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Yesterday, I found myself feeling triggered. Not in the dramatic, relationship-ending kind of way. I felt it just enough to notice an old part of me tightening around something familiar, an old sore spot my nervous system still remembered.
The sting was real.
This morning, I went for a bike ride and found myself standing in front of this magnificent crested Peruvian apple cactus in a neighbor’s yard.
What struck me wasn’t just the blossoms.
It was that this cactus was holding everything at once—sharp spines, unopened buds, flowers in full bloom, and fruit already ripening.
Isn’t that a little like us?
When we’re triggered, it can feel as though all we can see are the thorns. We brace. We protect. We react. Sometimes we even wonder if we’ve failed, or if we’re “back at square one.”
What if our triggers aren’t proof that we’re broken?
What if they’re invitations to pause with curiosity instead of judgment?
Sometimes triggers activate an old wound that is still asking for compassion. Sometimes triggers remind us it’s time to realign a belief, set a boundary, ask for what we need, or even change the environment we’ve been trying so hard to adapt to.
And sometimes… sometimes they simply hurt.
Not every trigger leads to an immediate lesson or breakthrough. Some stay with us for a long time. Some require patience, support, and more than one courageous conversation. And some simply remind us that something matters deeply to us.
Healing isn’t about pretending the thorn doesn’t hurt. It’s about remembering that the thorn isn’t the whole story. And while we don’t get to choose every thorn life places in our path, we do get to choose how we tend the places they’ve touched.
I learned years ago, while living in Peru, that this cactus eventually offers something unexpected. After its spectacular night-blooming flowers fade, it produces sweet, edible fruit.
It felt like a gentle reminder.
Sometimes the sweetest parts of our lives blossom because we were willing to stay with ourselves long enough, and kindly enough, to grow through what once hurt us.
I certainly don’t always remember that in the middle of a trigger. Last night, I didn’t.
But this cactus reminded me of something else that helped…
It reminded me that we are rarely just one thing. We are the thorn that learned to protect. We are the bud still unfolding. We are the blossom opening in its own time.
Helping people look for blossoms, even in the midst of life’s inevitable thorns, is one of my favorite parts of coaching.
If you’re standing in the middle of a trigger today, I hope you’ll remember this cactus. There may already be a blossom quietly beginning. Even if you can’t see it yet.
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