Proud To Be A Gentle Blend
SensitivE EMPATHY – the HuMAN bitcoin 2.0?
Are you by nature highly sensitive, highly perceptive, or cognitively and sensory active? Highly whatsoever definition may fit! What does that mean for you? Are you possibly feeling proud of it?
*** Caution! Please decide yourself if at the very moment you are open-minded ‘enough’ to read further here. The following content might lead to more tolerance, compassion, respect and empathy by dissolving cognitive dissonance in the way you perceive sensitive “others”. Please also note, this is a viewpoint from an individual perspective without any intention to claim a universal truth. As I believe in the inviolable equality of different perspectives and viewpoints. ***
For more than 4 years now, I have been passionately researching on this particular topic inside a countless number of available resources on- and offline and must say, at first, it left me with a quite pessimistic view-point. Let me therefore start by making subjective comments on what by personal experience I nowadays feel is no match.
By a summary of what I think it is NOT.
Common thesis 1: Highly sensitive people are lacking sensory filters.
My first reaction to it was: shock, self doubts, and FEAR. Woooo, there is something quite essential missing, something that against an undefined baseline “measure” is expected (by whom?) to be there. Something that is essentially needed (for what?). Ok, mhmm. And now, what? Where can I buy it? **joke**. Against which baseline measure this is compared, I may ask – yet fully seriously. So there are people who think, feel, perceive A LOT. They do so by nature, naturally, instinctively, by predisposition. They amount up to 20% of the population statistically. The have wide open physical or psychic sensory antennas which 80% obviously do not “have”, or let’s better say do not actively use. They are apt to process on CONSCIOUS or semi-conscious LEVELs more than an average person.
So?
If we remove a neat judgement filter for a second: Nothing of that is good or bad, worse or better, worst or best. It just IS.
However, the widely accepted ‘conclusion’ is there must be something missing – and therefore needs to be fixed like a ‘disease’. Arbitrarily declared disease black box, in fact, no one deeply and holistically thoroughly penetrates to the heart of things. Something that better needs to be adjusted is juggled like a hot potatoe. For example, someone who is dedicated in alternative therapy just recently told me she diagnosed someone “highly sensitive”. Seriously??
When did we start to declare something that to a certain degree we all do share – an individual sense of perception – to be a defect that needs a fix?
For all the ultra-rationals out there, let us quickly have a more systematic umbrella view here: A concluded THEORY by those who do not “suffer” from a “lack”, yet quite assertively proclaim by doctrine that it is a LACK. An assumption turned into doctrine by an even smallish percentage of x out of 80%. I do respect that. But I do not consent. Fact is we are 100% together. And we are talking here about one fifth of the population, not even a rare amount of some unexplainable statistical outliers only.
I find this really difficult to be sold the ultimate “truth” to those who seek adequate understanding in what innate predisposition they are born with. So, it becomes a problem cause you are constantly being told it is a problem. Classified by those who obviously do not share the experience. The result may most likely be that natural assets are suppressed again into a mediocrity that can be “understood”. Either by trying to re-adapt them to a reduced, accepted level of mental behaviour in order to function again normally, or by pushing them into highly addictive medication – to get a quick shot re-norming result. The prescription rate of anti-depressants and similar substances has exploded over the last 50 years. While, let us face it, there are no rock-solid reliable long-term effect studies on the use of psychotropics.
The human psyche still is one of the biggest mysteries to us. Compared to human history any holistic scientific approach to it has just “recently” started to evolve in baby steps over the last 150 years. Which is fine as soon as we see it that way: a certain early state of scientific evolution. A lot to discover still, just to give it a humble touch.
And well … there is certainly a complex systemic view to consider for each individual case. E.g. faceted degrees of individual resource characteristics, epigenetic determinants, curriculum vitae influencing conditions, social and biological environmental factors, and certainly development states of individual coping strategies. I would for sure never question the daily idealistic effort by many in the healing industry who try to support those who do suffer and seek help.
But I, personally, do harshly critique a dogmatic ‘conclusion’ on the declaration of a pathological malfunction deficit one-fits all theory-’truth’ from somewhere within the statistical mass that does not consider the full picture from a relevant experience database. Kind of denying coloured human sensory contrasts in between do exist.
Maybe a picture helps to make this more coherent:
It would be like advising a deep sea whale to better switch off his sonar - and make him learn to send & receive a simple 160 character SMS instead.
