From: L. Michael Hall
2024 Neurons #40
September 11, 2024
THE DAY TRUMP GOT TRIGGERED
As I watched the Trump–Harris debate (September 10), it was obvious that Harris was well rehearsed in how to “get under Trump’s skin” and irritate him. I began counting every comment that seemed to be oriented to do that. But after 5 or so minutes, I gave up counting. She was doing it almost constantly. And she was good at taunting and annoying him by saying things that were intentionally provocative—often as a side-comment when saying something else.
What was also obvious was the fact that while Trump didn’t let many of the provocative statements and lies get to him; he did get triggered by many of them. Yes, he took the bait! And in taking the bait, he ended up talking about things that no one cares about except him and what no one trying to decide who to vote for cares about—numbers at the rallies, who want the 2020 election, Harris’ father, which former administrative persons left and thought Trump unfit, which world leader is laughing at him, etc. All irrelevant! But by taking the bait, Trump got distracted, and wasted his time on irrelevancies.
I found it interestingly sad that Harris spent so much time baiting Trump and almost no time defining any of her positions. Perhaps that was her intent. She avoided answering quite a few direct questions: Are we better off today than four years ago? Why have you flipped on so many issues? Would you abort a baby in the 7th month, the 8th month, the 9th month? Do you take any responsibility for the terrible way we pulled out of Afghanistan?
If her goal was to get under Trump’s skin, then she certainly succeeded in doing that. He certainly seemed to be rattled by her insults, zaps, insinuating implications, personal attacks, etc. He was rattled so much that he got angry. And as he got angry, he become less coherent so that whereas he is usually very sharp and can improvise a comeback in the moment—he missed a great number of opportunities. On the first question, “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” when Harris did not answer it and talked all around it, he could have simply noted,
“Did you notice that she failed to answer that simple question? I wonder why? Is it because the whole country was better off four years ago than they are now.”
Then he could have quoted the facts about the cost of groceries, gas, rent, housing, etc. But being triggered, he missed that opportunity.
Nor was Harris the only one on the attack. So where the two ABC moderators. For Trump they asked follow up questions, they fact checked him 5 times to correct him, but they fact checked Harris 0 times—zero even though she made several glaring mistakes. So as many have noted, the debate was really 3 against 1.
I felt sorry for Donald Trump as I watched the debate. He could have done so much better if he had not taken the bait, if he had not let her get under his skin. So what is my points in all of this? To make the point, let’s do some imagining. Imagine that Trump had attended a Neuro-Semantic Training or Hired a Meta-Coach and learned the Un-Insultability Pattern! Imagine that! If he had learned, as so many have learned, how to reverse his “taking insult” strategy—a strategy that everyone seems to learn and learn really well as they grow up(!)—then he could have maintained presence of mind while staying calm and cool. Then he would have had all of his knowledge and communication resources fully available to him.
Since first developing and teaching the Un-Insultability pattern in 1995, I have taught it to Police Departments, to busy open-room news departments, and to the medical responders on the front lines. I have taught it at Sales Training meetings. But mostly I have trained it in NLP practitioner courses and our Trainers’ Training course. What’s amazing is that it is imminently learnable. If a person wants to be able to not be so easily triggered, even if he thinks of himself as “a sensitive person,” he can learn this as a way of being in any context of pressure.
Every year at Trainers’ Training, we have one of the more skillful trainers present the Un-Insultability Pattern. This past May, Wahyudi Akbar or Yudi made the presentation which was live streamed as he presented it. It was a fabulous presentation and it is what enables those who experience it to stand up and keep presence of mind without getting triggered! Mr. President, if you’d like to experience, just call on us.
[You can find Un-Insultability in the book, Meta-States (1995/2012) as well as in Dragon Slaying, The Sourcebook of Magic, etc.]