Face It - We've Been Triggered

What world-wide event will make us turn on one another?

As I tell women that I mentor or minister to, a trigger has to do with a particular perception or a personal sensitivity likely due to an unresolved issue, and is not the fault of the person who triggered us. With hypersensitivity growing due to the progression of social justice or “woke” culture, gender identity, and political polarization, we need to remember this.

Although corporate triggers are a sign of shared emotional experiences like 9-11 or quarantine life, you and I can be triggered by anyone—family, friend, or foe.

In Chapter One of Culture Changers, I wrote:

I know a woman I will call Susan who was in a relationship with someone of another race. After being emotionally and physically abused, Susan ended the relationship, but for a time she was triggered whenever she saw someone of the same build and skin color.

We all do it, often without realizing it. We can be triggered by something that reminds us of painful episodes in our personal history…

As I’ve worked toward my own emotional healing and practiced becoming more self-aware, I’ll often notice a sudden sensitivity to one of my kids or my husband. I try to pause before I respond to them and ask myself, “Why am I triggered?” Those of us who are married or have kids benefit when we recognize our triggers and take some time to figure out their origin. The more I deal with these origins, the less I operate in projection, reaction, and conflict.

Let’s evaluate our relationships. Have you concluded why you are triggered when you spouse does something particular? Or why that look your mother gives you when you tell about a change in your life evokes such anger? Our lives will improve—blame and offense will be lessened—if we resolve our ability to be triggered.

Perception is related to insight and understanding.  How people with unique experiences, intellects, memories, and worldviews receive and interpret stimuli.

Assuming that our interpretation of another person’s look, comment, or behavior is correct is plain old arrogance. We cannot evaluate a person’s intent based on how we feel or how perceive a gesture, a look, or remark. However, this is the definition of microaggression. This article refers to Dr. Chester Pierce who first used the term. If the article correctly summarizes Pierce’s definition of the word, then while I agree that “regular insults and dismissals” could impact the recipient, problems arise when we elevate our perception over the unknown intent of a person’s heart. A white girl wanting to feel the texture of a Black girl’s hair could be mere curiosity, not a cultural slight. (And truthfully, as a Black girl, I once wanted to feel what a white girl’s hair felt like just because it was different.)

The blame narrative of social justice advocates aka “the woke” ignores the subjectivity of perception and the cognitive distortions that each of us must own:

Cognitive distortions (i.e., bad thinking and sometimes pathological thinking) involve distorted valuational-styles giving rise to distorted thought-styles which include the "magnification" of catastrophic thinking; absolute and grandiose demands; blame; constricted two-valued-logic or black-and-white thinking, overgeneralizations and confusion concerning levels of abstraction discussed by General Semantics; magical thinking, and the emotional reasoning which ignores facts. (Microaggressions and Trigger-Warnings | Psychology Today)

The author of this article goes on to address the troubling state of our college campuses, our pedagogic models, and what terms like microaggression and the overvalued mention of trigger-warnings tell us about the need for moral education in America.

It is a failure of education that has left today’s campus vulnerable to the bad and pathological thinking that gives us concepts like microaggression and trigger-warnings as new manifestations of political correctness gone mad in the manner of a modern day folie à plusieurs. This "insanity of many" was discussed by the French over a hundred years ago. It refers to the collective mental health of many that Sigmund Freud also considered in the pages of his “Civilization and its Discontents.” Is this a phenomena that is also contributing to gun violence in our schools and colleges? Are we looking at the signs and symptoms of social unrest in response to modern life without the common ground of moral education giving us our half-smart approach to education and distorting today's zeitgeist, spirit-of-the-times, mother-of-all-minds, or climate of opinion? I believe we need a preventive psychology based on moral education and moral science for the cultivation of a greater "moral imagination" without emotional and partisan ideologies. I'm doing my best to bring this issue to the wider world and my profession.

The article in Psychology Today is worth your time, but what I want to emphasis here is our need to deal with ourselves, individually and corporately. We must take ownership of our developed sensitivities, some of which are passed down genetically or imparted environmentally, often through media or education. If we don’t resolve the origin of the triggers or sensitivities, we will oppose each other instead of opposing our real enemy.

Besides my desire for us to have vibrant relationships and my dislike of narratives and events that stir disunity, I have another concern. I think that we, the people, are being played. Manipulated. Piloted into a heightened emotional state that is unsustainable. The health PSYOP of 2020 caused a marked spike in American emotional frailty, which had been weakened with three years of racial unrest encouraged by organizations like BLM and the Proud Boys.

