• Highly Sensitive Person Survival Guide

If you are a, chances are you are quite different from your colleagues. You may find a typical office background noise more distracting than they do. You are likely to get more easily overwhelmed when you’ve got much going on. You may feel more tired after a whole day of staring at computer screen, or need extra time to withdraw somewhere quiet and dark after an intense meeting with many people.

Does it sound like you? If so - don’t worry, there is nothing wrong with you - this is a typical “side effect” of being highly sensitive. Highly Sensitive People (or HSPs) is a scientific term. It refers to people who are believed to have a genetic ability to notice more subtleties in their environment than most people, and process more sensory input from it, including sounds, lights, temperature etc. They are not sick and don’t need any treatment – it’s just that their nervous system and mind are more “fine-tuned”. Think about sensitivity as a super-expensive medical knife that can be used for the most delicate surgery thanks to its sophistication and sharpness. However, if the same knife is used to cut bread, chances are it will break down or become dull, and so can no longer be used for a surgery.

Same way, highly sensitive people will flourish in the right conditions, or shut down and/or experience stress-related issues if they are continually overwhelmed. Because highly sensitive people are in the minority (it is believed that only about 20% of all humans belong to HSPs), most companies are not structured to support them. So a highly sensitive person might struggle to have a successful career, especially at an early stage. However, being highly sensitive does not mean you cannot be successful - it's just a question of learning to manage and 'sell' your sensitivity. The following five tips will help you with that.

Understand that people see the world differently Most problems a highly sensitive person gets at work arise because people don’t get them. As previously said, 80-85% of people are not highly sensitive, and so they genuinely don’t understand why you are bothered about food smell at the desk, loud music or an air conditioner. They might even not notice something that will seem to you like a major thing impacting your well-being and productivity. They even may enjoy this little stimulation, otherwise their nervous system is dormant, and will think you are too demanding when you ask them to turn the music volume down. Explaining what sensitivity is to a non-sensitive person is a bit like trying to explain to a blind person what colors are.

Oct 1, 2004 - If you're a highly sensitive person (HSP), you're in good company. HSP's make up some 20 percent of the population, individuals like you who.

You need to “sell” your sensitivity in the language they can understand. For instance, if you need time to withdraw after a meeting, don't say you are overwhelmed, but mention you are going somewhere to write down the thoughts that came to your mind after the meeting. Or make a joke that you need a cup of tea to warm yourself up after a chilly conversation with a client.

People are afraid of what they don't understand, so use humor and keep things really simple. Incorporate regular breaks throughout the day If you are a highly sensitive person, you need more rest than most people to recharge your nervous system. I remember this made me really upset in my younger age, as most of my colleagues were able to carry on working. Having built a successful career in several fields, I can assure you now it's not the question of working harder, but working smarter with fewer distractions. It may sound counterintuitive, but the most efficient thing to do for a highly sensitive person at work is to incorporate breaks every hour or so for a few minutes not to accumulate stress. Because if you don' rest, it will take you much longer to recover after you break down. Taking r est for a highly sensitive person means doing something that involves as little stimulation as possible – so no computer, possibly no chatting to colleagues, but taking a few moment to be somewhere quite, or even better having a little walk outside.

Ideally, you want to manage your schedule yourself and this should be your priority at work. If you do, do not put several meetings one after another.

Switch between meetings and personal activities. As a highly sensitive person, you need time to recharge after one intense experience. Know what triggers you We all are stimulated by different things – some of us are more sensitive to noise, some to smells, some to information overload.

You can take this to see what stimulates you compared to other highly sensitive people. Notice what triggers your sensitivity, and start consciously managing it. For instance, if your trigger is noise, make sure you have a pair of earplugs when you work (earplugs are way better than earphones for an HSP, as music adds stimulation). In my experience, wax earplugs are the best ones, as they don't let any noise in and are also not irritating to the ear. If you absolutely cannot avoid the trigger, try minimizing it.

Highly Sensitive Person Survival Guide

For instance, if you know you get tired after the flight and being in the airport among crowds of people, do not set up important meetings for that day. Go on a business trip a night before to have proper rest. A typical trigger for all HSPs is multitasking. People aren’t generally good at multitasking as has been proven by multiple researchers, but as an HSP you need to be even more careful because any distraction has a bigger impact on you than on your non-sensitive colleagues. You need to organize your work so that you have enough time to dedicate to one particular task and aren’t disturbed in between. This means you may need to book a closed room, ask everyone not to approach you for two hours, and switch off all notifications, all sound signals on your communication devices and put them face down.

