. You just completely ignored me. Who are you?
[00:04:37] Eric: And you’re so dead to me.
[00:04:40] Rob: Don’t make me do it. And we’re, we wanna talk about, there, there are some key principles, some things.
And so if you’re tuned in and that’s where you’re at, you’re just thinking, man I just, I’m stumbling here. I’m frustrated. Things aren’t really going well. I’m not living richly this weekend, this month the last couple of months, whatever it is. Let’s talk about some of the principles that we’ve used, that we’ve learned that we apply that help get us back on track when we feel like we’re off track. So maybe what’s one of the first principles we talk about?
[00:05:11] Eric: I think before we even jump into principles for just a moment, is whats a trigger? No, we’re gonna jump into, we’re gonna, what’s a trigger? What are sim, what does it look like to get triggered? Yeah. And that’s, let’s face it like. Sometimes it’s just a family visit, right?
And it triggers something. Sometimes it’s a fear and insecurity. Someone says something and we feel so outta sorts and we recognize that I love this language when the drama decibel or distress levels being felt or expressed are out of sync with the current situation. It’s time to really lean in and pay attention.
In other words, when your response to whatever’s happening is greater than actually what’s happening, there’s a mismatch between your level of distress. The decibel levels, perhaps the distress levels are far more elevated than what the situation calls for. Chances are, you’re in a triggering moment. Some past fear has been, or insecurity or trauma has been triggered. We talk about and this probably happens a lot to a lot of us, I don’t know about you, but I know for me family, we talk about how family no one like family can push our buttons, right? They know how to push the button, which button to push to get a certain response, and we can be doing great and feel like we’re really growing and evolving.
And we joke around all the time, if you think you’re e, e evolved or enlightened, go home for Thanksgiving, right? Because family, there’s nothing like family to test that resolve. But the point of being triggered is you are literally overreacting. You are overstimulated, you are over responding to what’s actually happening right in front of you because it’s actually not about what’s happening immediately.
It’s about what it represents to you. Yeah. And so that’s where the principles wanna talk about when we look at, and I would say one of the first ones, Is be kind to yourself. We’re gonna have these moments because healing is never a once and done type thing. We talk about the need to even we talk about radical selfe acceptance and doing that work of really loving ourselves and learning to give ourself that sense of worth, that’s not a once and done I’m completed.
Check that box and move on. That’s a lifelong journey. And where we may learn to express that towards ourselves in certain aspects of our lives. All of a sudden, a different fear gets triggered, a different past experience gets triggered, and all of a sudden we have to revisit it and say, can I give myself the same self-love, the same compassion that I would I’ve given myself in previous seasons of my life?
And the way that I always like to position it is think of. If your best friend or your child, if you’re a parent listening to the show came to you and talked about a struggle that they’re having, how would you speak to them? Likely you would speak to them with love, with compassion, with understanding, with empathy.
But think about how we often talk to ourselves. Yep. And I know this is a big one for me, is I’d get triggered. I’d get I’d stumble, I’d be reminded of something, something would happen. And I know for years I’d even recognize I was being triggered. I would just overreact and then like, how the hell did I end up here?
Because I wasn’t present to actually what was happening. I started to get present to it and then when it would happen, instead of giving myself compassion, I would beat myself up about that and say, if only I was a better person Yeah. Then this wouldn’t be happening
[00:08:18] Rob: For, and you’re absolutely right. And for me, I know one of the ways that I can tell I’m about to not be kind to myself. So I’ve learned to listen for this. Is when something happens, if there’s a triggering moment or whatever that is situation is happening. As soon as I start the should again. As soon as I start shutting all over myself again, yeah.
That’s when I know, oh, I’m about to be unkind to myself. Ah, I should know better by now. I should have learned this Le right. And I should be further down the road. Further down the road. Yeah. And as soon as I start, I, I shouldn’t have, or even whether I should have or shouldn’t have done whatever.
As soon as I start using the should the shoulds I know, oh, that’s a, that’s now a trigger. That’s a word that says to me. Rob, you’re about to be, you’re being unkind to yourself. Take that pause and take that break. And so I think absolutely right out of the gate show compassion to yourself in the course of the, in that moment the second one.
