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Signs you are a Highly Sensitive Person or a Parent to an HSP
73 Plays1 year ago
Hello beautiful souls!
I am so grateful to be back with a solo episode on the indicators of being a Highly Sensitive Person. I am so passionate about helping other HSP's feel validated and create healthy boundaries for themselves.
This is an introduction to the signs of being an HSP & a bit on my own experience as an HSP. I highly encourage anyone wanting to go deeper to explore the books and work of Dr. Elaine Aron.
To take an HSP assessment quiz and learn all about her work: https://hsperson.com/
Dr. Aron is the researcher and author of the book "The Highly Sensitive Person" - must read for anyone wanting to understand the traits of being an HSP and their sensitivities. Also, her documentary "Sensitive the Untold Story" is phenomenal. I literally cried with relief that how I (and my kids) are a real thing!
If you or someone you love, has high sensitivity to smells, lights, easily overwhelmed, retreat to quiet spaces with privacy often, avoid upsetting situations, have a depth of inner awareness or seen as sensitive & shy (especially as a child)?
This episode is a brief introduction to the world of being an HSP. My intention is to validate and empower you as a parent to a highly sensitive child or for yourself as an HSP.
Thank you for listening and if this is helpful and you could leave a rating or review it would mean the world to me <3
To connect with Renee:
Instagram @feelgoodwithrenee or www.reneenovello.com
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Sensitivity and Self-Love
00:00:13
Speaker
Hello and welcome. I am Renee. I'm very excited to be here with you today. This will be a solo episode. I was feeling into what topic I wanted to speak to and share with you. And what kept coming up for me is being a highly sensitive person.
00:00:39
Speaker
and how to honor and love yourself if you are a highly sensitive person, or to understand if you have a highly sensitive person that you are caring for in a relationship with,
00:01:00
Speaker
someone in your world is likely a highly sensitive person.
Understanding Sensitivity: Scientific Insights
00:01:04
Speaker
It's actually a research and scientific discovery that highly sensitive people have brains that work a little differently. So
00:01:19
Speaker
For me personally, I did not know I was a highly sensitive person until much later in life. And now I can take more space for what I need personally to feel good. I can also create boundaries in a way that supports me as a highly sensitive person. And I've just learned to trust myself more.
00:01:46
Speaker
So why is it so important to know about your sensitivity? Well, from my perspective, this is my own personal theory, but we are seeing an increase in sensitivity.
Sensitivity in Children: Mental Health Implications
00:02:05
Speaker
We are either ourselves noticing that we're more sensitive in our
00:02:14
Speaker
perceptions, our feeling states, our physical bodies. And many of us have children that are coming in with very specific attunements to their environment, to energy, to texture. And this is so important to know how to support our sensitivity so that we are not spiraling in our mental health or well-being. And
00:02:42
Speaker
that we're honoring and meeting our children or our loved ones where they're at.
Dr. Elaine Aaron's Contributions
00:02:50
Speaker
So I wanted to share with you a few resources. I learned about being a highly sensitive person from one main source. Her name is Dr. Elaine Aaron. She has done a lot of research and work on what it means to be a highly sensitive person. And she has a fantastic documentary
00:03:16
Speaker
maybe you've heard of it. It's called Sensitive, the Untold Story, and it features Atlantis Morissette, who has spoken to her experience as being a sensitive, and it's really a fantastic documentary. I found it fascinating. In fact, I rewatched it a couple times at this point.
Personal Experiences of Sensitivity
00:03:44
Speaker
Dr. Elaine Aaron also has a book, and I believe that is just called The Highly Sensitive Person, but I will put that in the show notes and clarify. So I want to get into just exploring what this means and talking about it.
00:04:04
Speaker
I would love to hear if this resonates for you, if you feel like you are a highly sensitive person, if you have felt misunderstood, perhaps in the way that you are perceiving and experiencing the world and how that has been a gift and how that has been a challenge, because that is how I have experienced it is
00:04:30
Speaker
being wired a little differently, I am able to have this incredible sick sense of picking up subtleties and feelings and knowings. And it can be really hard when you're misunderstood or people don't necessarily understand where you're coming from. So,
00:04:59
Speaker
There is, I think, a common theme with being highly sensitive where you can feel misunderstood. I also have experienced sensitivities in my physical body that some people relate to also being a highly sensitive person on a physical layer.
00:05:23
Speaker
And these are our feelers. The highly sensitive people are feeling, they're able to pick up and observe so much that maybe most people aren't. In fact, most people aren't in the room. So the statistics on being a highly sensitive is that one in five people, so it's 20% of the population are a highly sensitive person.
00:05:53
Speaker
And this information that I'm going to share with you about the nuances of this, my intention is that this will allow you to feel more empowered, to feel like you can relax into yourself.
Sensory Processing in Children
00:06:12
Speaker
and potentially go from here and seeking more information or validation. And now there are many different Instagram accounts. There's many different resources out there that are talking openly about this. As I said at the beginning, I think that we are only at the very beginning of where the sensitivity spectrum is going to go.
