What if you could stay at peace — even when everything around you says you shouldn't?
In this episode of Triggered & True, emotional health consultant Laura Duncan and co-host Brian Freise slow down on the word at the heart of the entire show: triggered.
It's become a throwaway word online, but Laura gives it a definition that changes everything — "an irrational response to a rational or irrational situation" — and shows why understanding it can feel like a superpower.
Laura compares a trigger to an allergic reaction: the racing heart, the tight chest, the foggy brain, the thoughts you don't normally think — and the relief that comes the moment you realize nothing is wrong with you.
Together, she and Brian unpack what's happening in the brain when the amygdala hijacks your "adult" mind and drops you into a five-year-old's, why that leaves you stuck exactly when you most want to stay calm, and why the anxiety so many of us live with is really the pain underneath the trigger.
In this episode:
🔹 Laura's definition of a trigger — and why it means you can be okay even when your circumstances aren't
🔹 The "emotional allergic reaction": how to recognize a trigger by what it does to your body and mind
🔹 What's really happening in the brain — fight, flight, or freeze — when the amygdala takes over
🔹 Why the calm, capable things you learned vanish the instant you get triggered — and why that isn't failure
🔹 Why triggers aren't the enemy: how they're part of your design, and a doorway to your true self
Dive deeper with these two great resources! 👇
📕 Get your copy of Brian's book Above All Else: Winning the War for Your Heart Click here to get the book!
📩 Get your free Weekly Dose of Compassion — two short notes in your inbox every week. One to speak over yourself. One from Laura: https://www.lauraduncan.com/pl/2148814868
