Triggers are conditioned responses. The brain has learned to associate the cue with the behavior’s effect. The strength of the association is why, even long after a habit is gone, an unexpected encounter with the cue can produce a vivid pull. The cue does not cause the behavior; it raises the probability.
Mapping personal triggers — and either avoiding them, planning for them, or learning to surf the urges they produce — is one of the most-taught skills in CBT-based relapse prevention.
In practice
HALT is a quick filter for the four most common internal triggers. External triggers are typically mapped explicitly during early change work. Daybreak’s daily check-in is designed to surface the small versions of triggers before they accumulate into large ones.
Related
Source
Marlatt’s relapse prevention model.