The next one that I would suggest is this notion of slow down. I know that for me, when I’m in that moment, all of a sudden it’s like, Oh, I did it. Okay, boom. Where’s, how do I fix this? And I’m all of a sudden high speed and I’m not a, I’m a pretty chill guy. And that’s usually another indication that, oh, there’s something going on here because I’m trying to find the easy fix, the fast, quick microwave solution to whatever this motion that I’m feeling, because I need to get out of it faster than I got into it even.
[00:09:43] Eric: And it’s, it’s a, again this is not a checkbox on your to-do list. This is not another project. This isn’t a race. You’re not going to, chances are you’re not gonna out-hustle or out muscle what you’re feeling. And especially if you are in a triggering event where, again, when we talk about someone has pushed one of your buttons in a past, fear or insecurity is surfaced and you find yourself.
Like I said, going backwards instead of forwards you’re probably in a fight or flight response in that moment. Trying to rush, trying to amp up your entire nervous system to fight this thing is actually gonna work against you. You’re giving energy to the wrong part of your brain and to the wrong part of your spirit.
Slowing yourself down, literally is allowing energy, changing the energy around it can make
[00:10:31] Rob: such a difference. And with that energy, and this is where probably the in the entire living richly. Journey that I have been on. The if I had to rank the number one lesson that I have learned, it’s out of the book on Tethered Soul.
And it’s this notion of, oh, that’s interesting when it comes to thoughts, whatever. So when all of a sudden I’m having this thought, I’m having a should moment, I’m, and now rush, and now I’m feeling that end, I gotta solve this, I gotta solve this to be, to your point. Breathing to stop, pause, breathing, go, okay, that’s interesting.
What’s happening, right? I’m gonna let that flow through and now I’m gonna look at it and go, okay, so now what do I what needs to be the next step to this? But having that opportunity to, in that slowing down and processing, and then allowing, just allowing that energy first to go through. So that I can now process it separately from it being in me is so critical to that part.
[00:11:28] Eric: Absolutely. So little by little, slowly by slowly slowing yourself down I think another one is this notion of acceptance. We’ve talked about this in so many different ways. In so many different examples on the show in the episodes that we’ve done, but leaning into acceptance and reminding yourself that this too shall pass.
This is what’s happening right now, and I’m doing the best that I can. There’s this notion, we’ve all heard the saying, what we resist persists. And so back to this. Wrong use of energy that when we’re fe feeling ourselves being setback triggered where we’re feeling past fears and anxiety showing up in the moment triggered by a present reality.
This notion of amping ourselves up, trying to outhustle, trying to out muscle it trying to resist it. Often all we’re doing is we’re g it’s like throwing gasoline on a burning fire. What we need to do is throw water on that fire. And I think there’s this notion of, okay, I, I still remember that that weekend I described at the beginning of the show, I.
And I had to keep reminding myself over and over again that weekend being in a very heightened state of anxiety and fear. Again I, this has probably happened to me a handful of times to this degree, but it was a significant one, but kept reminding myself, this too will pass. This is what’s happening right now, and I’m doing the best that I can, but this too shall pass.
[00:12:50] Rob: So good. So good. These are rapid fire. We’re just throwing out some tactics and some ideas and hopefully some of these are going to you’ll grab a hold of some of these and they’re, because they’re all principles. They’re not in order of how you do them. The ones that resonate are the ones that we want to encourage, are listeners to to maybe embrace.
And I know for me one of the ones this is. Why the four by four model that we introduced. And if you haven’t had a chance to listen to episodes one and two where we just talk about living richly, we introduce the model in its general terms, and then we go into, in those early episodes, certainly walk through all of those things.
But the idea of. What has helped me when I’m triggered when those moments happen, is the fact that I’ve already created my rituals, right? So I know the things that bring me energy, the things that deplete my energy, and when I’m in a moment like this, once I’ve slowed down, I know now, okay, I have some time to work this through in my head and in my emotions.
One of the best practices is to go do something that enriches me, right? Something that gives me that, that sense of, so if it’s some, summertime, hey, get out on the water, go for a walk along a path, go do a workout, whatever. Go have a drink. With friends. With friends, yeah. There’s so many different, but go do some.
And sometimes people go, I don’t have time to do that. I have to solve this right now. No. The. Best thing you can do right now is go do something that brings back some energy. Love it. So that you can now address it.
