← Stress Management for Highly Sensitive People (HSP): Inner Work and Strategies for Coping with Stress, Overwhelm, and Negative Emotions
Stress Management for Highly Sensitive People (HSP): Inner Work and Strategies for Coping with Stress, Overwhelm, and Negative Emotions
#386 | What Being a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) Actually Means
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By the end of this episode, you'll understand what it actually means to be a highly sensitive person and how that shapes the way you experience the world. In this episode, you'll discover the common experiences that often point to someone being a highly sensitive person. What's happening beneath the surface that makes life feel more intense or overwhelming at times, and what begins to change when you understand how your system actually works. Welcome to this edition of Self Compassion Wednesdays, where we dive deeper into understanding ourselves as highly sensitive people by exploring the unique traits that shape our experience. If you're a highly sensitive person, you will probably notice some of these things happening in your life. You will probably have a desire for more space than other people, like time alone. And it doesn't mean you're an introvert. Actually, 30% of all highly sensitive people are extrovert. But there's still a need for downtime. After a busy time or after a lot of stimulation, you may find yourself thinking about a conversation much longer than other people might do. And as a result, you may wonder if something's wrong with you. Maybe I'm obsessing this conversation, but this is actually what highly sensitive people are designed to do, and they do quite naturally. We look carefully and thoroughly at our experiences. We analyze them, we look for connections, and that is a natural part of being a highly sensitive person. You may also notice that a lot of noise or things going on or bright flashing lights or high stimulation can make your mind just shut down. You can actually feel like there's. There's not much you can do. You want to get out of a situation like that. And that is common for highly sensitive people because we are designed to pick up subtlety. And so if we're bombarded with a lot of gross kinds of stimulation, then it can easily overwhelm our systems. That's not a weakness. It's not something that's going on that needs to be fixed or changed. It is a natural part of having a sensitive instrument, if you will. You'll find that you maybe take longer to make decisions than most people. You really think through the repercussions, through the implications, who it's going to affect, not just yourself, but others, and how it's going to affect future decisions you're going to make from there. We think deeply about things, and this is a natural trait, natural part of this HSP trait. I didn't realize I was a highly sensitive person until only a few years ago when a friend of mine suggested that I take the test and she thought I might be Highly sensitive. And sure enough, I was. But once I started studying this trait and started looking at what it actually entails, it started explaining a lot of things about myself. And when I look back on my life, even as a kid in grade school, I used to spend time reviewing conversations and situations from school for like an hour or two as I was falling asleep or not falling asleep. That kind of thing was just. I thought. I didn't know. I thought it was just me. But it is a natural part of being highly sensitive. Now, of course, everyone's mind can get caught on a loop and there might be some stress going on. In addition, it doesn't mean that if you're an hsp, you're going to naturally have insomnia. No, that's not necessarily true. But obviously I had a little stress, but I also had a lot of processing going on. And noticing this and putting it in the context of being an HSP helps a lot. It helps to normalize this. You know, my dad was also an hsp and he really didn't find out until just before he died because of the work I've been doing with hsps. And he was talking about it with me and we both talked about the experience of being what he used to call slow processors. We don't process things quickly. If you give me something to think about, I'll chew on it. And my dad would be the same. I'm not what I like to call quick smart. If you just fire something at me, I'm more likely to freeze than to come up with something clever as a result. But if you give me time, I can work through a problem very thoroughly. I remember in school some people were amazingly fast and super intelligent. And I never thought I was unintelligent, but I was not fast. I needed extra time. I needed time to work through and think through, step by step. And this is one of the hallmarks of being a highly sensitive person. Also, we are very attuned to emotion and to the different emotions that are going on in our environments. And we don't do well when there's a lot of intensity or even, even just watching a violent movie can be quite overwhelming for a highly sensitive person. Being in a high pressure workplace or around people who are very controlling or very needy, it can be a cause of overwhelm. We can also perform very well in these kinds of circumstances, but we can only take so much of it. And so sensitivity means that overall we get overwhelmed more quickly, we reach our limit more quickly than other people, or you could say our Bucket gets filled more quickly. And if you don't take time to empty the bucket, then it will just be in constant overflow and overwhelm. And that does not, is not a great experience. So as highly sensitive people, we actually have to pay attention to how we pace our lives and to the stresses we get exposed to and to many factors that