Work, Keeping It Superficial

The work environment is very different than any personal environment we're in.  The interpersonal communications are different as well.  For the Highly Sensitive Person (HSP, empath), it can be a minefield.  People don't communicate what they feel but communicate what is necessary for the job and to maintain work relationships.  That's the problem.  A work relationship is much different than a personal relationship.  You talk to people, you know how they work, and you work with them, but you don't know them or who they really are.  So that's what your interpersonal communication has to operate in.  Let's see how this poses problems for the HSP and what can be done.  These are general suggestions based on my own experience.

Try not to be too personal.  This is probably the worst problem to overcome with the HSP.  We tend to pick up the nuances in behavior and in brain waives.  We pickup so much information that we can be intimidating to anyone we work with.  It's better to keep that information under your hat.  We also like to know about people and like to interact with people on a personal level.  We have to restrain ourselves from that preference.  It's best to keep communications to a minimal and with light meaning.  That's hard.  We like to get to the root of things and tend to dislike the superficial conversations.  Some of us are even extroverts and like to converse a lot, others, are introverts and like to communicate meaningful things.  The key here is to keep emotional distance from co-workers.  You have to work with everyone and not everyone appreciates personal communication from people like us.

In a work environment it's common to be made fun of.  When this happens to you as an HSP, try to not react to it.  It's considered light fun though it may not feel like it at the time.  Certain characters will take it to the extreme, and it's better not to give them any fuel.  If you can, just find an exit.  It's not worth staying in an environment that is emotionally hostile.  Don't react in kind.  You really want to put your best foot forward.  When you give respect you get respect, but it takes time.

We talked about what not to do.  Now let's talk about what to do with all that pent up energy we absorb at the workplace as HSPs.  Here is what I recommend to do several times during the workday.  Take 4 deep breaths, and with each exhale, use some intent (manifestation, or will) to push out the energy you've absorbed.  Then, reason your current situation at work.  This will help bring down the anxiety level.  You can also be diligent about taking breaks.  Make sure you talk to your supervisor about breaks.  This will help establish your needs with your boss.  You can establish your needs with your coworkers by the way you act.  If you do it vocally, some people will try to argue with you.  You need to avoid arguments.  Anytime you have a serious problem, go to your supervisor.  There are no real friends at work.

For HSPs, the work environment can be naturally hostile.  Knowing how to be reserved and knowing how what to do is important to keep you job.  Eventually, your coworkers will get used to you and move on their attention to something else.  When a new person comes in, you may want to revisit your ways of being reserved.  Jobs are scarce.  It's best to keep yours.

Listening To Intuition

Highly Sensitive People (empaths) are nothing if they're not listeners.  We listen to everything and sometimes wish we didn't.  People in general have intuition.  People in general don't seem to listen to their intuition enough.  Dr. Judith Orloff has an article with a test on how much we listen to our intuition (see Dr. Orloff's article).  Do you listen to your intuition?  We get really busy and focused in our daily lives.  It's common for everyone to get tunnel vision and we loose sight of what is going on around us.  When we do that, things may happen that can affect us without us realizing it.  So it's helpful to stop look and listen to intuition.  What I want to do is highlight some things that may prevent us from listening to our intuition.  Through experience, I found out that trusting intuition does not come easy,  interpreting intuition can be hard, and wishful thinking is a hindrance.

In our society we are told not to listen to feelings, hunches, and imaginations.  Well, not in so many words, but over time and the fact that hard cold facts is what gets listened to rather than preference.  So, it's not surprising that we don't trust when thoughts come to us out of the blue and give us information that seemingly has no evidence.   Our overgrown analytical minds want proof.  The reasoning goes nuts without logical steps.  So we blow the information off.  That information is our intuition telling us something.  We must learn to trust it.  It took me some time to understand that my intuition was giving me good information.  Sometimes even now, my mind wants to say that it's just all my imagination.  That's how strong my analytical brain is.  I have strong reasoning abilities and it often clashes with my intuition.  Telling yourself that there could be something to this information and testing the information is one way to start trusting it.

