For instance, highly sensitive people’s downside is their tendency to sensory overload. That results in prolonged feelings of stress if they don’t take care of themselves. Consequently, stress, overstimulation, and overwhelm can impact their sleep, social relationships, eating habits, and overall health.
It does not stop there. Here’s a quick definition for those of you who are new to learning about the trait:
Highly Sensitive People
The term high sensitivity (HS) or highly sensitive person (HSP) was characterized in the 1990s by American psychologist and psychotherapist Dr. Elaine N. Aron.
According to her, a pioneer in researching, Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) is a unique, innate trait that at least 20 percent of the population had. In the scientific world, it is described as sensory processing sensitivity.
Important: It is NOT a disorder! It’s a personal trait, such as eye color. The sensory processing sensitivity (HSP) trait evolved as a survival strategy of the population. Highly sensitive people’s nervous system is very powerful and differentiative. Still, on the other hand, it is more sensitive to stress and overstimulation.
As stated by Dr. Aron the HSP trait is concluded in the acronym DOES, which stands for:
*Depth of processing
*Overstimulation
*Emotionally responsive, and Empathy
*Sensing subtleties
Stress and Highly Sensitive People
These days, stress is a major challenge for many people as well as Non-HSP as HSP’s. To name a few examples: a hectic, boring, stressful job, a chaotic, tensioned home life, bills to worry about, financial dependency, pressure, stress, and tension with your spouse, partner, colleague, sibling, friend, habits such as unhealthy, emotional eating, food stressors, environmental stressors, social stress such as racism and many more. All of those examples can lead to a mountain of stress in your physical, emotional, and mental body.
But as a highly sensitive person, your nervous system tends to get overstimulated easily in today’s modern society and the hectic, chaotic world because it takes in a lot of information in depth of processing. The HSP brain functions like a supercomputer – it takes in a lot and needs to process a lot.
If you feel overstimulated, you shut down your super senses and might become emotionally frozen. Consequently, it is harder to stay connected to the positive side of this trait, as well as the strengths of emotional sensitivity, empathy, compassion, and the power of vulnerability.
Therefore, it’s more important than ever to find the balance between healthy stimulation and overstimulation and become anchored in the centered, sensitive Self. I’d love for you to find ways to live BIG in this world instead of small caused by a lack of coping strategies for overstimulation, stress, and overwhelm. The world needs your sensitive leadership capacity!
