Imagine a world where sensitivity is seen as a strength — all the way up to our leaders. I felt anxious and embarrassed as I squirmed in the rough office chair. Moments earlier, our VP, with his steel, unfeeling eyes, had shifted his gaze directly to me. With the flip of his hand, he’d asked me an impossible question. My stomach sank as I realized, in front of everyone’s watchful eyes, I had no idea how to answer him. I tried my best to look confident, “I’m not totally sure about the answer to that, but I will look into it after this meeting and let you know!” He wasn’t amused. “You all need ..read more

Everyone tells you to pretend you’re not sensitive. What if you do the opposite? I have always known that I feel things deeply and need time alone to process things — both signs of a highly sensitive person (HSP). But the first time I really admitted to myself that I was an HSP was when I stumbled across the work of Sheryl Paul. Learning about the HSP trait has helped me become more accepting of myself and to set up my life in a way that works for me and honors my sensitivity. Instead of viewing the fact that I’m “too sensitive” in a negative light, I started to see my high sensitivity as the ..read more

When overstimulation and emotional exhaustion combine, the result is a tidal wave that can knock highly sensitive people out for a day or more. About a month ago, my partner and I had a few friends over for dinner to celebrate an exciting milestone — our first time living alone together, no housemates, just us. It’d been a busy week: moving things around, cleaning, organizing real estate paperwork, and general life stuff. We wanted to just have a relaxing night in.      I cooked pasta while everyone talked excitedly, country music blaring from the speakers. By the end ..read more

For HSPs, your greatest strengths can also be your biggest obstacles if you don’t learn to overcome them. Here’s how.  As a highly sensitive people (HSPs), our depth of emotion and depth of experience is the source of your greatest talents. They are the wellspring for your empathy, intuition, and sensory intelligence. Yet these gifts can also leave you feeling blocked at times — especially if you haven’t learned how to fully understand and harness them.  I speak from experience. After working with dozens of creative HSPs with incredible vision and ideas, I seen the same problems emer ..read more

Does it ever feel like your high sensitivity is the one calling the shots, instead of you? Here’s why — and the proven techniques to change it. I have a very rich and vivid imagination. For instance, when I read books, the movie that plays in my mind’s eye is sometimes better than an actual adaptation would be. This isn’t because I’m special; it’s a common trait among many highly sensitive people (HSPs). In recent years, though, I have begun to realize that having such a vivid inner world can be a double-edged sword, as things can linger in my mind for a long time… a very long time. For ..read more

You can’t turn traumatic memories into positive ones, but you can change the story you tell yourself about them. Here’s how. It can sneak up on me, without warning and out of thin air. I can be minding my own business, doing dishes, driving, or daydreaming, and suddenly I am 13 again, humiliated by having to leave the school carnival early because the rides, lights, and blaring music overwhelming me and making me physically sick.  Do you ever have painful memories that sneak up on you? My body often responds involuntarily to these memories, with a jolt of adrenaline that causes a physic ..read more

Any of the 16 personality types can be highly sensitive people — but each type “does” sensitive a little differently. Have you ever felt as though you might not actually be as sensitive as you thought you were because your personality doesn’t fit the typical description to a tee? For example, perhaps you’ve never been much of a crier. Or perhaps you actually have a high tolerance to pain and other physical stimuli. If so, you’re certainly not alone. HSPs come in all sorts of different forms and we have a beautiful variety of personalities.  In the past few years, I’ve been committed to l ..read more

One way to protect your highly sensitive emotions is by figuring out how your energy is being depleted in the first place. Those of us with high sensitivity are known for feeling our emotions very deeply. In fact, science has confirmed that emotions hit highly sensitive people harder, and we also have a greater likelihood of feeling others’ emotions. When our empathic tendencies are activated, almost like a radio signal, we can tune into others’ energy and emotions and mistake them for our own. On the flip side, it’s a common occurrence for highly sensitive people to feel our energy and emot ..read more

Are you deeply moved by art, music, and beauty? You might be an ‘aesthetic’ HSP — and the more you nourish it, the better.  My mom warned me that listening to music so loudly would damage my hearing.  But I was 16 and I didn’t care. I was lucky enough to have my very own old raggedy car to drive myself to school and I wanted — no, needed — to blast my music as loud as I could in order to stand every precious second of the commute. As a highly sensitive introvert, it was my way of readying myself for another overstimulating day at school.  This meant that not only was I a highly ..read more

1 in 10 people are wired to cause conflict. Here’s how to deal with them — without losing your mind. We’ve all met them. The person who can’t let anything go. The person who needs to prove that you’re wrong. The person who has explosive reactions to small things, picks fights that don’t matter, and takes two huge leaps back for every one tippy-toe toward compromise. This is a “high conflict person,” and they create most of the world’s unnecessary drama. They may lie, shout, threaten, or even shove people. They are up to ten times more common than narcissists, and may do just as much damage. A ..read more