Interpreting the information gleaned from intuition can be hard to do.  Interpretation is a function of the analytical brain.  To interpret intuition, we need to have a "common frame of reference".  Yeah sure, I took that one from Spock in Star Trek IV The Voyage Home (see quote).  You do have to have a common frame of reference to have practical information.  I see most of the common reference is learned in life as we associate feelings with situations.  Intuition comes in the form of emotion, and emotion is a language in and of itself.  Some things don't translate.  Some things are hard to put in words.  Some things you can only describe.  Some things are a driving force for action.  I went to a balloon race last weekend, and there was a large crowd with a festival.  There were lots of vendors of food and drink.  There were even some student dancers.  I picked up on the overall intuitive emotion int the area and my mouth relaxed and the ends of my mouth were edging upward.  That told me people were relaxed and were enjoying themselves overall.  Sometimes intuition comes like that.  I interpreted that one based on how I reacted to the emotion.  It's quite an art to interpret intuition. 

Wishful thinking is an enemy to intuition.  It will try to override the intuition information.  What I mean is that if you want something bad enough you may try to wish it into existence.  It's important to distinguish between what you want and what your observing.  I use this word observing in the sense of picking up information from intuition.  I have a hard head, as my wife would say.  That means my will is a strong one.  I blame genetics for that (thank you parents).  So, what I have to do is to get into a meditative state and listen for the intuition.  Sometimes, this takes a while.  I don't think it's because the intuition doesn't come to me.  I think it's there all the time.  It just takes a while to quiet down my analytical hard head.  By the way what I call analytical mind Dr. Orloff calls linear mind.  I use that word because I understand that the brain is very very complex, more than science understands.  So I don't think the work linear quite describes it.  Wishful thinking is a function of the analytical mind and it's made when we establish an intent (wish, desire, manifestation, prayer) we made earlier.

So, trusting intuition, interpreting it, and handling wishful thinking can help you listen to intuition.  As you listen, you come to realize that everything changes.  Then the more they change, the more they stay the same.  Sure, it's a paradox.  I think life itself is a paradox as well, but don't ask me to explain it.  The more you listen, the more you will change, and the more you become yourself  and you shed the facades you have in life.

Patience

 Patience is said to be a virtue.  Highly Sensitive People and Empaths are patient listeners.  It's one of the very special gifts that make interpersonal communication so enjoyable.  You can ask yourself how does patience help me in my interpersonal communication and how does it make me feel?  I'm going to explore how patience in interpersonal communication is a power for uplifting emotion.

In law enforcement there's the idea of letting people talk things out.  This requires patience.  Police are usually involved in talking to people who are emotionally charged.  Letting people talk it out helps them sort out the situation mentally.  Sometimes as an empath, I talk to people in regular situations that are passionate about a subject.  Their voice gets louder, they may talk faster, and/or they may have a more active body language.  I let them talk it out until they seem calmer.  Often they appreciate just the listening.  I don't choose these times as a time to argue so I avoid contradicting them.  That includes holding my opinion about the subject.  You might think that this somehow invalidates or ignores my opinion.  On the contrary, I feel it opens the person up to listen to my point of view since I was kind enough to listen to theirs.  As a result, a feeling of friendship and respect develops.  If you have trouble making your point of view known, or your view is not well received, try some patience with your audience.

I love how patience can change your life around.  Judith Orloff's article on patience emphasizes how patience is a powerful tool, though some people may look at it as weakness.  I know a type of person who will try and try to manipulate a highly sensitive person like me into doing whatever they say.  This person does not practice patience but the opposite, they practice urgency.  That is, they make you feel like you have to act now without thinking through the situation.   This is a mean trap.  Listening and being patient without reacting can help you avoid this trap.  I also use other techniques in such situations, like emotionally detaching from the individual.  It's really quite dangerous falling in such traps, because these people will make you their slaves if you let them.  In extreme cases, physical distance can be a good defense.  Using patience can protect you and can help the other person change if they are willing.  You don't have to point out that they need to change it will be evident to them naturally because of the feelings that patience on your part creates in them.

