A few Saturdays ago a close friend sent me a 30 minute voice message that triggered the absolute christ out of me.

I immediately called a whole lot of my closest friends, all of whom assured me that what she’d said was way out of line, not accurate at all, and really inappropriate and harmful.

My body physically shook from the stress of it and stayed shaking for a good few days afterwards, I think I must have gone into shock. Luckily I spent the weekend with two close friends who looked after me. Both told me “You need to get that friend out of your life”.

Another friend who is an absolute pro at seeing the most wise, loving, conscious view of situations said “your friend is communicating from her pain-body, she’s obviously very triggered and not in a good place. I’m sure if she was feeling grounded in herself right now she would never say or do something like that. But that doesn’t mean that friend is safe to have in your life, and it’s ok to tell her you’re not available for that level of unconsciousness.”

So I had my ammunition, I’d validated it with ten of my closest and wisest friends, and Neville was ready to say “Fuck right off.”

This is how it is when we’re in conflict. Someone says something that hurts us, makes us feel misunderstood, disrespected, uncared for, etc,

and our immediate response is to launch grenades of anger and blame right back at them (in our mind).

Since all my friends were in agreement with me about how harmful what she’d said was, I felt validated and safe in the knowledge that I was right.

But I don’t want to live like that.

I don’t want to always assume I’m right and that others are wrong. “Right” feels safe, high and mighty, and self-righteous. But it doesn’t feel good deep down. Not really.

I want to learn from my triggers, and grow from them so I don’t keep repeating unhelpful patterns. This is what it means to “do the work.”

Sometimes doing the work really fucking sucks.

I have been full of anger and confusion that this friend could be so harmful, and misunderstand me so badly. I have really wanted to just cut them out of my mind and stop wasting my energy on them.

That’s the easy way out. But I also know that this friend was not in a good headspace, and I know that when she’s feeling grounded and safe, she would never do something so hurtful. We have somehow managed to trigger the shit out of each other over the past year without hardly speaking at all.

Our conflict has caused both of us to feel attacked, judged and blamed by each other.

When I feel attacked, judged or blamed, Neville’s immediate reaction is to rain harsh judgements down on the other person (in my head). We all do this, it’s a natural response of the ego to try to keep us safe from perceived attacks.

This is our primitive limbic brain going to “emotional war” to protect us.

When I get triggered, as I have been a lot by this friend over the past year, I always try to pause for days or months until I can see a clearer perspective. I never let Neville say his harsh judgements out loud, because I know he’s not seeing clearly. But whether I say them out loud or not, the judgments are there in my energy, and I’ve no doubt they can be felt by my friend when we communicate, just as I can feel hers.

Words are often irrelevant. Our energy communicates a lot more than we realise.

I imagine my friend must have been feeling attacked by my silent judgement, my distance and my lack of communication while I gathered my thoughts. She couldn’t understand where I was coming from, and as a result, her ego (her Neville) had launched an attack right back at me.

It seems we’ve both been attacking each other in our minds for months, as neither of us have been physically well enough to have a proper conversation to resolve things (cheers, long !)!)

As my mate* Tara Brach puts it, “no matter how right you feel in a conflict, when you’re in a conflict and feeling right, you’re in a trance. The lens you’re looking through is the “right self” and “wrong or bad other.”

This is from Tara’s excellent podcast, Navigating Conflict with a Wise Heart, which has helped me a lot.

**Not my actual mate.

I believe there are no conflicts in which one person is completely in the right, and the other is completely in the wrong.

As Gay Hendricks puts it

— in any conflict between two parties, there is 200% responsibility to be taken — 100% each.

Usually both parties think it’s 100% the other person’s fault. Both sides tend to feel like the victim, which means the other gets lumped with the role of the perpetrator.

This race to be the victim is never a helpful dynamic when dealing with conflict between friends or family members.

There are always two sides of the story, and if we can only see ours, we’re missing something major.