[00:14:14] Eric: Absolutely. Hollow and meaningless activities may numb you in the moment and that may you “eat a tub of ice cream. ” Tub of ice cream. I’m gonna Exactly, I’m gonna binge another show, or I’m gonna scroll through my feed for a couple hours on social media. They may distract you, and sometimes that’s okay to, they do sometimes, listen, we can’t be doing the work 100% of the time. We can’t be healing 100% of the time.
But I think what we’re trying to encourage is that rather than turning to mindless numbing activities to try to see your way through those tough moments is to turn to activities you’ve identified. That fill your cup. I saw this great video on Instagram I think it was actually this morning.
And the lady that was doing it she had a glass of clean water saying, here’s my life, my happy life. And then she says, but life shits on you. She literally, life shits on and she dumps dirt. Thankfully it was dirt. She dumps dirt into the glass of water. And then she swirls it around. Of course the water becomes all murky.
And then she says, most of us, what we do in those moments, then we go about, and she’s with the spoon. Now she’s trying little by little take all the dirt out. No matter how much she did that, the water stayed murky. She said, you, she, you don’t get rid of the darkness by focusing on the darkness.
She says what you do? And she grabbed a picture of clean water and started pouring it into that glass of dirty water. And what happened is, in time all the dirty water was expelled and all that was left was clean. And so there’s this notion of when I know. The activities, the things that I do that fill my cup turning to those things and not so much as an avoidance strategy, but rather a coping strategy.
Turn to something that makes you feel good, that fills your cup, can go a long way. And I think a attached to that is this notion of reminding yourself when you’re experiencing a setback, that your brain is plastic. We talk about the neuro the neuroplasticity of the brain. Its ability to keep.
Growing to keep evolving your ability to continue to shape your thought life and your thinking. But a lot of us think our brain is plastic. In other words, we experience or sorry, not plastic, but elastic, right? We think it’s elastic. So when we experience a setback, we think we’re snapping back to who we were to write those moments.
Can be so significant where we feel like we’ve really stumbled. We’ve really, we’re really not going through a hard ti or we’re really going through a hard time. We’re in that moment of fear or insecurity that we were so accustomed to and thought we had outgrown. And now here we are again and we tell ourselves, oh I’ve just snapped back to a previous date.
You haven’t snapped back to a previous state. Your brain is plastic. Not elastic. Even in that moment, and I know now I look back on this event that triggered or inspired a lot of what we’re talking about here today. Inspired the i the episode itself. Yeah. About what to do when you experience a setback.
Is that, that, that weekend, as much as I wouldn’t wanna relive it. Okay. Anytime soon because it wasn’t a fun experience. What I learned. How I grew through it. So not only was I not snapping back to a previous moment in time, I was actually forming new neural pathways that are gonna serve me in the future when something good.
[00:17:18] Rob: It’s okay to have bad days. Let’s just normalize that, can’t we? It’s okay. To you. You mentioned just a moment ago, it’s okay. You’re not going to feel like. Living richly every moment of every day. It’s interesting. I’m in the middle of reading the book How to stubbornly Refuse to Make Yourself Miserable about Anything.
Yes, absolutely. Anything. Albert Ellis, and it’s a great title. I think we’ve all brilliant title, talked about that in a previous episode. My new favorite word. Comes out of that book, out of the first couple of chapters. I think I know what it is and yeah, absolutely. You’re back to, because the 12 year old boy and me absolutely loves this word.
Yeah. Yeah. And it’s not his word, but he actually gives credit to the author who first, that he reads it from, and then he basically talks about it over and over again. And the word is awfulizing. No. Oh, it’s not. I see. I love that. Isn’t that funny?
[00:18:07] Eric: We thought we were on the same page. We’re not. Totally not. What is your word? For me it was awfulizing.
[00:18:11] Rob: Musturbation.
[00:18:13] Eric: Oh, musturbation. That’s a great word too.
[00:18:15] Rob: It’s a great word. Yeah. And he talks about in those early,
[00:18:18] Eric: Just to be clear, we said musturbation.
[00:18:21] Rob: No, he absolutely talks about in those, in, in those early chapters of the, of his book that one of the reasons why we get so anxious and we get is that we have this notion that everything must be, and we, so we.