Patiently hearing out someone creates a bond of friendship.  This bond of friendship is spurred by respect you've shown by being patient in listening.  People have very few opportunities to be heard, and it's an innate need for all humans.  The right of free speech is an example of the need to be heard, to be listened to.  Parliament is derived from talking.  That's what legislatures are all about, talk or to be heard.  This is how we get our laws for our societies.  Likewise, being heard is how we derive at rules for ourselves and form ideas about personal situations.  Patience is essential for interpersonal communication to be uplifting.  Have you ever heard people arguing before?  They tend to interrupt one another.  This interruption just perpetuates frustration for both sides.  When one side is patient to listen without judgment, then the other usually reciprocates the courtesy and they both get heard.  Even if they disagree, they can walk away from the conversation feeling uplifted.

I looked at patience in interpersonal communication.  Being patient to let people talk and counter unreasonable urgency meets the need of people to be heard.  Patience is quite a power.

Humans Are Xenophobes

I heard, the other day on the radio, a scientist claiming that humans have more consciousness than plants.  That humans have the most consciousness than all the animals.  To me this smacks of xenophobia.  When xenophobia is used in science fiction, it seems to refer to the fear of other species, namely alien ones.  The true meaning of the word is "an unreasonable fear or hatred of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange" per dictionary.com.  So it has a very broad meaning and implication.  Xenophobia is based on fear, as the name implies.  Fear is a huge driving force for us.  The consequences of this fear extends far and wide in our social lives.  I want to discuss how our definition of consciousness is self serving, how xenophobia repletes our history, and how xenophobia extends to behavioral types.

I cannot say that a tree has more consciousness than I do.  I know they do have consciousness because, as an empath, I can feel it.  In the consciousness wiki, there are some science studies on consciousness.  I think there is a problem with their definition of consciousness.  If you define a consciousness based on humans only with the assumption that humans are the most conscious, then your conclusion would be that humans are the most conscious of all the animals and plants.  Then the conclusion is not a conclusion at all but a bias and an assumption.  Here is the dilemma of science,  that science is based on reasoning, and reasoning is based on language.  Biased assumptions lead to biased conclusions.  I'm afraid that that might be what science has done here.  It's a xenophobic act. Which, of course, is not science at all but just human fear.

Humans have always been xenophobic.  We look at anything or anyone with suspicion if they look or act different than we do. I think we all know this.  Do I have to mention the racism in the United States and in all other countries?  Does Martin Luther King need to give again his "I have a dream" speech?  Decades ago it was not only the color of your skin, but your language and your customs.  Germans against Danish, Italians vs French, etc.  History is replete with examples.  When our fist instinct when we find an unfamiliar animal is to kill it, we are unreasonable.  Cruelty to animals is a xenophobic act.  The other day I saw a semi-truck run over a canada goose without even putting on the breaks.  It made me sick to my stomach.

I dare say the xenophobia also extends to behavioral types.  If you act differently than the crowd, you get labeled.  Terms like nerd and geek were derogatory terms to describe those who weren't sports buffs.  I figure the more insensitive you are to others the more you tend to belittle others for your own ego's satisfaction.  This is the definition of a bully.  I believe bullying is a byproduct of xenophobia.

We looked at how the definition of consciousness is xenophobic, how xenophobia is in our history, and how it extends to behavioral types.  The reason for xenophobia is the fear of the unknown.  The problem with it is that the fear is unreasonable and unfounded.  It's a default response to something new for some people and it shouldn't be.  We need to move beyond it and start analyzing when we encounter a new person or thing. We shouldn't be 'demonizing' it/her/him.  That is what science is for.  That is what critical thinking is for.  This is what education is for.  We should not take new things personally but take steps to understand what it/she/he is all about and find ways to relate to it/her/him.  This is especially true when you encounter people from other race and cultures.  The benefits to understanding are many times more prosperous than refusing to understand.  It's my hope that more people come to this conclusion, that thoughtfulness is a powerful and empowering tool for good.  We should be teaching our children how to go through the process of understanding things.