Identifying yourself as a highly sensitive person

Identifying if you are highly sensitive

A lot of people think that'high sensitivity' means that you are insecure and easily tired and overstimulated† I like that interpretation. If I omit that interpretation and look at the term alone, I come to the conclusion that (too) absorbing stimuli makes the highly sensitive person highly sensitive. How you deal with that depends on your character and environment. High sensitivity strengthens your character traits. After all, your observations are somewhat more sensitive. But everyone's sensitivity is different. That's why today we take a closer look at identifying yourself as a highly sensitive person: what does this all include?

Why is one and the other not highly sensitive?

Why one person is a highly sensitive person (HSP) and the other is not, I find connected to the energetic shield around you. You are born with it. The thicker your shield, the less you can pick up with intuition and the more businesslike you work. It can become thinner or thicker over the years. It is often thinner in children as well if they have not yet been formed by their environment, but I will come back to that later in the article.

Sometimes events such as trauma make for a thicker shield: then you receive few incentives and you work little with your intuition. Some call that 'having a wall around you'. Trauma can also make your shield thinner, so that you receive a lot of stimuli. For example, you have to cry a lot and you can't take much. Your character has a lot of influence on this: what is your protection mechanism?

You cannot identify yourself as HSP on all levels

It is often described that high sensitivity is someone makes you tired. That does not apply to all people who are highly sensitive. So you do not need that as a guideline to identify yourself as a highly sensitive person. Getting tired quickly always happens in combination with other things, such as having difficulty saying no. That is therefore fixed in the character of that person. If you really like going on adventures, you only like this high sensitivity more. These people do not see high sensitivity as a problem and seek/share little information about it. The people who do, are precisely the people who get tired quickly and are overstimulated. That is why a lot has been written about high sensitivity and insecurity and such, but less about the extroverted HSP.

This smaller group of extroverted HSPs who nevertheless come across the term highly sensitive and also consider themselves highly sensitive, will find that they have almost no connection with the (described in many articles) stereotypical highly sensitive people. They do not recognize themselves in 'not being able to cope with crowded spaces'; that's why they are extroverted. They recognize themselves in 'problems' as 'not wanting to be alone' (ie not wanting to withdraw). In short, much information and self-tests are based on (not entirely correct) interpretation of high sensitivity† In my view you can be just as much an HSP if you have your affairs under full control as someone who is overly agitated.

Thinking twice about labels

In society there are rules about what is normal. People want to belong. Because they want to belong, they are (un)consciously prepared to adjust their own character to fall under 'normal'. After all, they want a job, a house (think of a stereotypical HSP who likes to withdraw when necessary) and to make ends meet.

Do you dare to show that you are different from others? Then you soon have PDD-Nos or another disorder. Parents often participate in these labels, because some parents also sincerely think that their child is not doing well because it does not want to make eye contact. They hope that care will make the child independent. And an independent child often means for a parent a child that meets various requirements, such as requirements of a future employer. In addition, care is often only reimbursed if you put a label on it. Parents can also justify the 'abnormal behavior' by means of the label. Children in turn interpret negatively that a label stands for 'being different'. After all, they get a different approach and other, 'normal' children do not. Children with labels sometimes no longer dare to investigate who they really are.

High sensitivity is also a label. Many people who do not feel comfortable with labeling, do not want to place themselves under high sensitivity. However, label thinking also has advantages: high sensitivity is a term that is not so much worrisome, as autism sometimes suggests, and which many people who live more emotionally can identify with. Often placing yourself under high sensitivity creates understanding and bonding with others. This increases the feeling of happiness and some dare to develop their own self again.

To what extent can you identify with the term high sensitivity in relation to you?