If you’re waiting for an important call, you should not be working on something that requires your concentration. Similarly, do not open more than one tab when browsing online. Multitasking isn’t good for your brain. Watch your diet As a highly sensitive person, you have to be extremely careful about how you eat, as you are more sensitive to sugar than most people (your nervous system literally gets exploded every time you consume sugar). This means that a regular office chocolate/biscuit snacking is out of question. When tired, we are not able to tell what’s good and what’s bad for us, so make sure to have something healthy (and yet yummy) in your desk instead of sugary stuff. As an HSP, you are very likely to be more affected by caffeine than most people, so it’s best not to consume it altogether, or if you do, not to drink coffee on the days when you’ve got a lot going.

Talk about your work, not sensitivity The last thing you want to do after you’ve read this text is to go to your boss or colleagues and tell them you’re highly sensitive, and therefore they should start treating you in a different way. If you did that, you’d be seen either as difficult, or sick. What you really want to do is to show them how your work might be impacted if a certain problem causing you extra stimulation (i.e. Sitting next to a noisy scanner) will not be resolved. Focus on the extra value you’ll be able to provide. For instance, if you are negotiating flexible working hours, tell them how you’ll be able to better concentrate and call more customers when it’s less noisy around.

It obviously helps if you are doing well in your job, and your boss is happy (make sure that they are by giving them the highlights of your key achievements on a weekly basis – it’s not bragging, it’s PR). If this is not the case, you may want to work a little harder (or rather, smarter) before you negotiate anything. The good news is that your bargain power will improve dramatically the more senior you become, so it’s the question of surviving through the early stages of your career. Bonus track Most importantly, start being nice to yourself and appreciate your sensitivity.

Many highly sensitive people feel they are different and have been punished for that at work or at home, and so try to downgrade their sensitivity to “fit in”. Instead of punishing yourself for not being able to cope as most people, think about all the great things you are able to do thanks to being sensitive. You probably know what other people want or expect, are able to build great relationships, forecast trends and make conclusions without having all necessary information thanks to your intuition. Start appreciating your sensitivity, and your colleagues and bosses will do so, too.

Do you feel like you reflect on things more than everyone else? Do you find yourself worrying about how other people feel? Do you prefer quieter, less chaotic environments? If the above sound true to you, you may be. The personality trait - which was first researched by Elaine N. Aron, Ph.D., in the early 1990s - is relatively common, with as many as one in five people possessing it.

Aron, who has written multiple studies and books on high sensitivity, including, also developed a self-test to help you determine if you are highly sensitive. While - driven largely by high-profile publications on the subject, including Susan Cain's - has brought more awareness to personality traits that value less stimulation and higher sensitivity, Aron notes that highly sensitive people still tend to be considered the 'minority.' But 'minority' doesn't mean bad - in fact, being highly sensitive carries a multitude of positive characteristics. Read on for some of the commonalities shared by highly sensitive people. They feel more deeply. One of the hallmark characteristics of highly sensitive people is the ability to feel more deeply than their less-sensitive peers. 'They like to process things on a deep level,' Ted Zeff, Ph.D., author of and other books on highly sensitive people, tells HuffPost.

'They're very intuitive, and go very deep inside to try to figure things out.' They're more emotionally reactive. People who are highly sensitive will react more in a situation.

For instance, they will have more empathy and feel more concern for a friend's problems, according to Aron. They may also have more concern about how another person may be reacting in the face of a negative event. They're probably used to hearing, 'Don't take things so personally' and 'Why are you so sensitive?' Depending on the culture, sensitivity can be perceived as an asset or a negative trait, Zeff explains. In some of his own research, Zeff says that highly sensitive men he interviewed from other countries - such as Thailand and India - were rarely or never teased, while highly sensitive men he interviewed from North America were frequently or always teased.

'So a lot of it is very cultural - the same person who is told, 'Oh, you're too sensitive,' in certain cultures, it's considered an asset,' he says. They prefer to exercise solo. Highly sensitive people may tend to avoid team sports, where there's a sense that everyone is watching their every move, Zeff says.

In his research, the majority of highly sensitive people he interviewed preferred individual sports, like bicycling, running and hiking, to group sports. However, this is not a blanket rule - there are some highly sensitive people who may have had parents who provided an understanding and supportive environment that would make it easier for them to participate in group sports, Zeff says.

It takes longer for them to make decisions. Highly sensitive people are more aware of subtleties and details that could make decisions harder to make, Aron says. Even if there is no 'right' or 'wrong' decision - for example, it's impossible to choose a 'wrong' flavor of ice cream - highly sensitive people will still tend to take longer to choose because they are weighing every possible outcome. Aron's advice for dealing with this: 'Take as long to decide as the situation permits, and ask for more time if you need it and can take it,' she writes in a. 'During this time, try pretending for a minute, hour, day, or even week that you have made up your mind a certain way. How does that feel? Often, on the other side of a decision things look different, and this gives you a chance to imagine more vividly that you are already there.'