Yes, corporate triggers have increased, but have we been dosed with some type of mental anesthesia that keeps us unaware of the shape we are in? The pandemic debacle has prompted articles on mass formation psychosis by renowned Dr. Robert Malone, and this theory suggests that the masses are no longer able to think and reason with clarity, but rather are “under the spell of mass formation will support a totalitarian governance structure capable of otherwise unthinkable atrocities in order to maintain compliance.”

Is the shadow of Orwell’s 1984 upon us? Are self-proclaimed puppet-masters causing events to weaken our mental and emotional states and with that, our resolve to live a life that honors our Creator? My students last year identified current dystopian trends without my help. Honestly, I don’t care if you call the “powers that be” the Deep State, the Global Elites, the Illuminati or the kingdom of darkness, there are those to whom “all the world’s a stage” and they are having a good time writing the script. Just turn on MSM and listen. However, we can be the editors and I am not referring to voting! Electing or re-electing an individual is not the answer. (I no longer trust in our election process by the way.) I believe the solution lies with us prohibiting the enemies of humanity from being able to bait us into their desired world climate. This means we have to better steward our wellbeing.

Ukraine and Russia. Maui fires. Inflation. Gender vs biology debates. Train derailments and toxic air. We, the masses, are mentally and emotionally cocked like the trigger of a pistol. One more event—an unnatural disaster, WW3, another pandemic—could release our built-up tensions not upon the puppet masters, but upon each other. And we cannot allow that to happen.

To end our cognitive distortions we must 1) support our perceptions of each other with fact, 2) acknowledge the sandy ground of the microaggression argument; and 3) “un-trigger” ourselves by rooting up lies, dealing with fears, resolving sensitivities, and placing the dismay of the past several years in the hands of Jesus Christ, the burden-bearer, heart-healer and the Redeemer.

We must start these processes now.

In summary, to stop the further manifestation of their desired world climate we need to understand that:

“The lens we use to peer into the world around us needs to  include how God created humans to function. Not all of the  nooks and crannies of our non-physical design can be easily  seen and accessed, right there on the surface. Some of them  are much more subtle…fears and habits can reshape our brains. Multiply  this “shaping” times the number of family and community  members, and we begin to learn how larger systems—the  business world, the political realm, and even faith communities—can become unhealthy and, for some individuals, even  destructive…” (Culture Changers, Ch. One, “Old Situations, New Eyes.”

“All of us are linked—by geography, history, traditions, as well as significant events like 9/11 and the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of our link, triggers aren’t just personal; they can also be corporate. This corporate trigger is based on a shared experience. Like war. Or discrimination. Or persecution. As Culture Changers, we have to look at the cause for personal and corporate triggers and deal with them correctly.” (Culture Changers, Ch. Four, “A Knee-Jerk Culture”)

Chapters One and Four of my book discuss the roots and solutions for ourselves and as promised, each chapter of Culture Changers: Understand the Roots of Brokenness and Help Heal Your Family and Community will be pasted, one chapter at a time, on my Sub Stacks for all readers. Cultivating the Souls of Parents is also helping for people who want to see how their family systems are caught in triggers and unhealthy mindsets. I will regularly post these chapters as well. Paid subscribers received signed paperback in their 2nd month.

Here is Chapter One:

CHAPTER ONE - Old Situations, New Eyes

People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them. - Epictetus

One humid day in August 2017, the climate of my town shifted. The KKK and Antifa were coming. Later, some would say that day destroyed the image of Charlottesville and repairing it would take decades. Others said it merely revealed the racism that was already here but ignored. I describe it like this: August 12, 2017, was the beginning of an unraveling.

We stayed at home. There was no way we, as an African-American family, were going anywhere near downtown. That was the plan, anyway, but ironically something came up, and I had to make a quick drive to the downtown area a few hours before the KKK rally was supposed to begin.

I could feel the tension without even getting out of my car, and I prayed as I drove. If I’d been able to see into the spiritual realm, no doubt I would have seen angels on one side with swords in their hands and a demon army on the other, laughing as they invited violence, hate, and murder into my beloved city, where I was raising my children.

There was a murder. A white KKK member ran down a white female protestor with his car. White-on-white crime. Go figure.

