The Highly Sensitive Person in Love: Understanding and Managing Relationships When the World Overwhelms You

by Elaine N. Aron

HSPs who are also HSSs need special help finding their optimal level of arousal. You are easily bored and easily overwhelmed. You are often in conflict about going out or staying home, doing more or doing less, and it isn’t just about wanting to be like the non-HSPs around you. It’s a “hardwired” inner conflict, and it can be intense. For example, you have a business scheme you love and know will work but also know how much stress is involved in starting any new enterprise, and you are already overloaded. What to do? ESPECIALLY FOR HSP/HSSs First stop blaming yourself for your “neurotic” or “self-destructive” tendencies when you start off in multiple directions even when knowing it will be too overstimulating. Yes, you could be behaving self-destructively, but when you honestly cannot see reasons in your past for self-destructiveness, thinking in terms of an HSP/HSS temperament instead can lead to a whole new realm of solutions. You can satisfy the HSS part with travel, not new work projects. You can hire an assistant for the HSP part to cut down on overstimulating hassles, and let the HSS go ahead and take on more projects. Above all, learn to forge major deals, not do-it-halfway compromises, between your two traits—don’t start the business, but ask over the charming next-door neighbor whom the HSS in you has wanted to meet, while the HSP part has been deliberating and dithering.