00:06:36
Speaker
and it's happening, open up the resonance and the coherence of our hearts. It's allowing us to get into our hearts and get out of our minds. And that is going to be
00:06:50
Speaker
so needed and as we are finding more coherence in our hearts, our nervous systems, and our bodies, and that is going to be bringing us into higher levels of awareness and consciousness on the planet.
00:07:09
Speaker
We know that we are seeing, and you probably have or have at least heard of somebody that has a child with a sensory processing and they call it a disorder. But, you know, I mean, it's a sensory processing sensitivity. I would say both of my children have this. It has to do with in kids, oftentimes how they can be very sensitive to textures in their food, in their clothing,
00:07:38
Speaker
sensitive to noise, sensitive to bright lights, to too much stimulation, they can feel overwhelmed. And sometimes with children that can be really scary and they can act out and it can be stressful for them and their caregiver because if the caregiver isn't attuned to understanding
00:08:04
Speaker
highly high sensitivity, they're potentially thinking, something's wrong with this child, how do I fix this? It causes a lot of stress in the moment. And it, in my experience as being both a highly sensitive person and a highly sensitive parent of a person, people,
00:08:27
Speaker
I feel what they're experiencing and I feel it myself in my own body, if that makes sense. I feel and I can be empathetic to what they're experiencing and then I also feel it in my own body.
Traits of Highly Sensitive People
00:08:43
Speaker
So that can be hard and
00:08:47
Speaker
It is fascinating that so many are coming in with these high levels of sensitivity and knowings and that they are here to teach us. Like I said, I feel like it has a lot to do with teaching us to be more open in our heart, more open in our understanding that people have
00:09:13
Speaker
all sorts of different gifts and abilities. So highly sensitive, their brains work a little differently. They're much more aware of subtleties and their brain processes information and reflects on it differently. So being a highly sensitive person, you notice everything.
00:09:38
Speaker
You pick up on it, for me, you pick up on it on a feeling state. You can feel the room, you can read the room. You are able to gather a lot of information through the sensitivity of your senses, through your sight, your hearing, all of it. You're taking in information and this can be hard because it can be overwhelming.
00:10:08
Speaker
For example, you could be on a plane and in the environment, an unusual environment packed into a plane with all sorts of other energy fields and people and noise and different things going on that you're taking in and you can notice
00:10:30
Speaker
things happening in that environment that you can feel uncomfortable about. Like let's say there's a baby that the parents are getting frustrated with and you're like taking that in and processing that and it has this lasting imprint really.
00:10:49
Speaker
So it can be overwhelming. I can feel like I've heard it referred to as being like a high monitor, like I'm constantly highly monitoring and it can be overstimulating in the intensity of just everyday life you're picking up on and you're seeing things that
00:11:08
Speaker
80% of the population is not, according to the statistics. Other characteristics of being a highly sensitive person are that you can need time and space to assess situations.
Challenges of Sensitivity
00:11:20
Speaker
This can be interpreted or felt as shyness.
00:11:24
Speaker
That has absolutely been my experience my whole life. I was a kid that needed time to process. I needed to observe and hang back before I jumped in and engaged. I've seen this with actually both of my kids too.
00:11:41
Speaker
And it can be challenging in society, right? You go, you take your kid to a birthday party, everybody's having such a great time, right? And you think the standard in that moment is, yeah, go over there, play with the kids, do the things that they're doing, and just jump right in. Highly sensitive, people need time to acclimate. They need to sense and take in the environment oftentimes before they feel comfortable jumping in.
00:12:11
Speaker
This can be hard for the caretaker because okay, you know, the norm here, quote unquote, is everybody's doing the fun activity and it can bring up frustration. Why are you not jumping in?
00:12:26
Speaker
Why do you need this extra space? I have been both on the receiving end of that, and I've also been the perpetrator of that with my own children, where I'm not putting myself in their shoes and I'm not slowing down and allowing them space. And sometimes that can be hard. I feel, you know, a little bit of shame or regret around that.
00:12:48
Speaker
times where I was feeling uncomfortable, so I was trying to force them or push them into moving at a pace that they were not comfortable with. So this can often lead to low self-esteem. If you are a sensitive person and you've been told your whole life, what's wrong with you? Why are you so sensitive? Don't be so sensitive. All those sorts of messages really come at highly sensitive people.
00:13:18
Speaker
And that can lead to feeling low about yourself. Like, you know, what's wrong with me? Why can't I just jump in? Why am I, you know, wired differently in this way? And it can also lead to being codependent and feeling responsible for fixing or absorbing
00:13:43
Speaker
if there's tension in the room, if someone is acting out in a certain way that makes you feel uncomfortable, you feel a pressure to fix that or to make it okay. And that can be even a pattern that you carry throughout life that can be that over-functioning, codependent nature.
00:14:07
Speaker
Because you feel like you're not safe if people are upset. Because you feel that intensity of the emotionality happening.
