The Highly Sensitive Person

A fresh approach to those times when you doubt your own worth

Elaine N. Aron Ph.D.

Highly Sensitive People and Decision Making

Do you have trouble making decisions? Most Highly Sensitive People do. A few methods can assist HSPs in making decisions.

Time and Transitions

From the moment we wake up and until we go to bed, we are dealing with transitions. Learn ways to ease—and even enjoy—the shift into the next moment.

The Power of Inner Silence for the Highly Sensitive

Quieting the mind can help highly sensitive people find peace and sanctuary in this busy and noisy world.

New Research on Sensory Processing Sensitivity (SPS)

Here are some of the latest studies helping us to better understand and support Highly Sensitive People.

Introversion, Extroversion and the Highly Sensitive Person

Encouraging more accurate definitions between introversion, extraversion and the highly sensitive person.

More Thoughts on the Wound with No Name—First Aid

There are rarely any quick fixes when the wounds are deep, especially from early childhood and/or in combination with being highly sensitive. But what might help, right now?

4 Allies and Too Anxious Beat 1 Shade of Gray

After being bullied all his life by anxiety and depression, one man found a new way to relate to them. This freed up energy and changed his life.

36 Questions for Intimacy, Back Story

This post is the real story behind research I was involved in that has led to a "method of falling in love" that has gone viral in the last few days, after The New York Times published an engaging article about it by Mandy Len Catron in their Style section on Sunday January 11 as well as Dan Jones' supplement with the questions themselves.

Frustrated Scientist Makes Movie

Elaine Aron, Ph.D., okays a documentary about high sensitivity—here's how you can help.

Meditation Part II

Behind every method of meditation there's an opinion about how to become enlightened. If enlightenment could improve the human race, or you, it's worth considering.

Meditation Part I

Feeling stressed? Highly sensitive? Meditation's a fine idea. But there are many different practices with quite different effects. Investigate before you close your eyes.

Fireworks and hearty congratulations to HSPs

Time Magazine: "The Power of (Shyness)" and High Sensitivity

No, we are not necessarily shy and not always introverted, but the book which prompted the article, Susan Cain's "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking," is actually more about HSPs than social introverts, so we're getting there. Perhaps in a year or two the highly sensitive person will be Time's person of the year!

Depression During the Holidays

The shadow side of this period of light and hope is darkness and despair, and many people fall into darkness at this time of year. They feel left out.

Three Risk-Free, High-Yield Investments

In these uncertain times everyone wants a safe place to invest their time and energy--and money if they have any. Ideally an investment is not only safe, but grows in value, as when you invest in your own education or in a growing company.

Understanding the Highly Sensitive Person

Extraverted HSPs face unique challenges.

The Wound with No Name

For emotional reasons, some people cannot go out and look for a job. Or they cannot keep a job. They cannot bear criticism, can't get along with others, or maybe don't even know why. Or they work as if driven by demons, but remain unmarried and friendless. Many overeat, gamble too much, drink too much, buy things they cannot afford, and can't stop.

Watch Out for Those Touchy, Treacherous, Hurting Complexes

Among the depth-psychology tools we need for living life, understanding complexes is your handy screwdriver. It opens up many things and closes some as well.  We all have complexes.  They are the "building blocks of the personality," as Jung called them.

Consulting with Your Wisest Self

The undervalued version of yourself is only one of many "self states."   By a self state, I mean the way we think and feel in a particular situation or role.  You are still you, but you may also feel almost like a different person whether you are with your parents, best friend, supervisor at work, etc.

Remember the Soul?

Today good therapy is said to be brief, focused on a diagnosis, and manualized for standardization. There is more than a hint that it is unethical to look any deeper.  However, that is all changing.

Time to Find Out: Are You Highly Sensitive?

Are you famous for being slow to make decisions? Do you need more down time than your friends do?  Are you bothered by noise, crowds, and having too much going on at once?  Are you unusually conscientious? Creative? Have a rich inner life?

Easy Ways to Escape Feeling "No Good"

Ranking and Linking, For Better and For Worse

 Self-affirmations do not help when we are hit with low self-esteem because this universal problem results from our natural response to defeat, part of our broader instinct to rank ourselves among others. The first step is to better recognize ranking and linking behaviors, the two things we do all day but hardly think about.