How meeting your inner child can help you love yourself as an HSP

Let me start this by sharing a hard truth with you. Until you fully embrace your sensitivity, you will feel more overwhelmed than necessary.

Life will feel harder than necessary. Why? Because you’re rejecting who you are. You’re essentially communicating to yourself on a cellular level that you’re not enough. 

My experience

For two decades, I was ashamed of my sensitivity. I remember so clearly the time my aunt called me sensitive and I just thought it was the worst thing ever. I grew up with a distinct impression that my sensitivity was something that I would either have to grow out of or learn to overcome. It was something that was going to hold me back. 

My older sister was fiercely strong and I was highly sensitive. You couldn’t get two more different kids than us. We bickered and squabbled and argued on a daily basis. Yet, infuriatingly, she would get over it within two minutes. Totally forgotten, she would want to be best friends again. And it made me so annoyed - how could she be over it when here I was three days later still chewing it over in my mind, replaying the conversation over and over in my head. My parents, seeking peace, would ask why I couldn’t just get over it like my sister had. To them, I was probably just being dramatic or attention-seeking. 

By my late teens and early twenties, the belief that being sensitive was a hindrance had been confirmed again and again from school experiences to university to the working world. So I tried on different masks in an attempt to fit in. I blocked my emotions preferring to feel nothing than feel it all. When I cried I made sure it was in my room with doors locked; the music on loud to drown out any sounds. I tried my hardest to ‘overcome’ it, to be like everyone else who could just get over things, or not take comments so personally. I said "yes" to things I didn’t want to do because I thought they would make me appear more ‘normal’. I hid my emotions and my experiences from others afraid that they’d be deemed too much. 

I had this deep sense that if I could just be less sensitive life would be so much easier. Oh, how wrong I was. Because asking someone to be less sensitive is like asking someone to be shorter, or to have less blue eyes. It’s part of our DNA. It’s who we are.

If you’ve read this far, I suspect it’s because, in some way, you identify with what I have shared. So if you can’t change who you are, what can you do?

The power of acceptance 

The most transformational moment for me was embracing my sensitivity as a highly sensitive person (HSP). And I’ve seen the same empowering shift in each of the clients I work with. 

Embracing your sensitivity and accepting who you are means going beneath the surface layer of what you say and do. It requires digging deep into where your subconscious thoughts lie and the story that you’ve been telling yourself for years, even decades. The narrative that you don’t matter. That you’re less important. That you’re boring or selfish. 

In order to update the programming, so to speak, and transform our limiting self-beliefs, we first need to know what story we’ve been telling ourselves all these years. Because we’re each going to have our own individual story.

So, grab yourself a journal and pen, find somewhere safe that you can settle in, and just answer the first thing that comes to mind, trusting the gift of your intuition. 

• I wish I was more….
• If I could change anything I would…
• I feel I should…
• My family expects me to… 
• Society expects me to… 
• What phrases do I remember from my childhood and school regarding my sensitivity?
• How did I feel about my sensitivity at school?
• When did I receive praise in my childhood?
• When did I receive criticism?
• Looking back, can I see my siblings as sensitive like me or not?
• In what ways has my sensitivity held me back?
• In what ways has my sensitivity felt like a burden?
• Who have I felt like a burden to?
• Reflecting on all this, what story have I been telling myself about my sensitivity?
• Reflecting on all this, what belief do I hold about who I am as a sensitive person?

Meeting your inner child through journaling can be a way to both reflect on your limiting beliefs and help you love yourself as an HSP.

Understanding the story that I had been telling myself allowed me to rewrite the script so that my sensitivity works for me instead of against me. Embracing my sensitivity gives me the compassion to take care of myself so that I can show up more often as the best version of myself. I don’t feel like I am running on empty each day. I recognise my triggers, I see the signs of overwhelm and know the tools to bring me back to balance. 

It’s no word of a lie when I say I love that I am sensitive. I am proud to be sensitive. Yes, there are challenges that can be annoying, but the rich, vibrant, colourful life it gives, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. It makes me who I am. 

And this is how I want you to feel about your sensitivity and your life. What’s the story you’ve been telling yourself? What beliefs are holding you back? And if you’re feeling inspired and ready to change the narrative, then book your complimentary discovery call today and let’s rewrite the script with you as the leading character of your life!