HSP: Three letters, infinite meanings. If you’ve heard someone refer to themselves as an HSP, they consider themselves a Highly Sensitive Person.
In all walks of life, you’ll come in contact with HSPs. It is not a disease or a disability. It is not an impairment or dysfunction. It is not something that will change the course of someone’s life. It’s something you should understand because you’ll interact with HSPs throughout your life. But it is not something to fear or look down upon. In reality, we’re all sensitive in some way or another–some people are simply more sensitive than others.
In all walks of life, you’ll come in contact with HSPs. Click To Tweet
What is a Highly Sensitive Person?
“Someone who experiences acute physical, mental, or emotional responses to stimuli.”
“A person who has a sensitive nervous system is aware of subtleties in his/her surroundings and is more easily overwhelmed when in a highly stimulating environment. “
“Someone who reacts more intensely to experiences than the average person.”
Life as a Highly Sensitive Person
Here’s a short list of examples of sensitivities HSPs might experience:
- Unable to stay more than a few minutes in a candle shop with all the strong scents overwhelming them.
- Unable to go to a sports bar where there’s music blaring and fifteen TV screens, all showing different events, while people loudly cheer on their teams.
- Unable to avoid anxiety when shopping in a crowded store with narrow aisles and pop music playing in the background.
- Unable to wear certain types of fabrics because they feel strange or scratchy on their skin.
- Unable to wear loud or colorful clothing, especially shirts, which they can see in their peripheral vision all day.
- Unable to watch horror movies or TV shows with gratuitous violence, especially towards the innocent, such as children, the elderly, or animals.
- Unable to watch the news or read certain sections of the newspaper because of the high intensity of worrying information about world conflicts, etc.
- Unable to watch sad movies without crying as though the situation were happening to them.
Coping Skills for the HSP
Parenting
- Take a break when needed
- Recharge with your kids
- Establish speaking rules
- Talk about feelings
Social Situations
- Accept who and how you are
- Pick out the things that make your comfortable
- Come up with phrase or mantra
Work
- Refrain from gossip
- Embrace your differences
- Check in with HR if needed
Parenting
- Take a break when needed
- Recharge with your kids
- Establish speaking rules
- Talk about feelings
Romantic Relationships
- Recognize the good
- Learn when to separate your needs from your partner’s
- Take a break when you need to
- Embrace honesty
- Communicate openly