As he says, and again, this is why I love it so much, we masturbate right all the time. And so everything is about and so even when it comes to living richly, it’s this idea of we must always be living richly or always on this journey. And always all of us. And I remember the freeing thing, I talk about this probably four or five episodes ago when I realized that I really enjoy reading a good fiction right?
I love reading a Stephen King book or whoever it is. I’ve got a bunch of different authors. I found a new author that I’ve been reading. I’m reading another one of his books as well as the Albert Ellis book. And I, but I felt guilty. Because it was, why am I spending, three days or a week or two weeks reading this latest, whoever, Stephen King book when I, oh, now I’m not reading a personal development book.
And I realized, no, actually that’s part of Living Richly, right? Just to get lost in the character of story and all of this and this notion of it’s okay to take that step back, not. Everything has to be always absolutely on point and give yourself that grace and the f and the freedom to a hundred percent.
[00:19:42] Eric: I think what we talk about is the importance of normalizing setback, normalizing bad days, normalizing triggering moments that these are actually a normal part of human experience and are not a. Poor reflection on your ability to navigate life. I love the word from Ellis’s book where he says we’re so prone to awfulizing everything or catastrophizing everything.
[00:20:06] Rob: I think musturbation is a better word.
[00:20:07] Eric: Musturbation is probably a better word, but but it’s this notion he would go on to say that what our problem is we have too low. Of a frustration tolerance. In other words, our tolerance for when life doesn’t show up the way we want it or expect it to show up, our tolerance for that is too low.
So we get knocked off center too easily and our emotional reactivity is too high. When we begin to normalize that bad things happen to good people, that bad days will come. Just like good days will come and not catastrophize them or make them more than they need to be. Then we’ll find ourselves less emotionally reactive, and when we talk about emotion, another key.
To navigating moments where we feel like we’re experiencing a setback. We talk about beating ourselves up for thinking the wrong thing. How often do we beat ourselves up for feeling what we feel is feeling the wrong thing? So I would say a key strategy, a core strategy to cope when life is really going.
Opposite of what you hoped it would be is to give yourself permission to feel fully. It even naming your emotions, the ability to name them can help you tame them. And we will, we’ll put it in the show notes. There’s a great tool called the Feelings Wheel. We’ve referred to it in past episodes that oftentimes we, because we don’t have the emotional literacy to truly understand or the emotional acuity to understand what’s going on internally. Then we’re tossed around the ability to name the emotion, to say, I am feeling X and get as specific as possible, and then giving myself permission. Giving yourself permission to feel it. That it’s not wrong to feel it, it’s not bad to feel it, that you’re not weak for feeling it.
You’re human for feeling it. Yeah. And so give yourself permission to do it. And you are not your feelings, you’re not your feeling you’re not your feelings, you’re not your thoughts.
[00:21:49] Rob: Exactly. Yeah. You’re not your feelings, you’re not your thoughts. And I think the notion of, again, that, that naming the feeling. It it in, and we see this all through history. We talk about this in one of the previous episodes that as you name the feeling and oftentimes you, I you you break the power that feeling has over you. By just, by simply identifying it. Now you have the ability to process it and feel it the proper way.
[00:22:15] Eric: I know that one of the keys for me and I think it was probably the most significant breakthrough for me in that weekend that I described, where I was in this full flight or full flight or flight moment. And actually my coach thought like this, what you’re describing sounded like a, an actual P T S D type episode.
That’s how severe it was. But I remember it took me hours to get here, because I, but I finally got to a point where I’m going, wait a second. This is not happening to me. Yeah, this is happening for me. I don’t have to work my way through this. I get to work my way through this. And I always give credit to the get to mindset to Kate.
That’s a cism for sure. It’s a lesson that she has taught me that has become so central to my way of seeing the world. But it was a major shift where I began to see all of a sudden, what in the past I would’ve seen as this sucks. This is terrible. I am going backwards instead of forwards, and all of a sudden begins to wait a second.
This is not happening by accident. This is not just some weird. At random moment this is actually happening for me and I get to work my way through this because I get to figure out what’s going on. And I may not be able to figure it all out right now in this moment, but the universe is allowing this to happen for me to get present to something that has unresolved in my thinking, in my heart and my memories and then be able to apply.