other people also need to pay attention to, but can kind of get away with for a while. And we can't get away with that. I always say that I don't have a buffer, and that means that whatever comes in, I have to deal with it, I have to process it, I have to learn how to guardrail against it, but I need to deal with it. There's no just sweeping it under the carpet. The main idea here, though, is that being highly sensitive is a natural pattern. And it is not something that is a flaw. It's not something that needs to be fixed. Stress, that's another thing. Yes, that needs to be dealt with. But the trait itself, the sensitivity itself is like having a electron microscope that is so sensitive it can detect just the tiniest little organelles inside of a cell. That there's nothing wrong with that kind of sensitivity. But you can't use that in a crude way and expect it to do some kind of battle for you or you can't handle it. Roughly, it has to be held and protected, encased in some kind of protective material so that it can do its job, which is high sensitivity. So there's been a lot of research done on this over the years. And it was started with Elaine Aaron, she's the pioneering researcher back in the 1990s. And basically there is a way of thinking of the characteristics of the trait that falls under the acronym DOES does. So D stands for depth of processing, O stands for overwhelm, E stands for emotional awareness or empathy, and S stands for sensitivity, like sensory sensitivity. So when they looked at, and they did many, many studies, and there's ongoing studies on this, when they started studying people who were, who have this, this experience of being highly sensitive, they notice some things. And when they looked at, for example, FMRI studies at the brain, while it's, while it's, while you're active, they found that the. There's increased activity in regions like the insula, which has to do with internal awareness, and the prefrontal cortex, which has to do with reflection and decision making. In other words, there's more processing going on, more connections being made, more thinking things through. That happens for highly sensitive people. On the other hand, it Means that your system gets full faster. And this is the next one which is o overstimulation. And where they found in the research how this shows up is that when they exposed people to sensory input like noise and light and chaos, they showed stronger responses and there was a higher baseline arousal in stimulating environments and stronger fatigue response after prolonged input. So this is, it's like things affect highly sensitive people. Naturally they do, but this is the research that shows it. There have been many studies as far as emotional responsiveness is concerned. They looked at, they noticed that HSPs have more activation in the mirror neuron systems, which has to do with empathy. And when brain regions tied to emotional processing like the amygdala and the insula. And studies show stronger responses to others facial expressions and emotional clues or cues, and greater responsiveness to both positive and negative emotions. And then finally, with sensitivity, sensitivity to subtlety. HSPS notice details that others miss. And that has also been shown in scientific studies. There's a lower threshold for detecting subtle stimuli and greater awareness of small changes and, and patterns and inconsistencies. So this is not just something that people are theorizing about. It's not something that is just kind of being talked about. This is something that they've done extensive scientific researches, research on to help us understand that this is actually a normal part of the, the human race. And it's not just the human race. They've studied over a hundred different species and it shows up in the same exact way, usually about 15 to 20% of any population, whatever the species is, shows this high sensitivity. For example, they looked at fish and they found that some fish are bold and quick to explore and others are cautious and observant and slower to act. And so the cautious fish spend more time assessing before acting and noticing changes in the environment sooner. And they tend to survive better in high risk or changing environments because they're so tuned in to that environment. The bold fish tend to find food faster, but they tend to take more risks and they do better in a stable, resource rich kind of environment. And they found the same kind of things with birds that are the sensitive birds are more accurate at detecting threats and they adjust their behavior more flexibly, but they're also affected by environmental stress more. And so it goes on like this. They looked at dogs, they looked at monkeys, and on and on and on. And what they found is that in every single species, right about the 15 to 20% range there, there's a difference of about 15 to 20% are showing the high sensitivity trait and about 80 to 85% are showing the just normal kind of trait, the non sensitive trait. And it brings up the idea that there are two strategies and they are complementary. And there's something that evolution has preserved over the millennia because there's a need for both. There's a need for the fast and the bold, and there's a need for the slow and the cautious. The fast, bold, less sensitive types of individuals act quickly, take risks, and are efficient in stable environments. Whereas the slow but cautious and highly sensitive individuals observe first, process things more deeply, adapt carefully, and do better in complex or changing environments. So if you have this trait, then it means that you were designed to pick up on danger earlier and to see signs of food availability earlier and to notice when someone needs support in the community and to