I believe that day in 2017 would have been much worse if not for the children of God and their prayers for protection. In advance of the rally, several people gathered at the downtown mall to pray. The storm built threateningly on the horizon, but there they were—followers of Jesus, inviting Him to come and change the situation.

How Brokenness Works

Brokenness permeates our world. It affects all of us, no matter our race, family, or the city or state we were born into. It’s a curse passed down through bloodlines. Brokenness builds empires and meets some of us right at our front door. Sometimes literally. I laugh to myself when I recall the house appraiser’s face as I answered his knock on our front door. It looked like he didn’t expect to see someone who looked like me living here. My life has given me a unique point of view about race. Although my parents proactively involved us in clubs and events that celebrated our rich African-American heritage, most of my life, I’ve been immersed in a predominately white world. I homeschooled my children for twenty years—a viable option for many ethnicities. Still, back when I started, it was rare to find a black homeschooling family. For much of my life, my closest friends have been white or Latino, and I’ve found that what we share bridges our differences. We have many things in common—the desire to be loved, for example. Faith. And brokenness. I’ve been able to see that white folks have as many issues as black folks. At the same time, I understand the truth of “white privilege,” and the white friends I’ve discussed this with, recognize it as well.

When it comes to emotional needs, we are all the same. All of us face internal struggles, some of them severe, and understanding this one similarity helps us embrace each other. No matter what a person looks like, what club or church they belong to, no matter if they have a college degree or barely made it out of high school—that person is like us. Imperfect, but worthy of attention and kindness.

Human brokenness has coursed through history. The issues we face today are not new or “modern” but have been a part of our history since Cain killed Abel. Racism, poverty, and elitism started way before Africans were stolen from their homeland and enslaved. Humanity has been broken—mentally, emotionally, spiritually wounded—for a long time, and this brokenness can show its face in a variety of ways.

Several years ago, a close friend stopped by after work. On the verge of tears, she sat at my kitchen island. She told me about the verbal and emotional abuse she regularly endured from her black co-workers. They called her names, ignored her, and spoke rudely to her. Her attempts to stand up for herself went nowhere.

“They hate me because I’m white,” she said, “but I have personally not done anything to them. They don’t even know me.”

Yes, my friend, I understand.

She grew up extremely poor; her parents didn’t go to college, and one of her brothers had been in prison. She worked her way through college and cleaned houses after her full-time job each day to help pay her bills. In other words, my white friend understood poverty and struggle, and now she understood the unfairness of being hated based on the color of her skin. For a moment, I felt myself growing angry that those who should know better did this to her.

In another conversation, she and I talked about what it felt like not to belong anywhere. That is, to feel like an outsider. The circle we shared was made up of mostly middle- to upper-class white people with college degrees. Few grew up at her level of poverty or shared my experience as “the only.”

As racism cracked open the underbelly of my city and exposed its wounds, August 2017 became seared in mind for another reason. My dad passed away without warning the day after the KKK rally. The whole world seemed to be unraveling right outside my door, and my peace of mind went out the window.

While I believe God was determined to use the evil incidents in my town to unravel the twisted coils of discrimination in the community, He clearly had an agenda for me as well. Surrounded by so much unrest, I grieved and processed death and life, family dysfunction, and community upheaval, as well as the bigger concepts of eternity, the unseen and the visible realms. As the ache in my heart pushed forward, I ended up crying out to God for peace amid so many storms, so many questions, and not enough answers.

I began to think about all I had read over the years—topics like emotional health, cellular memory, spiritual warfare, and quantum physics—and what my husband and I had experienced in our years of ministry. We’d listened to and prayed with many people of various ages, races, and backgrounds. As I considered all these things in the wake of my pain, I began to see the one common denominator—the brokenness spread through society. The course of inherited sin rang loud and clear as I recalled how the individuals we ministered to grappled with bad decisions. Decisions they had made on their own, yes, yet they hadn’t made them “alone.” They were influenced by childhood trauma or family and community culture—more brokenness.

As I pondered these things while watching the news or reading disturbing posts on social media, I prayed again and again, “Lord, I have no idea how You are going to fix this complex mess!”

But at the same time, I had great confidence that He would fix it—but it would take more than one U.S. administration, grassroots hashtag, and church prayer meeting. Seeing individual, family, and social struggle through a broader lens and realizing the fixing may take two to three generations has given me a peace that if I do my part, teach my kids to do their parts, and encourage others to do their parts—slowly and steadily, life for us all will improve.

