Improve Your Storytelling: 3 Ways To Listen Without Being Triggered

 

Being triggered in a conversation can rob you of your power, sending you into an emotional spiral that derails your storytelling - and maybe even your career. Have you been there? Staying calm in a conversation is essential, especially when emotions run high or when the subject matter challenges your perspective. To avoid being triggered, understanding is the key. After all, you can choose to be triggered or not. (Easier said than done, but the possibility exists). You can choose how you show up, even in the most challenging of confrontations or resurfaced memories. New listening skills can help you to experience things in a new way, so that you can

show up differently inside of difficulty. Ready to see how storytelling can change, when you understand more about how we listen?

Common Triggers, Uncommon Responses

Three common triggers in conversations are personal attacks, feeling unheard, and perceived threats to one’s beliefs or identity. Amy Gallo tells Harvard Business Review that workplace conflict is a normal, inevitable part of interacting with other people. “If you’re involved in conflicts at work, it’s not that there’s something wrong with you, or the other person. In fact, there’s no such thing as a conflict-free office,” she writes. When someone feels personally attacked, their instinct is often to defend, which can escalate tensions, erode engagement and crush collaboration. Perceived threats to deeply held beliefs or identity can evoke a defensive or confrontational response, as these challenges strike at the core of how someone sees themselves. How do we de-escalate a situation where we feel triggered?

Without minimizing your experience, inside the triggering behavior, new options need to be explored. Your perspective is valid - but it is one among many. All human beings have instincts, but we are not driven solely by them. Being triggered isn’t your only option, if you are open to that possibility.

To navigate being triggered, stay focused on the other person's perspective and ask open-ended questions. Ask yourself if it is your job to fix this person’s point of view - and pick your battles. How badly do you want to win this one? Another question that can help reframe triggering behavior: what else could this mean? Perhaps simply stating your boundaries can change the conversation. By shifting from judgment to curiosity, you can defuse tension and create a space where collaboration, rather than confrontation, thrives.

The Anatomy of Listening: How to Avoid Being Triggered

1.     Listening to Affirm: You may experience “listening to affirm” as you read this, if you find yourself making comparisons to other authors you have read. And people are doing the same thing when you share your vision. They’re comparing you to the previous CEO, or to what they read in a book by John Maxwell. References and comparisons might make you feel more intelligent and smart (a self-affirmation) but notice that no new learning is taking place. If you’re making comparisons to the past, how are you really able to be present and engage with the person right in front of you?

2.     Listening to Defend: When you’re triggered, it’s easy to get defensive. But a maxim in business (and in life) is: When you get defensive, you lose. You’re not at your best. By taking a defensive posture, your focus shifts to your response. Stephen Covey described it like this: Listening is merely a delay in your ability to respond. Essentially, you only listen well enough to counterpunch. Your attention is on yourself. Focusing on your own story and how to defend it

3.     dismisses what the other person has to say. It’s how you politely listen to someone tell you about his or her vacation, just so you can say, “Well, when we went to Monterrey last spring. . . .” Dismissal, in this case, is disagreement. Being dismissed is a great way to be triggered! Is the conversation getting better, if you are defensive? Disagreement closes off the realm of possibility, collaboration and cooperation. Why? Because, no matter what the possibilities are, your disagreement will cause you to miss them.

   Listening to Discover: the best listeners aren’t triggered. They are curious. They are listening to discover, even inside of confrontation or correction. I can remember, being triggered inside a conversation with an irate customer, thinking to myself, “I’ve been chewed out and yelled at before - and I survived.” I triggered a memory that helped me to stay calm, remembering that no one was going to die seemed to help me to live a little differently. If a co-worker has a challenge with your new tattoo or your lifestyle choices or your haircut, turn to curiosity not confrontation. Aren’t you curious why acceptance is so elusive for some people? Being triggered requires you to put your attention on yourself, but listening to discover isn’t about you. Listening to discover will show you what’s missing - because your intention is not to “win this conversation” or to change somebody’s mind. If you’re unable to listen to discover, how are you going to change the game? How are you going to lead others to new outcomes, if you won’t engage in the place where those outcomes live? If you are triggered, are you going to respond at your best? Acting from instinct and emotion can be a very natural response (believe me, I know). But remember the YAHOO strategy. That’s not a search engine - it’s an acronym: You Always Have Other Options. Find them.

Listening To Discover: Unlocking Collaboration and New Storytelling Possibilities

Your expertise isn’t diminished, it’s enhanced, when you listen to discover. Effective storytelling means letting people know that certain conversations are unwanted and unnecessary. Remind people, through your storytelling, that work is about (wait for it) the work. Your storytelling can help people to focus on what matters. Curiosity can provide a new response when you are triggered, because you can discover the insights you need, for the results you want. We all listen to affirm (“I’ll wait until she says something that confirms what I already know, so I can feel good about myself, my education level, my experience, etc.”). Have you been there? Maybe you’re trying to defend something - and I’m not saying it doesn’t need defending. I’m saying, what’s the most effective way to show up, for yourself and the causes you care about?

Being triggered is a natural response - but is it the most effective? Listening to discover allows you to focus on understanding, rather than defending or affirming. And isn’t understanding what we really need, right now? Understand this: You are more than your emotions. You have the ability to choose how you respond. You can show up differently, when faced with what has triggered you in the past. Otherwise, coaching, therapy and maturity would not exist. Neither would learning. When you approach a conversation with the intention to learn, you create space for empathy and insight, reducing the likelihood of triggered conflict. This mindset requires patience and self-awareness, but the payoff is a greater ability to navigate complex interactions. Listen to discover, set some boundaries via your storytelling, and you just might discover you’re not triggered after all.

-Forbes