Hi, this is Cheryl Richardson and in
honor of the paperback release of The
Art of Extreme Self-Care I wanted to
talk to you about another popular
chapter in the book. And that's called
You're So Sensitive or You're So
Sensitive. How many times have you heard that? You know our sensitivity really is
our greatest gift. It gives us access to
wisdom and insight, makes us highly
perceptive in the world, allows us to be
more in tune with our intuitions so that we're
able to hear that voice inside that
leads us in the right direction. It
allows us to connect more deeply with
other human beings because we're present
for the connection in the relationship
and it allows us to just experience life,
the beautiful nuances of life, the beauty
of nature, connection to animals,
connection to strangers as we pass
through the world. Our sensitivity really
gives us access to the richness in the
meaning we all long for. Therefore you
need to become fiercely protective of it.
Your sensitivity is going to emerge when
it feels, when you feel safe and loved
and comfortable. So I want to just
suggest a couple of things you can do to
protect your sensitivity. The very first
thing you can do is make sure that you
start surrounding yourself with
relationships that are healing, nurturing
compassionate, relationships where you
feel safe to be authentically who you
are, and to be vulnerable and to let that
sensitive part of you out. That might
mean telling the truth to or setting
limits on the people in your life who
were always criticizing you, overwhelming
you with their negativity, their critique
of who you are and what you're doing. Or
the people who are boundary bashers who step over the boundaries that you set. If
you have people like that in your life
on a consistent basis, your sensitive
side is not going to be present, it's not
safe to be. So you may need to tell the
truth in some of your relationships.
You may need to set some limits with
people. And honestly you might need to
eliminate some relationships altogether
because your sensitivity is an asset and
you want it present in your life. You
also want to turn down the noise:
radio, TV. Shut the radio off in the car
when you're driving to work. Allow your
adrenal system to relax so that you can
get comfortable with being in that more
sensitive arena in your life. And noise
just keeps the amygdala revved up and
the adrenal system locked in
fight-or-flight, too much noise. So you
want to turn the noise down in your life.
I do things like I keep the ringer
turned off on my phone at home or on my
cell phone. I keep technology really at a
distance. I now do things like I respond
to email on airplanes because I travel a
lot. So that when I'm home it's a
peaceful place and I can allow that
presence to be there in my life because
I'm not always on alert. That's really what we want to do.
You want to turn down the noise so that
you're not always on alert waiting for
the next thing that's going to happen.
You also want to stop the violence. Stop
watching news, stop reading sensational
stories on the web, stop doing those
things that are an assault on your
adrenal system. Because once again that's
going to cause you to shut down, numb out, squelch that part of you. If you begin to
protect your sensitive side what will
happen is this: The next time someone
says to you, You're so sensitive, you'll
look at them with a big smile and you'll
say, Why thank you very much. You're right. I am and I love that about myself. Thanks
for watching and I hope you'll pick up a
copy of The Art of Extreme Self-Care. I
really want you to take good care of
yourself and good care of the people you
love.