My more mature self now, more a more mature version of myself. Because let’s face it, when you’re being triggered and you’re remembering past pain, you’re remembering your past self who had less experience. Yeah, less knowledge, less skill. Now this event is being brought to your attention again, and it’s current situations is doing it, but it’s really not about the current circumstances at all.
It’s about something else. But now I’m I literally became present in that moment to, wait a second, I’m not the same, Eric. Yeah. This is triggering fear from we’re talking. This has went back like over 10 years ago. Some cir circumstance happened in my life over 10 years, over a decade ago, and here I am being able to look at it and say, wait a second.
I am not the Eric of 10 years ago. I have grown, I have learned, I have I, I have evolved. I’ve learned all kinds of skills that I didn’t have then. So this is an opportunity. This is not a setback. This is actually a leap forward because I get to apply. Current Eric to an old situation and bring healing to it.
[00:24:31] Rob: What talk language matters. How often do we say that right? Language matters? And that notion that the, you’re right the the experiences, all that you suddenly have, you’re armed with all these new tools. All this new language and how you identify and how you think and how you talk about that experience that has set you up now ready to do that.
And I think it’s so important for us to we don’t live in the past, but we lean on the experience in the learnings of the past. And one of the ways that we can do that is, and I certainly see this and I know that this is often for me when something shows up now and I’m like, oh my God, what is this?
And I’m lost and I’m all. I can lean on the fact that, you know what? I’ve done hard things in the past, right? I’ve worked through some of these things in the past. I am now growing and I’ve taken on more as a result of that, and I am now ready and equipped to take on this next challenge to become the next version of who I am, right?
What an incredible opportunity, not challenge. That this presents for me.
[00:25:33] Eric: The fact that it’s resurfacing now, whatever that may be, whatever trigger is happening for you, whatever past experience is coming full center in your life and feels like it’s stealing all your joy. The very fact that it’s resurfacing is a testament to your growth and evolution, because it’s almost like the universe is saying you are ready for this.
It’s proof that you have the courage and the strength to face it now, perhaps in a way you couldn’t before. One of the things that I think is also so critical to be mindful of when we are, again, being triggered and feel like we’re experiencing a setback due to present circumstances triggering past trauma, is that the current actors.
In the triggering event are not the real issue at hand, okay? So it, it may be a family member saying something to you that triggers you to remember something else, or it could be a set of circumstances that reminds you of a past painful experience. The current actors, the current situation are not really the issue.
They’re merely serving as reminders of past programming and trauma that’s now resurfacing.
[00:26:37] Rob: Yeah. And all of what you’re feeling and thinking about that past trauma isn’t necessarily the facts or the truth of the moment today. And wait a sec,
[00:26:47] Eric: Isn’t hindsight 2020 Rob?
[00:26:49] Rob: Yeah absolutely.
[00:26:50] Eric: Do you know that the recent research, they’re showing that less than 50% of what we remember is actually true? Yeah. That o over 50% of our memories are constructs or versions of what happened as opposed to what actually happened.
[00:27:04] Rob: Yeah. Keep talking about that because I want to pull up a quote. I, I’ve gotta pull this out of a notion of. And I just I want to find it, and I know we’re right in the middle as we’re talking here, but it’s so powerful around that notion, and I just want to pull it out here as to how it’s talked about in this book. And I hope I can Well,
[00:27:19] Eric: You keep looking. Let me keep going. So if the current actors are not the real issue at hand, what’s also important, especially listen, we are not psychologists. We’re just two guys sharing. Their journey, sharing the lessons that we’ve learned along the way. Sometimes when people talk about being triggered, they’re talking about some really significant world altering trauma, right?
I think what’s really important to remember in those moments and in others is that we’re, you’re not in that season of your life right now, even though you’re the fear, the anxiety that you’re feeling feels very familiar. The scripts that are going through your mind, Feel very familiar. You are not reliving that moment.
Now, you may be reliving memories of that moment, but you are not reliving the same exact situation and you can retreat in most cases to a secure, soothing sort of environment as necessary. I would say this too, the mind your self-talk and your old scripts. I think that we’ve talked a lot about Our thinking and how it shapes our reality and our perceptions.
When you are being triggered like this or in are in a less, let’s say a less rich moment in your life your scripts, your old beliefs that were limiting and in many cases damaging will likely be out in full force. They will be out in all of their glory as you experience this. Learn to label them.
