People who have been meditating for a while may find value in “trigger practice”. This is when we voluntarily expose ourselves to a stimulus that usually activates a strong emotional, addictive, or painful response in us so that we can focus and meditate on that reaction.
One way to work with triggered content is to practice intentionally ignoring it, by, say, meditatively grounding our full attention inside of our breathing instead. More common, however, is to choose to fully experience the emotional activation – for example, to deeply and openly feel the discomfort in our body and to notice the rising and falling of wild thoughts, while breathing deeply and generally remaining relaxed and spacious.
Some examples of what we might choose to have in front of us for trigger practice:
● A computer screen displaying a project that we are worried about, a full email inbox, or a long to-do list
● A messy garage or a pile of undone laundry
● Something that’s addictive, possibly a physical object, or something on a computer or phone screen
● Something that triggers emotions of grief after a loss
● A recording of a speech by a politician that we have strong disagreements with
● Just having the TV on, or a movie that brings out a reaction in us
Trigger practice runs a danger for inexperienced meditators of playing with fire and possibly kicking off an addictive episode or getting sucked into negative emotions. It is more helpful for people who have already been meditating for a while, and have skills to stay grounded and resist the pull of unconscious cravings, and to be able to clear and flow with intense bodily energy. And trigger practice might be most attractive for those who have been meditating for so long that they don’t have islands of mindfulness in an otherwise unconscious life, but the stuck places are the relatively little islands that they want to intentionally seek out to free up.
In general, trigger practice can be useful for lessening addictions, helping us to move through grief more rapidly, and helping any and all emotions to flow through us without getting stuck. It is an example of a meditative “accelerator”, similar to running up a hill instead of on the flat or lifting a heavier weight – the practice is more difficult, but we are making progress more rapidly.
Some might recognize that trigger practice is like “exposure therapy” in psychotherapy. This is where a therapist will intentionally have a client experience what they fear, while providing companionship and coaching on staying open to the experience.
In daily life, we sometimes are ambushed by situations that evoke strong emotional reactions, and that may lead to us taking actions and saying words that we later regret. Trigger practice is a way of training for such moments, like how a basketball team might scrimmage outside of game days. The hope is that if we can burn off some of our reactivity when the stakes are lower, then when an intense situation arises again in daily life, our body and mind will be able to stay more open, aware, relaxed, meditative, and free.