Highly Sensitive People: how to harness and nurture their superpower

The Highly Sensitive People they have a different neurological wiring that makes them perceive more information through their senses than the rest of the people, and many times this avalanche of stimuli causes them to become saturated.

Meritxell García discovered by chance that she was a Highly Sensitive Person (PAS). From that moment on, her life changed completely and she began to investigate PAS. Has published The strength of being highly sensitive (Grijalbo), a book that invites people to discover if they are PAS and learn from their creative power. In this article, he discovers the secrets of Highly Sensitive People.

By Meritxell Garcia

Highly Sensitive People (PAS) are 30% of the population. That is, 3 out of 10 people are PAS. Either you are one of them or there is someone close to you who is. There is a lot of ignorance about the personality trait and that makes many people who are highly sensitive unaware and have never heard of the trait.

Highly sensitive people: what neuroscience says

Today we have different studies by Bianca Acevedo, Elaine Aron and Michael Pluess among others that tell us that there are 30% of people who are highly sensitive, that PAS we receive 10% more information through the senses and we have mirror neurons -those in charge of capturing the emotional state of other people- more activated that lead us to empathize more easily with others.

Nature is very wise. Highly sensitive individuals have been found in more than 100 species of animals, It is not an exclusive personality trait of human beings, far from it.

What distinguishes Highly Sensitive People (PAS)

Studies seem to indicate that PAS they react to the environment and to sensory stimuli differently from neurotypicals. We tend to observe and analyze before acting and generally have a slower response to stimuli due to deep information processing.

It is a way of nature to ensure that there will be some individuals in the species that will not be carried away by impulse and a first analysis, but by observing and taking their time they will analyze and see the subtleties and find another different path.

This looks very easy in a study on bluegill fish. Scientists realized that there were two types of fish: the timid and the daring. The timid fish were slow to adjust to the conditions of the controlled environment in the study and fell further behind the bold fish, which were comfortable in the environment. It was forced that in the enclosure in which they were there would be a shortage of food.

The shy fish observed the situation and knew the environment very well, realizing that they had to look for an alternative option and were among the first to swim into open water in search of food. The timid fish’s observation, pause, and awareness of their surroundings—although they had been in an observation rather than action attitude at first—caused them to take a shortcut that the daring fish missed. We PAS are the shy fish.

Is it good to be a highly sensitive person?

sensitivity is a gift and that gift lies in the force that moves this sensory and intense perception of reality.

Have fine sensory perception It is neither good nor bad, It depends on the specific stimulus. This gift is a great privilege when spring comes and allows us to distinguish the smells of flowers, and it is not so pleasant when the garbage truck passes by.

When it comes to emotional sensitivity, happiness in all its splendor is a great feeling, and when we experience disappointment, sadness can invade us in the same way.

Each PAS has a more developed sense than another and may be disturbed by noises, smells, flavors or textures. Emotional reactivity without management tools can take us on an emotional roller coaster, going from laughing to crying easily. Deep processing feeds a destructive internal critic that crushes us from the inside if we don’t work on our self-empathy and self-esteem.

Empathy is another of the characteristics that can play in favor of our gift connecting deeply with others or against us if we forget our needs to please others.

Highly sensitive people: how to seize opportunities

In the force of being highly sensitive we travel to the world of creativity. Sensitivity and creativity are united: the more sensory stimuli, the more information perceived. And what do we do with this information?

We can generate intrusive thoughts, anxiety and endlessly spinning things or we can make creative connections, materialize options that we have imagined and look for different ways to carry out what we propose from the game.

Creativity is like a Swiss Army knife. The moment you hold it in your hand for the first time, you don’t quite understand what all those strange gadgets are, but once you become familiar with it, you increasingly see more utilities and options with its tools. Through practical creativity exercises we cultivate the habit necessary for creativity to enter our daily life and play in favor of sensitivity.

As human beings we are wired for creativity. It is a natural talent that has advanced the human being. Before a table was built, the Wifi or the clothes you wear someone had to create and invented first in their head.

Many times we associate creativity with artistic production and we are wrong to think that it is the only creativity that exists. Everyday creativity: the one that inspires us to get dressed in the morning, the one that allows us to innovate a recipe, recycle materials and create with them, the one that seeks solutions to the problems of the day… is also creativity.

Taking life as a game, with the eyes of a child, seeing options everywhere and imagining allows us to find solutions where rationality creates problems. The Swiss Army knife of creativity comes to remove the weeds of limits, beliefs, and self-fulfilling prophecies.

Highly sensitive people: how to deal with difficulties

Sensitivity is directly related to the perception of subtleties of the environment. In the workplace, short delivery times for tasks or projects can affect us, the anxiety of feeling observed or watched, having to speak in front of a large group of people or being the victim of violent communication and lack of empathy and respect towards sensitivity and neurodiversity.

In our home they may not understand our sensitivity or why we live words and emotions intensely. It is our job as PAS to manage sensitivity, understand ourselves better and be able to express ourselves so that others understand us.

This does not mean that we should be treated in cotton, but that self-knowledge allows us to be more connected with our needs, to be able to express and communicate from empathy and give the necessary importance to what happens to us if we are aware of what affects us and why. Most of the time the problem and the solution are within you.

PAS and not PAS we should be selective when it comes to spending time with people. The vitamin people Marian Rojas talks about are essentially people with whom we feel good and exchange oxytocin, which is the empathy hormone. The people we choose should bring something to our lives and build healthy give-and-receive relationships with them.

We’ve all ever had an interaction or a friend that does us more harm than good, either because of their personality, because they drain our energy, or because we don’t connect on a deep level.

We must let ourselves feel if the people around us add to our life experience, we receive them with a smile or if they are one of those people we let go of. whatsapp until there is no choice but to answer.

When we are in a moment of saturation in which the rational brain has shut down, we must stop and relocate. Meditation may work for you carry a roll on of lavender in the bag or take a deep breath. Once the break is made it is important to relocate. As? In everything that happens to us we have a I who lives the experience (feels, saturates, thinks in a loop, judges, blames and blames himself, etc.) and a self that observes objectively (observes, empathizes, understands, analyzes).

We must activate our observant self, it is the one that will allow us to see the situation objectively. Being aware of what we can do differently and see the different perspectives of the same situation. From observation we leave the victim space and enter a space of creative options that can cover the needs and feelings that have caused the saturation.

Highly sensitive people: test

Know yourself. Your sensitive nature is valuable and knowing how your machinery works is essential to finding solutions to everyday obstacles. Take the PAS test to find out if you are highly sensitive. Think that what you see today as a problem can change with information, knowledge, management. After this, your creativity and your sensitivity will shine like never before. It is a superpower that must be cared for and nurtured.

I realized by chance that I was a highly sensitive person when, while studying integrative coaching in New York, I had on the agenda a section on highly sensitive people, what they were like and their traits. Something resonated within me, but I was not truly aware until I met a co-worker coaching, Susana, who explained to me that she was PAS. Eternally grateful to hers, with her experience, I began to connect the dots about my childhood and past experiences that confirmed my suspicions: she was a highly sensitive person.

Discovering it gave my life an unexpected turn, as an outgoing PAS (curious and a good sensation seeker when something is on my mind) I wanted to endlessly find out and investigate.

That’s where all my research on empathy began, high sensitivity and highly sensitive people looking to get to know me better and tools to manage my emotions.