I would like to add another perspective from one who did both, “suffer” (as long as I believed there is something wrong), and finally found treasure in it when I falsified that assumption for myself. Counter-thesis: “What if there is nothing missing? What effect could it have for those of altered sensory capability if their biological predisposition was accredited, cared for and fostered?” Having travelled a personal odyssey, I finally chose to choose the second way perspective for myself, chose to walk the talk and incrementally adapt my lifestyle to best comfort my sensitive needs. For instance, by the conscious creation of “zero-external-input” zones. May it be noise, hectic, extensive small-talk, smells, etc. and do still enjoy much and many social contacts, either privately or in business matters. But on aware demand and certainly more selectively now in terms of conversation quality. For my mental processor to daily reboot after intense social update, and clear cache.
Common thesis 2: Highly sensitive people are space cadets.
Gosh, thanks god, they are! The best inventions you are using so normally today were implemented by space cadets with unorthodox imagination. And guess what, they always will be, even if they silently concentrate on hands-on practical stuff, even more by functioning in soul-sucking routine jobs, or passionately pretending to like football (e.g.!). They may just not tell anyone and hide their real personality inside! Not show it, as they fear not to be understood, respected or accepted by whatever their mind produces with flying colours up in the sky. What a pity that these beautiful mind’s idle creativity may not be seen or realised just because some simply may not be aware of the infinite sky’s magnetic stimulus.
I herewith openly declare myself proud to be a space cadet soul. Mimosa space cadet pragmatic visionary. With my two feet firmly on the ground – when I want and need to! To live a life with both parts freely in it.
“Yeah, right. And what is all that in aid of?” – one may cynically ask.
Simple. Because I see-sense options when others may not.
Saying this, I would full-heartedly smile back at you, and continue: “And personally that makes me a wonderfully empathic coach, mentor, friend & partner – back then even international project manager or information platform architect. I do process mentally highly detailed, and simultaneously with all of my senses on aware level. It enables me to quick-sense into people, concepts, challenges, visions, possibilities for an open rational discussion and due diligence feasibility study later on. A full picture top-down-top processing loop approach. Where the majority may start somewhere in the middle layer, and get lost in focusing attention solely on problems, pessimistic views and no-gos without wanting to understand systematically the underlying root-causes.”
It is in aim of a fuller picture to make an effective difference. Which takes grasp time by thorough effort, and can be quite tiring sometimes, too.
That was a snapshot of the common bias side as I perceive it to be. A dominant collective opinion that may make it for most of us hard to fully blend into a society which is anyhow trending to become cognitively-emotionally flatter and flatter. The quicker it goes the more it woes. Another highly interesting topic but not for now.
Better – time is now to paint a personal picture of what it is. Let’s maybe first take a long and deep breath from here.
To be a highly sensitive, highly perceptive, highly whatsoever being personally for me means:
To close the eyes and eclectically drift into the bass of a divine deadmou5 masterpiece. With all senses fully surrender into it. Feel it, let it gently and softly vibrate into every cell of my body. Let it slowly take me into a mental state of free fuse emotion and sensing at the same time, glide deeply into it ….. until the very last tone fades out… then open the eyes, smile and work with energetic bliss on a dry business plan calculation.
To stand in deepest wonder. In wonder of once-in-a-lifetime moments. Speechlessly absorb while watching a Sahara sunrise with a hot peppermint tea in my hands. At midnight on a beach in Mexico stare at the clear night sky with my feet in warm sand while the sound of incoming waves tenderly orchestrates a moment of all-sense serenity that goes beyond words. Climb a glacier in Patagonia for the first time and presumably feel excited like Luis Armstrong when he stepped on moon ground.
To openly cry rivers reading something that touches my soul so deeply. Cry rivers for loss, cruelty, injustice or in grief. Cry rivers of bliss. Embrace to shamelessly cry when I feel like. All so very natural parts of the full me-spectrum.
It means to be endlessly curious in many different aspects. To be 100% intrinsically empowered. Tirelessly research for hours to learn new things. Learn them quickly and profoundly. Build a website on my own for the first time – whatever it takes. Get frustrated. Research night after night for an understanding on how things could possibly work. Procrastinate when it does not go the way I initially thought it should. Get more frustrated. Work harder on it. Almost give up, doubt myself for a short while and then wake up one day: There it is! The fully coloured picture!! And from there things enter a sudden flow as if nothing more there was to be understood. Just to be done – in a creative state of flux with flying colours and joy. Finally, smirk proudly at the end result.
It also means for me to enjoy the treasure of deep rest and solitude. Not ‘doing’ anything for hours, just space-cadetting. Sit still in meditation and enjoy every level of deepest mental relaxation that re-energizes me fully. Forget time and space when reading a fascinating book. Or feel the need to walk alone in the woods for a while not saying a word.