be aware of changes even in group mood. And to be able to analyze situations deeply and thoroughly and get to the bottom of what's really going on. Even to be able to prevent conflict because you are aware of it so early and because you care about that. That is our role in society is to be the ones that notice things and then see what we can do to actually direct things in a way that can improve the life of the overall society. So we have a different operating system. It's not better and it's not worse. It's just different. Some people are built for speed and some people are built for depth. Highly sensitive people are built for depth. So the thing that you have to be aware of is that we have a limit and we can't keep going past that limit. Everybody has a limit, but we reach our limit quicker and we have to take our time to recoup and decompress so that we can begin again. We move in a kind of cyclical rhythm. Naturally we engage in something. We process that by taking time out and then we reset and begin again. Now, it's important, I mentioned already, to know the difference between stress and the trait of HSP itself. HSP is neutral wiring. It's natural. There's nothing that needs to be changed. I will always be a slow processor. My dad will always be a slow processor. Nothing you can do about that. There's nothing wrong with that. But stress patterns can overlay the natural trait and stress itself can cause a kind of sensitivity to in of its own. And so you have to watch that. What is the cause of this sensitivity in a certain situation? Is it due to the natural trait of being highly sensitive or is it due to an extra overlay of stress that can cause overwhelm And a feeling of just like you can't handle it and needing rest in the same kind of way. So at first it may be a little confusing until you sit with this and start to notice what's causing. Is this mice? Is this an overload of stress or is this just I need some need a break because I've had too much going on. And this is one of the things that it's helpful to sit with and to distinguish and to look at carefully so that you can know how to approach coming back to balance. If it's the trait that's just needing rest, you know, and just give it rest. If there's a stress pattern coming, then you may need to do some inner work to release that pattern. So why understanding this HSP trait is important is simply because it helps you to gain more self trust and helps you stop comparing yourself to others. It helps you make better decisions about how to pace yourself and about what environments to set up for yourself and what kind of boundaries that would support you. I support people in dealing with stress as highly sensitive people. And the two main approaches I use are self care, setting up an environment and a lifestyle that supports you so that you can protect that sensitivity. And I also do inner work that helps you to let go of attachment that causes stress. When you take care of both of these things, the self care, do the self care and allow yourself to let go of what you might be attached to. You can find that your sensitivity can begin to blossom and thrive. And it is not something that holds you back, but something that you work within as a natural part of your own self. And when you do that, you you have superpowers as a highly sensitive person and those become apparent and you begin to use those. So the feeling I'm left with today is that being an HSP is as normal as being male or female. It's simply how some of us are made. I love the normalization that this brings to what is sometimes considered a weakness and is looked down on by others and ourselves. Owning your sensitivity is the first step to a life of balance and self confidence. In this episode we looked at the common experiences that often point to someone being a highly sensitive person and they are noticing the subtleties. Being overwhelmed, easily processing things deeply and maybe even slowly, and being attuned to emotions that other people experience and our own. We also looked at what's happening beneath the surface that makes life feel more intense or overwhelming at times. And that is that we have a sensitive instrument and it is easy to overwhelm a sensitive instrument. It doesn't take a lot of disturbance from the environment when one is sensitive. But that's not a problem as long as you learn how to protect that sensitivity so that it can be used for what it was designed to do. And then we also looked at what begins to change when you understand how your system actually works. And in that case, you begin to own it. You begin to use it for what it was designed to do, and you stop trying to use it in a way that it was not designed to do. If you try to pretend that you're not sensitive just to fit in with the rest of the world, then you end up straining past your capacity and you end up causing more problems. So listen to the research, notice that this is something real, and act on that information. Thank you for listening. It's always great to explore with you. This program comes out three times a week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Join me next time for Strategy Fridays, where we think about specific things you can do to help manage stress as a highly sensitive person. Tired of feeling overwhelmed by everything all at once? Take the HSP stress test@TrueInnerfreedom.com you'll also find a link in the show notes. The test will reveal your unique stress sensitivity profile, including how your nervous system naturally responds to stimulation, emotions, social energy, and more. You'll also gain a clearer picture of how stress might be amplifying that sensitivity. Take the HSP Stress Test now. It's a powerful first step on your journey to true inner freedom. Sam.