I love what you talk about. Oh, that’s an interesting thought. Yeah. And learn to label it. Call it what it is. Don’t remember don’t embrace it. You don’t have to embrace it by labeling it. As a matter of fact, I remember that particular weekend where this happened and I’m working through it and I remember, and I was those old scripts.
I was feeling like I felt years ago I was feeling anything but rich. I was feeling like all of this has been a fraud and this is all a mistake. And no, see, nothing’s really changed in you Deshaun, and you’re just a failure. And all the same scripts that, that I’d felt like I’d overcome were there in full force.
And I was able to say, and I remember saying this out loud actually, I said, oh, I remember you, but I don’t believe you. Yeah. Anymore. And it wasn’t just a trite statement. It was an actual affirmation say, yep, I remember you and I remember how dark you were and I remember the darkness you brought to my, but I don’t believe in you anymore.
So you best move on.
[00:29:32] Rob: And as you change your thinking and you change those beliefs, And this is where this quote it just was jumping in and I was trying to remember where I got it from. It’s actually from Joe Dispenza’s book Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself. Oh, he’s so good. So in breaking the habit of being yourself, he makes this statement, let me read the quote.
I’m gonna read it right from my iPad, because I, I want to get it right. Not only can we change our brains just by thinking differently, but when we are truly focused and single-minded, the brain does not know. The brain does not know the difference. Between the internal world of the mind and what we experience in the external environment, our thoughts become our experience.
Yeah. And that notion that, so when we’re so good triggered and we fall into old thoughts and we start thinking, it becomes the, it becomes our reality. And that’s why it goes back to what jumped in was that notion of we have to remind ourselves of what we’re experiencing right now isn’t necessarily real.
It’s a past experience when we’re focused on the past, and so we, how do you change that? You rethink. The moment you change what you think about that moment, it will change the experience for you.
[00:30:40] Eric: Dispenza would go on to say in the book and does go on to say in that book. Yeah. This is how many of us stay stuck in our past. We program ourselves to stay stuck in our past because when those past thoughts and feelings come up, we actually feed them and we entertain them and we embrace them as opposed to challenging them. And again, it was a, it was such a life-giving moment to be able to make that statement. I remember you.
But I don’t believe you anymore. Now this part is so critical and we’ve talked about this over and over again, and I don’t think we’ll ever get tired of sounding this note because it is so critical to the living richly journey, especially when we’re, we feel like we’re experiencing setbacks or we’re struggling or and it’s not going well for us, is to stay connected Yeah.
To the people who can help us sort through what we’re feeling. Stay connected to those that will love you and support you and encourage you through it. Listen, you may need we may need some retreat time, right? Yeah. And by retreat time is, you may need to retreat for a little bit and reflect on what’s happening and think about it, but try not to isolate because isolation feeds the past isolation.
It’s almost like it can be a, an an incubator for all those past scripts and thoughts and feelings to, to really begin to take over. So reflection, retreating to reflect, and to work some things through is fantastic. That’s great. And that’s highly recommended. As a matter of fact, we’ve said it before.
The living richly journey requires reflection of some sort. Yeah. Some sort of reflective practice, but try not to isolate from the people that love you and who are gonna help you navigate
[00:32:11] Rob: this tough season.
Yeah. And if you’re worried that you might isolate in your retreating then reach out to someone and say, Hey, listen, I’m taking, I, I need to take a step.
I just need some time alone. I need some time to focus on this. Check in with me in a couple of days, and don’t let me go longer than that. To be able to, even if you need that, some people don’t, but. Be able to now trust on your network and your community to be able to be able to retreat without the danger of isolating, of getting caught into retreating another day and another day, and all of a sudden you’re into darkness.
You want to be able to, make sure that you’ve got those boundaries in place. When we can’t trust ourselves and those boundaries invite, that’s the power of the community that we’re. Part of it.
[00:32:52] Eric: Talk to your coach, talk to your therapist, talk to your friends make sure it is someone who is going to give you the space to show up as you are without judgment, without accusation, without condemnation.
But we’ll give you the, a safe space of grace where you can work it through. And that’s why you gotta be careful who you talk to, but you need to connect with people. Absolutely. The last thing I would say to, this was the last major lesson, at least that emerged for me out of this weekend that I experienced not that long ago was and this was a big one for me, is trust that you will learn.
