What To Do When You Are Triggered By Your Family

My family and I just spent a week with my parents during which I found myself triggered like I haven’t been in years. I won’t divulge the details to respect other people’s privacy but I will share that I often found myself feeling guilty, ashamed, angry, frustrated and very, very sad.

This just wasn’t how I wanted it to be. I wanted a “perfect” family, like the kind I saw on TV growing up.

I compounded the negativity by judging myself. How can I still feel this way after twenty-five years of personal growth? Shouldn’t I be over all this by now? Why am I feeling all this again after years of feeling pretty Zen?

Can you relate? Have you been there?

Luckily, I could also see the progress that I made. There was much love but also lots of abuse in my childhood so being triggered could open up Pandora’s box of deep pain.

And yet it didn’t.

Because I now have the tools to take care of myself and process it all before I descend into a deep darkness.

I share this with you in the hopes that it will help you also should you find yourself triggered by your family (or anybody).

It’s actually pretty simple – the #1 tool that helps me re regain my balance is giving myself time alone.

Even though I have 3 kids, I always find at least 45 minutes or an hour to be alone (longer if I can swing it). I escape all the “family togetherness“ and regain my balance.

I’ve had family members make fun of me over the years for “disappearing” but I have stuck to my guns and honored myself by giving myself what I desperately need: time to think, to breathe, to dream, to recalibrate, to clear my emotions and to clear other people’s energy (I am an empath). It’s simply non-negotiable.

And over the years, I have taught my kids to not only respect my need for moving my body and some alone time but to honor their own needs too. They now know that mom is not to be disturbed when she is in alone time unless the house is on fire and they know when they need alone time or to rest or to move their bodies as well.

What do I do with my alone time?

1. I move my body – I go for walks, swim (if it’s an option), do some yoga. Moving my body and ideally working up a sweat, makes me feel great and clears my head.
2.  I clear my energy field – There are many ways to do this and I will share my favorite with you next week.
3. I meditate daily for 20 minutes – Meditating helps me calm my nervous system, get in touch with myself and hear the still voice of intuition within me. Not to mention if I’m triggered, I ask the universe to send me the wisdom that I need to regain perspective and it always comes.
4. I journal – Sometimes when I’m triggered I feel a jumble of emotions and I don’t know of a better way to make sense of them than to journal. Writing helps me get it all out and calms my emotions in a way that few other activities can.
5. I do the Healing Code – This is a system of energetic healing developed by … and …. And it’s the best way I have found to heal emotions and body memories in just a few minutes per day. You can learn how to do it here.
6. I visualize – I imagine the future I want to have, how I want the day to go and how I want to feel. I set my intentions and I feel in control of my life.

This may seem like a lot to do, especially when you’re visiting family. I rarely have the time to do them all but I find that I can often multi-task and do 3 or even 4 every day. For example, I often clear my energy field and visualize as I move my body (3 down in 30 minutes) and then I can meditate or journal or do the healing code depending on how much time I have left.

And the results are so worth it! I quickly regain my center, calm my inner child and give her what she needs and start feeling like a competent, wise adult again.

So, what about you? What do you do to regain your center when you’re triggered?

I would love to hear from you so feel free to leave a comment below.

Happy Tuesday!

xoxo,

Natalie

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