From Triggered to Tranquil: How Self-Compassion and Mindful Presence Can Transform Relationship Conflicts and Heal Childhood Wounds

by Susan Campbell

A Therapy-Tested, Real-World Approach to Defusing Anxiety and Anger Reactions

At home, at work, or even out shopping, we’ve all experienced a moment when we’ve gone from feeling just fine to feeling out of control. Something inside us shifts. We instantly feel hurt, angry, shut down, or frozen. In these moments, we’ve been triggered, according to therapist and bestselling author Susan Campbell. In From Triggered to Tranquil, she offers a no-blame approach to conflicts and misunderstandings, empowering us to explore triggers and trauma responses and use these as portals to growth and self-compassion. This accessible, timely, and useful book

five steps to “trigger mastery” that can be applied to any interpersonal relationship or encounter

specific techniques for relationships with spouses, partners, children, bosses, coworkers, and friends, as well as a chapter for group facilitators

ways to address triggers related to politics, racism, climate change, and other hot-button issues

Genres: Self Help, Psychology, Nonfiction, Audiobook

Audible Audio

Published February 15, 2022

Reviews

[January · Rating 5 out of 5]

From Triggered to Tranquil: How Self-Compassion and Mindful Presence Can Transform Relationship Conflicts and Heal Childhood Wounds by Susan Campbell, PhD
7h and 22m narrated by Christina Moore, also available in Paperback and Kindle format

Genre: Nonfiction, Self-Improvement

Featuring: Triggers, Anxiety, Anger Reactions, Trauma Responses, Childhood Issues, Parent-Child Relationships, Fear Stories We Tell Ourselves, Scripts, 5-Steps, Practices For Transforming Reactivity

Rating as a movie: PG for General Content

My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Quotes: "I got into the field of psychotherapy so I help people live happier, more fulfilling lives. I have been doing this work for 55 years and I believe I have discovered the root of most human unhappiness, conflict and disfunction; it is the fact that we do not know how to accept and work with painful emotions and trigger reactions, so we project the cause of our reactions on to others, thus creating needless conflicts and misguided actions."

"What most of us need to do is to learn to calm ourselves. We need to learn to repair."

https://youtu.be/G5WtXv1mdtk

My thoughts: 5% 21:18 Ch. 1 - So far it's good but the exact same paragraph was used twice in the introduction.
📱22% 1:35:35 Ch. 3 - This is really good and surprisingly quick. I could read it in one session if it wasn't for the reflection questions, which are important.
📱 36% 2:37:14 Ch. 5 - Does this book have a companion workbook, because I need one.
📱64% 4:43:33 Ch. 8 - This book is very enlightening, it needs a class to go with it.
📱71% 5:11:58 Ch. 9 - I think chapter 8 should be expanded into its own book and used for a parenting class.

This book is really good. It is one I will need to revisit. There is a snippet at the opening of each chapter, including the introduction, from the chapter, so you will hear it repeated within another paragraph. It was off-putting at first but became very helpful later. I really enjoyed how she touched on several different categories and provided trigger work to them. I think one about children was really good because it becomes a cycle. I would be interested if that chapter was expanded into a book of it's own. Not only does Dr. Campbell teach you how to recognize the early signs of you becoming triggered, she shares how to pause, reflect and repair so you can maintain your relationships, if desired, open the door to better communication and possibly letting go or accepting that trigger.

Recommend to others?: Absolutely! I think this is a great book, and an important topic everyone should explore. I will be reading it again.

[CJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall, it's a good read. It got a bit repetitive at the end, good excersices to get to know yourself a little better and how to self regulate. Don't agree that you must or should seek to have all these conversations with every single person who triggers you, those closest to you, yes if you want to save the relationship but not in the work place because highly unlikely they'll agree with you, also the word trigger idk how i feel about it, some people might use these tools as a chance to get away with almost any kind of behavior. I'm unsure if I agree with all the points in this book. I like the pausing idea. Helpful in some ways, in my opinion, if you keep dissecting everything that triggers you keeps you in a sense of self healing forever, we can't keep licking our wounds and expect them to heal, yes acknowledge your trauma/situation/pain, sit with it but idk how I feel about bringing it up all the time, not every behavior stems from some deep seeded trauma or painful memory sometimes things just are.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I strongly encourage anyone who is interested in reading this book to also sign themselves up for therapy if they aren't already, because I imagine that anyone picking up this book is going to uncover untold depths of suffering within themselves that they were not aware of. I think this is a positive thing. Don't they say "the first step is recognizing you have a problem," or something like that?

I think this is an excellent guide to wading into your own feelings, and finding the healing you need. Following Susan's instructions is not fun or easy, and in my personal experience - painful! In the end, I am so grateful to have found this book. It has helped me, and continues to help.

[Charles Reed · Rating 2 out of 5]

47%
This book fills out a lot of pages without actually giving good tangible advice for directly calming down in a situation where you get triggered. There are direct physiological ways to engage your parasympathetic nervous system and relax. This book gives you some examples for situationally engaging with others and communicating. But it does not give you direct action steps to relax and calm yourself down and become tranquil. So instead of going from A to B, we go from A to C to D to E to B. Why? I have no idea. Probably because the author is trying to sell something specifically like a service of her own.

[Vanessa Pena · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have clipped like 100 parts of this book. LOVE LOVE LOVE. Going to keep this with me at all times for whenever I feel like my head is going to explode.

Definitely recommending this to moms and people that are unhappy with how they treat others. I feel like I learned knew coping strategies for when I feel "triggered", which I often confuse with overstimulation.

[Alina · Rating 5 out of 5]

absolutely life changing. Through the whole book i felt so calm because Susan Campbel shows an amazing way to deal with difficult feelings and leads a way to bring rationality and love into the relationship to self and others.
10/10 recommend!

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it. I appreciate how her main goal is to own your triggers (not that it’s okay whatever happened to you) but what can you do with them….esp in your relationships. And it was nice how she broke down all the parts and gave statements to say and ways to work through it all.

[ej · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5/5 i would say it’s pretty good, big repetitive sometimes although i know it’s to cement things but yeah, i’d recommend

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some beneficial practices and ways to move through and understand triggers

[Victoria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Broadly helpful especially part 2 about in application, and to self, relationships, kids, group leadership, macro world context. Do the inner work to do the outer work / make a difference in society.

[Mariah Hanson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read

[Christina]

was introduced to the concept of "freeze" which was very helpful for me to understand that's a trigger.