How We View the World

The lens we use to peer into the world around us needs to include how God created humans to function. Not all of the nooks and crannies of our non-physical design can be easily seen and accessed, right there on the surface. Some of them are much more subtle.

For instance, did you know that certain fears and bad habits have generational and spiritual roots? For example, a fear of failure can be passed on and keep each generation from making decisions that benefit them. A lack of preparedness in education can intensify this fear. Similarly, compulsive spending can be an inherited weakness. Twin studies support the genetic components of habits. (We’ll talk about this more later in the book.) This issue grows even more complex when we learn those fears and habits can reshape our brains. Multiply this “shaping” times the number of family and community members, and we begin to learn how larger systems—the business world, the political realm, and even faith communities—can become unhealthy and, for some individuals, even destructive.

Here’s an everyday example of how this shaping can work.

Consider the husband who loses his father to cancer. His grief slowly spirals and pushes him into a depression triggered by his memories of growing up with a dad consumed by work. The adult son realizes he’s always longed for quality time with his dad, and now he’ll never get it. His depression causes episodes of anger that begin to affect his wife and kids, as well as the people who work for him. It gets so bad that some employees quit, others become overwhelmed and less productive, and his business begins to suffer.

One man’s brokenness not only affects those in his family but reaches out to influence many people in other families, as well as their economies and emotional wellbeing. We aren’t islands, and our junk—even the hurts we may not realize exist—can affect others. Our emotional and mental processes influence our behavior and health, and our lives inevitably touch the lives of others. That’s how God made us function—as a unit.

A worldview is a lens. When I put on my sunglasses, the lenses influence how I see everything around me. Similarly, how we view the world will dictate how we interpret experiences, issues, and ourselves. When we have a holistic or comprehensive lens, we are empowered. We realize that if we focus on our wellbeing (spirit, soul, and body), and if we strengthen the relationships in our social circles, a domino effect will occur. Just as one person’s brokenness can negatively influence the people around him, one person’s wellbeing or triune health (1) can benefit others.

(1) Alignment of spirit, soul, and body to the Creator’s intent and design.

This route doesn’t produce a world without suffering, but it does mean that becoming whole together can help us deal with struggles more effectively. When we have a plan for our own triune health and how we’re going to help others heal, we become Culture Changers who slowly and steadily mend broken hearts, families, and communities.

The need is all around us. Millions of people long for a nation that offers equality and healing between races, generations, and socioeconomic classes, but much of the climate of present-day America reveals fear and anger instead of hope. From hashtag movements to opioid addiction, statistics and the media reveal people are hurting. This hurt spans political viewpoints and economic class. It is circumstantial (based on individual choices that hurt others), and it is also predictable (because hurting people hurt people).

Embracing the reality of one Creator and understanding the way He designed us to function—as a powerful unit filled with influence—allows us to be equipped to bring wholeness.

The world around us can be changed—neighborhoods, workplaces, churches. Communities can be transformed one person at a time, one family at a time.

What You Can Expect from This Book

Have you ever looked through a kaleidoscope? As you turn the knob, different layers and designs appear. Going through the material in this book will be a lot like turning the knob of a kaleidoscope back and forth while zooming the picture in and out. I’ve mentioned some of the problems or symptoms, and later in the book, I’ll propose what I consider to be the root and how we can take practical steps to heal it. As we go through this book, we’ll understand why the solutions will take time and patience as we walk alongside one another in love.

Remember—change is possible. Hope is coming. Prejudice is solvable.

My mother posted this thought on social media a few years ago:

Mostly what we see is “PREJUDICE” — is something we all have. We PRE-JUDGE PEOPLE. We connote things about people that we don’t know, from a distance. Prejudice in its highest levels dovetails into racism. But for most of us, prejudging is a part of life and is eradicated when we get to know people individually and see each person’s own uniqueness. Prejudice is in our DNA in order to maintain our safety until we know who the person is. It is Stranger Anxiety based on outside appearances. It is understandable. Prejudice can be defeated by conversation and community — by putting on someone else’s skin and walking around in it. (Harper Lee – To Kill a Mockingbird.) Prejudice is solvable in communities, in families, and in the individual. Because Love never fails.

The answer is found as we understand one another, and I believe the road is easier to navigate than we think—when paved with commitment and the grace of God.

-End of Chapter One-