00:14:20
Speaker
And also, depending on the degree of how much of an open and path you are and a highly sensitive person, you can take on other people's stuff, right? You can kind of, the line is blurred and you can mistake it as your own. Also leading to potentially being more predisposed to people pleasing.
00:14:45
Speaker
This is important. I'm bringing all this through because there's an opportunity here to heal and to be a whole highly sensitive person and to just take stock of where these potentials maybe fall for
Embracing Sensitivity and Setting Boundaries
00:15:04
Speaker
you. Not saying that everyone has them, that's sensitive.
00:15:08
Speaker
And of course, because this is my perspective and I'm the one sharing, these are things that I have had programming and patterns around. So one thing that I have had to work through is evaluating boundaries of where I am trying to control environments, where I'm over giving,
00:15:36
Speaker
And with being sensitive, it's very important that we find our voice and our footing with teaching people how to treat us, with potentially even educating them on your needs, how you are wired.
00:16:02
Speaker
That can all help to feel more ease. It can go such a long way if people know where you're coming from and you're able to stand up for yourself and explain yourself in a way that is non-confrontational and allows there to be space for discussion.
00:16:26
Speaker
you know, not trying to convince anyone of anything, but just letting them know what is okay and what is not. So sensitivity is a gift. It is a gift because you are in a sense able to come to a conclusion and have an emotional attunement
00:16:55
Speaker
and be very caring and loving, very highly intelligent in an emotionally IQ way. So indicators of being an HSP is that you are an introspective feeler,
00:17:14
Speaker
potentially overwhelmed by external input. And oftentimes you need more rest and time alone to discharge the feelings and the information that you have picked up from other people and being out in the world. HSPs can have sensitive physical bodies.
00:17:42
Speaker
Oftentimes that can manifest with anxiety, digestive issues, or carrying tension in the body. So the HSP path is a little different. It requires us to
00:18:03
Speaker
own our differences and to be able to have boundaries around those differences, to be compassionate to ourselves.
Sensitivity as a Gift: Living Authentically
00:18:15
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And it allows us to connect from our hearts ultimately, which is a beautiful thing. So I wanted to speak about this because
00:18:29
Speaker
A transformation for HSP that honors and loves themselves is when that they understand that their needs are what they are, and they don't apologize for them, and they have boundaries, and they are able to take up space and trust themselves. And this is so needed for them to be self-led.
00:18:56
Speaker
for them to be fully in their power and resonance. And as I mentioned, I believe that the future is more and more sensitive. And we see that with how our kids have their sensory sensitivities. So this is an introduction to what it is to be a highly sensitive person.
00:19:26
Speaker
Tell me, do you resonate with this? Do you feel like you're one of five? Definitely watch the documentary by Dr. Elaine Aaron. It's so fascinating. I mean, it's going to feel so validating to you. If you are in HSP when you watch it,
00:19:49
Speaker
It's going to probably move you like it did to me, to tears or chills or just be in this feeling state of, wow, I feel so seen and understood.
00:20:04
Speaker
And there is a common thread in this podcast where we are exploring ways to go deeper within our own self-awareness, within our own knowing, because nothing feels better than
00:20:22
Speaker
being in our own power, fully shining our light bright out into the world unapologetically, stepping into our gifts, stepping into living in our purpose. That is what we are being called for to do. If you are listening to this, there's a chance that there is a urge within you that maybe
00:20:51
Speaker
is quiet and maybe subtle, but you're feeling called forth to shine brighter and you want it to feel good. You don't want to take with you old programming, fear, limiting beliefs, all that density and all that stuff. You believe somewhere that there is
00:21:15
Speaker
space where you can step forward and feel really good about shining your light and not dimming to fit in and not apologizing for the uniqueness and the difference that you are, that you're here to make and to bring forward. And the stakes are that if we don't do it, I mean, think about that. Those stakes are actually really relevant.
00:21:44
Speaker
I can't remember the name of the book, but it's about people's regrets when they are on their deathbed. And it has to do with living our lives small, about listening to what other people want for us instead of what we want for ourselves and what we are here to claim and
Reflecting on Personal Sensitivity
00:22:07
Speaker
to do. And once we get that clear signal,
00:22:11
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Once we understand and we know who we are, we can fully step into ownership. Fully step in all in and live from that place. So, HSPs.
00:22:32
Speaker
Do you parent one? Are you one? Are you married to one? I would love to hear your experience with this if this resonates with you and how it's hard and then how it is good.
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:22:45
Speaker
Thank you for listening to this podcast. Thank you for taking your energy and your time and your attention, which is so precious in this world, to listen in. And I hope that this leaves you with a little spark of feeling lighter and joy in your life, sending you a big hug.
00:23:03
Speaker
Thank you for listening to this episode. If you enjoyed it and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post on social media, or leave a rating and review. It would mean the world to me. To catch all the latest from me, you can follow me over on Instagram at Feel Good With Renee. Thanks again, and I will see you next time.