Today we're going to talk about clichés that I often hear: hypersensitive people are necessarily empathetic and introverted. If you are a high hypersensitive potential that does not fit into a box it will help you better understand who you are. Without this distinction one can really feel very bad because one does not identify with what one sees on the internet.
My name is Paul and my high potential was detected more than ten years ago now. And today I share on Connect The Dots what I learned to help the little new ones better accept.
NB: This article is the transcript of the above video.
Introverted persons
We start immediately with the introverted person. Already what we need to understand is that being introverted does not mean being shy or being asocial. I consider myself an introverted person, but also a social person. Just, I like to spend time with some close friends and not necessarily with a huge group of people. In fact, what is happening is that we are quickly exhausted in these social situations. So once we're exhausted, we need to find ourselves alone to recharge. I love reading, walking alone, or doing things alone. It feels good to replenish us. That's why we prefer small groups. We're running out less quickly.
In doing my research, I saw that it would (a priori) be a difference in how our brain manages the reward circuit. It is the circuit that is made with dopamine. Basically we are not rewarded the same by the same events and things. Some socially charged events can reward us less than time alone.
But what we have to remember is that we are born introverted. We don't. It's something that's at birth.
Moreover, Professor Elaine Aron estimates that about 70% of hypersensitive people are introverted. That's where the cliché came from. Since a large majority of hypersensitive people are introverted, it is likely that all hypersensitive people are introverted. That is not the case at all. Hypersensitive people can be extraverted. Conversely, introverts are not necessarily hypersensitive.
Besides, before going a little further in this article, I take this opportunity to remind you that if you wish I can give you free hypersensitivity tests (yet again at the bottom of the page).
Empathes
Now we move on to the empathies. It's a word I see more and more. Or rather, I also saw him before but he was rather employed in science fiction. For example it was Professor Xavier in X-Men who reads in thoughts or things like that. Today we associate less this spiritual side, and we use more to talk about someone who is extremely conscious of the emotions of his entourage. It's about empathy. Above all, we see that empathism does not only notice the emotions of its entourage, it integrates them and feels them completely.
There's Dr. Judith Orloff (who wrote "The Empathy Survival Guide") who says it can even include real physical symptoms. When empaths experience stressful emotions, they can go into panic attacks, depression, chronic fatigue or even physical symptoms that are difficult to explain by the traditional medical diagnosis.
And besides, remember: in an old article, I had talked about an experience with MRIs in which scientists showed that several hypersensitive people managed to physically feel the emotions of others. I spoke in my article detailing the functioning of the hypersensitive brain. So that's exactly it. We're back on it. It is also estimated that many (if not almost all) empathes are hypersensitive. That's where the second cliché comes in, where we combine the two. On the other hand, the empathes are as introverted as well as extraverted.
Hypersensitivity
And finally the third category: hypersensitive. If you're hanging out on this chain you have to start knowing because it's a subject I'm dealing with a lot. Unfortunately I find that the word "sensitive" in "hypersensitive" has a negative connotation. That's too bad. You can imagine someone who spends his time crying.
Truly being a hypersensitive person simply means that we process more information about the world around us than the others.
- It can be dealing with things deeper, making connections that others don't notice. This deep treatment can sometimes overwhelm us completely because we are over-stimulated and our brain is thoroughly and thoroughly treated. It often happens in very stimulating places (festivals, nightclubs, noisy classrooms, amphitheaters, etc.). I have a lot of trouble doing it and it can sometimes over-stimulate me.
- Being hypersensitive is also gathering many emotional signals that we see in others. There it gets close to the empathes.
- Or then, it is to notice small subtle things that others do not even capture (like textures of materials, small noises). Basically, if we need to simplify, it means that our antenna captures more sensory signals than others. She analyses them harder. It also happens in sensory hypersensitivity (not just emotional). It's calledhyperaesthesia.
The advantage of hypersensitivity (compared to the other two categories) is that it is something that is highly studied – or at least more and more. It is estimated that about 20% of the population is hypersensitive. Of these 20%, 70% are introverted as seen at the beginning (and at the same time 30% are extraverted). On the other hand, among these hypersensitive 20%, there is a priori an overwhelming majority which is taken but we do not have too many figures because there is not enough study on it.
Each position
You will understand, we can be a little of all these categories, none, one or two. It'll depend.
In any case I really want to press the fact that we are all unique. Whether you're introverted, empathe, hypersensitive, or a mix of all this, you're unique. You did. You're your own personality. Even if I identify with many of these categories, I remain Paul. I'm a full person. I'm different from someone else who could watch this video and identify with the same categories as me.
We must not lock ourselves in "I am hypersensitive and introverted and so it is like this, and my life is rotten, and so it is". You really don't have to lock up in there. You have an engine that's a little different. We navigate a little differently in life. But we can still take the same roads as everyone else. We just need to drive our vehicle a little differently. But life is the same after, and there's no reason why we don't get there.
Conclusion
So a small quick synthesis the main difference between a person introverted, empathe and hypersensitive.
- Introverts are people who are more stimulated by activities to be carried out alone or in small groups.
- Empathes perceive and above all they feel and completely analyze the emotions of others.
- And finally the hypersensitive treats the external stimulations more deeply.
Again note that we can have 0, 1, 2, or 3 of these characteristics, that this is not what defines who you are, and that in any case it is neither a good nor a bad thing. It's part of your personality, like many other things that are part of your personality.
Thank you for reading this article. Remember to download your hypersensitivity test above. And in the meantime I invite you to go and read my other article about hypersensitive and why they need time alone. See you!