One exception: Once a highly sensitive person has come to the conclusion of what is the right decision to make and what is the wrong decision to make in a certain situation, he or she will be quick to make that 'right' decision again in the future. And on that note, they are more upset if they make a 'bad' or 'wrong' decision. You know that uncomfortable feeling you get after you realize you've made a bad decision? For highly sensitive people, 'that emotion is amplified because the emotional reactivity is higher,' Aron explains. They're extremely detail-oriented.

Highly sensitive people are the first ones to the new shoes that you're wearing, or a change in weather. Not all highly sensitive people are introverts. In fact, about 30 percent of highly sensitive people are extroverts, according to Aron. She explains that many times, highly sensitive people who are also extroverts grew up in a close-knit community - whether it be a cul-de-sac, small town, or with a parent who worked as a minister or rabbi - and thus would interact with a lot of people. They work well in team environments. Because highly sensitive people are such deep thinkers, they make valuable workers and members of teams, Aron says. However, they may be well-suited for positions in teams where they don't have to make the final decision.

For instance, if a highly sensitive person was part of a medical team, he or she would be valuable in analyzing the pros and cons of a patient having surgery, while someone else would ultimately make the decision about whether that patient would receive the surgery. They're more prone to anxiety or depression (but only if they've had a lot of past negative experiences). 'If you've had a fair number of bad experiences, especially early in life, so you don't feel safe in the world or you don't feel secure at home.

At school, your nervous system is set to 'anxious,' Aron says. But that's not to say that all highly sensitive people will go on to have anxiety - and in fact, having a supportive environment can go a long way to protecting against this. Parents of highly sensitive children, in particular, need to 'realize these are really great kids, but they need to be handled in the right way,' Aron says. 'You can't over-protect them, but you can't under-protect them, either. You have to titrate that just right when they're young so they can feel confident and they can do fine.' That annoying sound is probably significantly more annoying to a highly sensitive person.

While it's hard to say anyone is a fan of annoying noises, highly sensitive people are on a whole more, well, sensitive to chaos and noise. That's because they tend to be more easily overwhelmed and overstimulated by too much activity, Aron says. Violent movies are the worst. Because highly sensitive people are so high in empathy and more easily overstimulated, movies with violence or horror themes may not be their cup of tea, Aron says. They cry more easily.

That's why it's important for highly sensitive people to put themselves in situations where they won't be made to feel embarrassed or 'wrong' for crying easily, Zeff says. If their friends and family realize that that's just how they are - that they cry easily - and support that form of expression, then 'crying easily' will not be seen as something shameful.

They have above-average manners. Highly sensitive people are also highly conscientious people, Aron says. Because of this, they're more likely to be considerate and exhibit good manners - and are also more likely to notice when someone else isn't being conscientious. For instance, highly sensitive people may be more aware of where their cart is at the grocery store - not because they're afraid someone will steal something out of it, but because they don't want to be rude and have their cart blocking another person's way. The effects of criticism are especially amplified in highly sensitive people. Highly sensitive people have that are more intense than less sensitive people.

As a result, they may employ certain tactics to avoid said criticism, including people-pleasing (so that there is no longer anything to criticize), criticizing themselves first, and avoiding the source of the criticism altogether, according to Aron. 'People can say something negative, and a non-HSP highly sensitive person can say, 'Whatever,' and it doesn't affect them,' Zeff says. 'But a HSP would feel it much more deeply.' Cubicles = good.

Open-office plans = bad. Just like highly sensitive people tend to prefer solo workouts, they may also prefer solo work environments. Zeff says that many highly sensitive people enjoy working from home or being self-employed because they can control the stimuli in their work environments. For those without the luxury of creating their own flexible work schedules (and environments), Zeff notes that highly sensitive people might enjoy working in a cubicle - where they have more privacy and less noise - than in an open-office plan.

Could a positive outlook be the key to a healthier ticker? Maybe so, according to a 2012 scientific review published in the journal Psychological Bulletin. 'Health is more than the absence of disease,' co-author Julia Boehm, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Harvard School of Public Health, told HuffPost's Catherine Pearson when the findings were released. 'So we looked at the positive side of things - how optimism and happiness might protect against cardiovascular disease.' The review suggests that psychological well-being, including optimism, is linked with a reduction in heart attacks and strokes, as well as other cardiovascular problems, according to HSPH News. HuffPost's Pearson reported: The evidence suggests that people who are happy and optimistic are more likely to engage in healthy behaviors, like doing physical activity, eating healthy foods and getting enough sleep.

It also shows an association between positivity and measurable biological factors, like lower blood pressure and healthier lipid profiles. But the various studies do not reveal whether happiness or healthy behaviors come first. It could be that happier, more positive people are more likely to engage in healthy behaviors, which in turn improves factors like blood pressure. It could also be that engaging in healthy behaviors and having a better biological profile helps boost psychological well-being.