How To Know If You're 'Too Sensitive' (Or Just Exactly Right)
Sensitive? Most likely yes! Too sensitive? Most likely no!
Petrichei, Science Photo Library | Canva Are you too sensitive? My apologies for asking such an insensitive question right off the bat. But honestly, how often have you been told you are "too sensitive"?
Here’s my response when someone tells me I’m too sensitive: “I agree I am sensitive — even a highly sensitive person — and I love that about myself. I’d be happy to share more with you about what it means to me if you're interested."
Here's how to know if you're 'too sensitive' (or just exactly right)
1. Being sensitive means you are in touch with your senses
Your ordinary five physical senses are the instruments of the Divine to sense and perceive Her way around this physical universe and have all kinds of experiences: seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching.
Today, science knows people have many other senses outside of the basic five. They are referred to as perception of heat, cold, space, body, gravity, pain, and more.
However, while everyone has those main senses, not everyone is called "highly" sensitive. So what makes you different and prone to receiving those rather negative labels, often associated with HSPs?
2. There is a sixth sense about things
There’s one additional sense, commonly known as the sixth sense that has a kind of mystery and awe around it and doesn’t fall into the five physical senses category, nor the additional senses of heat, pain, gravity, etc. The sixth sense is a keen intuitive power.
A spiritual teacher of mine once described the sixth sense as "perceiving everything all at once". When you perceive everything all at once, you are not perceiving through your five senses. You somehow "just know" — or "just sense."
If you’d grown up in a family who also perceived everything all at once, it would be normal and natural to you. You wouldn’t question or doubt your intuitive sixth sense ability. Unfortunately, most people didn’t grow up in a family like that, which makes you believe you have to adjust to fit into their normalcy.
To people who are not yet in touch with their sixth sense, you may appear "too sensitive," only because they mostly relate to the compartmentalized five senses — and aren't in the practice of getting in touch with their sixth sense.
3. If you are a highly sensitive person, you may frequently experience the following things
- You can get a "feel" for people before you know them
- You can tell when someone is lying to you or not telling the whole truth
- You're told to be quiet when you speak what you feel, see, and know
- You wonder why other people don't seem to have the same knowledge or understanding as you
- You occasionally doubt your natural abilities because nobody seems to understand you
- You shut down your natural state to better fit in with other people
If you are a highly sensitive being, you’ll never feel that you fit into an insensitive world filled with people who are not in touch with their intuitive senses. You are a round peg and cannot fit into a square hole.
Imagine your sixth sense as your mother tongue and a language others have not learned. It’s confusing to be born into a world where people speak a different language than you do (the five senses). That’s why so many highly sensitive beings have "unlearned" their native tongue to try to fit in. And it doesn’t feel good, nor does it work.
Andriy Solovyov via Shutterstock
Humans tend to judge what they don’t understand, which leads to confusion and aggravation. It’s easy to take judgment personally and judge yourself for it, too. But in reality, a judgment from someone else about your sensitivity is just a misunderstanding — not a personal flaw.
If you speak a different language and someone doesn’t understand you, there is no reason to take it personally. It just means that they don’t understand you. Similarly, if you realize someone has not learned to tap into their sixth sense and misperceives you, there is no reason to take it personally either.
So it starts with you. It starts with you realizing that your sensitivity is a bigger way of perceiving life than most people do.
4. Being a highly sensitive person truly is your gift
It most surely does not mean that there’s something wrong with you — or goddess forbid you're too sensitive. It is your gift! Please receive it.
When you stop doubting or hiding your sensitive nature and start loving yourself for it instead, your energy changes quickly. Suddenly there’s nothing to take personally, nor make you feel bad about yourself anymore, no matter what anyone says.
Yet, to love what you believe to be wrong, you first need to understand it yourself — outside of your judgment and confusion. Dear one, your sensitivity is a gift that is completely misunderstood in this world, and the time has come for you to embrace it.
Everyone has their unique flavor in regards to being highly sensitive, perceptive, or intuitive. Please use your description of how you experience yourself to determine what that is.
I’ve heard descriptions like psychic, clairvoyant, telepathic, vibing, hunch, gut feeling, instinct, ESP, divination, foreknowledge, and channeling. Do you also get those chills, sometimes called "truth bumps?" Me too, and I love them. They are so clear.
At the core, no matter what you call your sixth sense, it simply means you are in touch with something much deeper and bigger than what most people are aware of in this world.
5. Sensitivity makes you different. However, it doesn’t make you wrong
Some people are classified as "highly sensitive people" or HSPs. Coined by psychologists Elaine and Arthur Aron, authors of the groundbreaking book, The Highly Sensitive Person, a highly sensitive person is a person with a particularly high measure of sensory processing sensitivity — a trait that makes people have a heightened response to physical, social, and emotional stimuli.
And while living with increased sensitivity comes with a few challenges, being an HSP isn't a bad thing. I’ve been told I'm "too sensitive" once too often in my own life, and if anyone tells me that today, I’m well prepared with a firm and kind response that feels empowering and loving to myself. But let me first answer the above question for you. No, you are not too sensitive.
PeopleImages.com - Yuri A via Shutterstock
6. Yes, it makes you feel that you don’t fit in
However, it doesn’t mean you don’t belong. Certainly, it’s hard to live by the rules of this world. However, it doesn’t mean you can’t live on your own.
You were born into this world as a more "round" expanded soul. The world you were born into is inhabited by many "square" souls here to learn how to become "round and whole." And you are here to show them just by being yourself, "round" and all — sensitive, perceptive, in tune with what is true and what isn’t.
You are here to show them what it’s like to be "round" simply by being yourself and trusting your wisdom and intuitive guidance from within. You don’t need to prove anything to anyone.
You are also here to learn how to remain "round" when everyone else wants you to be "square." Many sensitive souls have completely misunderstood their roles. By believing what others say about you, you doubt your experience and find ways to stay isolated and safe.
7. There’s more to life on Earth than trying to stay safe
The time is now ripe for you to realize the gift of your sensitivities. What if I told you that the solution the world is looking for lies inside your sensitivity? That would turn things around, wouldn’t it?
It’s so opposite of what you’ve been told to believe, which is why you need a new viewpoint reflected on you by more than just me.
If you're a highly sensitive person, you need to connect and reconnect with other highly sensitive people and learn to fall in love with yourself for who you are. You need to feel seen, understood, and recognized by each other. You need to be reminded of the power and beauty of being a highly sensitive soul.
Artie Medvedev via Shutterstock
It is one of the great joys to "see and acknowledge sensitive souls back to themselves." Can you imagine the possibilities from there? It starts with you first connecting with yourself and your inner senses. And because most people didn’t have any role models for that, thank Goddess you have each other now!
When you reconnect with other sensitive souls and acknowledge the beauty in each other, the light within starts shining brighter, and you start trusting it more. Your light empowers all highly sensitive people and makes you feel safe and confident to shine your light in whatever way, shape, or form you came here to do.
8. We can normalize the sensitivity, which our society has pathologized
When you embrace your sensitivity, you’ll fall in love with yourself — deeply. Your light will shine brighter and will naturally soften the "squareness" in the world. Just by being seen and recognized by other sensitive beings, you effortlessly participate in rounding out of the edges of the square souls and help others expand their consciousness, too.
When the sixth sense is activated, more and more people will start seeing "everything all at once."
Pernilla Lillarose is a self-love mystic mentor and certified Hakomi practitioner.