In particular it means moments of deepest emotional-physical perception. To feel the overwhelming intensity of true intimacy in a welcome hug I never ever want to leave. And show it. Magnetically bond in there for the breath-taking beauty of that moment. Moments of true, unmasked loyalty between me and my loved ones. A purely passionate kiss or touch that makes me shiver unchanged even years later just by retrieving the memory of it. Spontaneous gestures to give or receive caring compassion that it makes me cry for a spark that kindles freely from the heart.
It means wanting to write about what I see, sense, observe. It means wanting to share experience, competence, thoughts and energy with others to co-create together in constructively focused, gentle attitude.
All of that and more.
In a nutshell: To be in grateful receipt of an extra bit of a colourful sensory deep dimension of life.
And a last thought. If one day the last tree is cut, the earth dry of oil, what truly sustainable ‘currency’ for fuelling future progress do we primarily have if not the natural willforce to create teamwork solutions by personal commitment to sensible collaboration? On whatever community or relationship level it may be. It is a conscious decision to invest in embracing our own energy sources first, beyond all vaguely assumed ‘differences’. And then respectfully play in the sandbox together. 😉
Some will relate more than others. I am truly in personal peace with that.
Let us love not only our sameness but our unsameness. In our difference is our strength. (Leonard Peltier)
For those who can… I hope you find heart-felt inspiration in it.
Feel free to read also: Knock Knock – Who’s It?
Or leave a comment. 🙂
Please feel free to share this content with others but maintain the article’s integrity by copying it unaltered, and by including the author plus source website link: Nadia Oulhaj, Bulb Your Mind, https://bulbyourmind.com
Zlatko M.
17th January 2018 9:16 pmA very nice post and bunch of valid points and topics for thinking.
I tend to put a question mark over one of the statements though, and I am not even certain it is your statement since that figure appears quite often when talked about the Highly-Sensitive population. The 20% seems to be a very conveniently round figure and a very arbitrary one too. I don’t want to say it is low or high, I just don’t see what was or what could be a base for establishing that figure. Problem for me comes from the fact that Highly Sensitive people can’t be put into a single basket, and can’t be simply delineated to being or not being highly sensitive. I have a feeling that confidence of that statistics is somewhat lacking. For qualifying you for being highly sensitive you don’t necessarily have to tick all the boxes on the questionnaire, and ticking some or none doesn’t disqualify you either, as the questionnaire itself might be lacking in its understanding what it tries to establish. Personally I expect that figure to be much higher, but it wouldn’t cover just the ‘full spectrum’ highly sensitive people but also those that are brilliant on a single topic, the ones that have their antennae tuned to one specific frequency, but at a very high level. What I am getting at, and what you touch in the article, is that instead of understanding the differences and reaping the benefits of being different, possibly brilliant in one area and also possibly totally useless in other, we as a society are trying to medicalize it and bring everyone to the baseline level at whatever cost. I have the impression that again we as a society are failing at one major thing, and that is failing to identify brilliance among children through the education system. Instead of encouraging differences we are boxing the children in. They have to pass the same tests, perform in a same manner to satisfy the same criteria. Ultimately they are to be prepared to feed the corporate world with reusable cogs that runs the machinery. Brilliance is often perceived as bothersome and problematic, because it has its own ideas, and is difficult to manage. Exceptions of course exist, but the pace of change in this area is limited and slow. At this age of digital and integrated everything, where everything can be tailor-made it seems unreasonable that the schooling system still relies on concepts of 18th and 19th century. And the major problem with that is that it doesn’t affect us immediately (it does – because the current society is a mirror the result of schooling in past decades) but it also ruins the future of the society to be.
Nadia Oulhaj
6th February 2018 9:23 pmDear Zlako,
first of all your quite elaborated comment is much appreciated. Thank you very much for openly sharing.
The statistical approximation of 20% is a proportion by pattern that has been “measured” scientifically by observing various living beings’s populations – from bees to humans. In a sense it is a research pattern hint that breeds further elaboration by neuroscience and psychology in joint forces. A pattern I myself can observe in me in others likewise, so personal experience supports the general outline that there are differences ignored or to vast degree unknown by a bigger group.
I personally do totally agree with most you stated, would however like to ping back one counter question:
What sigificant difference to the overall statement of neglecting talents would it make if it was 21%, 19% or even 30%+?
What – in my view – is essential common sense among the article & your comment is that it is a structural, cultural and educational unawareness of a majority that shapes the environmental system (schools, jobs, etc.), a common “opinion”, an overall limited perception what “can” or “should” be. Neglecting what ‘could be’. Limiting those who may want to contribute in a different form.
Great complentary comment! Thanks again. 🙂