I know for sure there was a lot I did to cause this conflict, through my own triggers and hurts, for taking things personally that weren’t personal, and for letting things build up for way too long on multiple occasions before having challenging conversations. I have been open about my role in this conflict.

I feel pretty sure my friend must be missing something, as she keeps insisting our conflict is 100% on me.

I felt I was owning my 100%, but she wasn’t owning hers. But I began to wonder if there might be more I was missing, too.

So as I’ve been processing what this friend said to me, I’ve been trying to feel all the pain and hurt that it’s caused.

That’s the first step, because without feeling that pain and looking after the tiny child inside me who is just bloody sad, and without looking after my very distressed nervous system, Neville will have no choice but to keep burying my pain with rage.

At 1.07am on Sunday, after lying awake for hours, unable to reign in Neville’s angry ruminating, my heart was still racing. My body needed help to calm itself down from such a major trigger, not just my mind.

So I did all the things I know to do to help my nervous system calm down. Meditating, slowing down my breath, long walks on the beach, running, journaling, lots of talking to loved ones, mindfulness mindfulness mindfulness.

It’s times like these, when some of my most painful trauma/ triggers have been bashed, that I lean very heavily on the techniques I teach in Bloody Good Life. They’re game changing. I honestly don’t know how people get through life and have healthy relationships without learning mind taming and emotional regulation skills.

Even when my mind is going a million miles an hour round a furious race track, I can still find moments of peace and calm and wisdom in between. Even compassion, for myself, and for my friend.

And then, as the rage-dust starts to settle I start to journal and talk to friends about why this triggers me so much.

Which parts of it might be true? Which parts of it are hitting up against my beliefs about myself which may or may not be true? What is my actual intention with this friend? What needs of mine are not being met? Is it my need to be understood? To be respected? Why am I so hurt by this?

Because I know that when I’m triggered, it’s always because either there’s some truth in it, and/or because it hits on a painful belief I have about myself that may or may not be true. Like, “I’m rubbish,”  “I’m broken”, or “I suck at friendships”.

If my friend had said to me “I just hate so much that you have blue hair” I would be confused, but I wouldn’t be triggered, because I know for sure that I don’t have blue hair. When we’re triggered, there’s always something for us to learn. It doesn’t mean that what people say to trigger us is right.

But there is gold if we’re willing to look into the dark parts of us that might feel bloody uncomfortable to look at.

I’ve been able to be honest with myself that parts of what she’s saying are true.

That my insecurities in female friendships have contributed massively to this conflict. And my tendency to pull away and shut down has made things significantly worse. It’s allowed misunderstandings and misperceptions to breed in the dark, for both of us. I know that I’ve been judging this friend a lot, and that it has caused her to react very badly and judge me right back.

I’ve also started to more clearly see some painful things about myself and the way I sometimes unknowingly seek reassurance in female friendships in a way that obviously bothers some friends without me realising. It’s been a shit lesson to become aware of, but one that I’m so glad for, because now that I can see it I can do the work to heal it.

On the other side of painful self-realisations is always a greater level of freedom and love. And when we can do this self-reflection work with a safe friend or loved one who is willing to do the work too, we can build stronger, more beautiful relationships.

Not everyone is willing or able to do this work. But we can still do the work on our end, grow from it as best we can, and either accept the other person including their lack of willingness to do the work, or walk away.

I’m committed to always working through hard things with friends and family (where safe), so that we can both grow and learn from our mistakes. It sucks sometimes, because it means wading into the mud in order to make it through to the other side, free-er and lighter and more connected than before.

Sometimes I think “oh fuck the mud, i’ll just remove hard friends from my life and be done with it.”

But ultimately my highest values are integrity, growth and honesty – which includes being radically honesty with myself.

So I persevere in the mud even when I’d really rather not.

If you find yourself in a conflict where you’re really bloody triggered…

And you’re pretty certain you’re 100% right and the other person is 100% wrong…

There might be something your Neville is hiding from you.

No mud, no lotus.

The beauty is on the other side of what you’re avoiding.