What you need to learn. Just trust what you need to learn. You’re not gonna learn everything right now. And I now, what if you miss something? What if you miss something? I believe the universe will give you another chance. Universe. The universe will queue up. Congratulations, right? Queue up a new set of actors in similar roles who will trigger maybe another part of this trauma for you, or past pain or insecurity.
And you’re gonna have an opportunity to address it layer by layer. But you don’t need to learn everything right then, right now. Remember going back to what we said earlier, little by little, slowly by slowly. Take it one day at a time, one moment at a time. But trust that you will learn what you need to learn.
And if you miss something, the universe will give you another chance.
[00:34:12] Rob: Thank you universe. This feels it wasn’t that long ago where we did the greatest episode that has ever been recorded in the history of episodes. And that was of course the Star Wars, of course, episode of course.
In which we tell the Star Wars story in 60 seconds or less. We didn’t do it. We didn’t succeed. Trefor lost an arm. Yeah, exactly. It’s why he’s not here anymore.
[00:34:33] Eric: Listen, you could listen for the sound of one hand clapping.
[00:34:37] Rob: Oh, that’s good. And but this feels a little bit like we just tried to do what to do when you’re triggered in 60 seconds or less.
It was 35 minutes or so, but hey, we got it, but this was I a bit of rapid fire just jumping in with a bunch of these.
[00:34:51] Eric: You know what I would love to hear as part of our response to this when we post this out? Listen you’ve had your own experiences, you’ve had your own journey.
No doubt you have tons of wisdom that you could share with us. We want you to share that with us when these episodes get posted. Either you can direct message us if you like. You can post on our social media feeds. Here’s some of the strategies I use when I’m triggered or when I’m going through a setback.
We would absolutely love to hear from you. So that we can share those ideas and those strategies out as well.
[00:35:22] Rob: Which is what I was about to say.
[00:35:24] Eric: Did I take the words right outta
[00:35:25] Rob: No. Yeah. No. That’s a good, we’re aligned. We’re on the same page. We are aligned. We weren’t with the words earlier, so glad that we’re, I still think awfulizing this better, but it’s okay.
Musturbation. Okay. Musturbation is the, it really is fun because people go, what? What? He just. If you’re listening to this during your lunch break and coworkers are walking by wondering why you’re listening to something, turn the volume up real loud and say the word musturbation. That we’ll see where that goes.
No listen If you’re in a place where you’re feeling like you’ve taken a step back or something is showing up and you’re wondering, where was all that work that I’ve been doing? The work is there. Yeah. The lessons have been learned. The processes. And so take some of, hopefully some of the tips and the suggestions that we provided today will help you in just navigating through that moment.
It’s a moment but navigating through that moment as Eric has already mentioned, we’d love it if you would share those comments and maybe just provide us some input into some of the things that you do while you’re doing that. Take a moment to like, subscribe so that you’re able to be part of this community and the episodes as they come out.
Most importantly of that, would you share the episode with a few people that you are connected to? We get even some of the letters that we hear and some of the emails, the letters, listen to me, sounds like an old letter that keeps, some people are even faxing us superior. Some of the fax that we received, some of the the Some of the emails and the I, the telegram I received the other day was especially meaningful.
It’s both signal that was said to me. Some of the the and when the show fell apart Yeah. Really fast. No, but the emails in the dms of how some have shared. Out one of the episodes with family members, with others that are within their community, just in how it’s impacted. That means so much to us when we know that not only are we able to impact and maybe provide some encouragement to you in your journey, but also to the journey of the people that matter to you.
So maybe take a moment and do that.
[00:37:25] Eric: Last thing recommend is go to our website, livingrichly.me/act -act – where you’ll be pointed to all the recent episodes, including this one. Show notes, whatever we refer to. As a matter of fact, all of these principles that we covered today will be available for you in a simple downloadable pdf so that you have them.
And you can also sign up there for our newsletter to be kept up to date on exciting new opportunities that are emerging for coaching, group coaching, retreats to help folks on their living richly journey.
[00:37:55] Rob: Thanks a lot for being a part of this episode and part of the journey with us. And until next time, we just encourage you to live your best life.