Read This If You Have Been Called Sensitive

Right now, we are all cooped up indoors and while most of us are trying hard to make this time restful, productive and positive, there can be some tricky days.

During this time, people are managing their emotions in different ways and many of us are learning new ways of sharing.

We cannot control or stop people from using words of sarcasm, indifference, judgement or reprimand. We can only slowly begin to manage these triggers and reach a place of response versus reaction.

If you are one of those people who cannot shrug off a harshly spoken word, then this article might be insightful. It lays our five potential reasons why words might hurt you deeply. If you resonate with one or many of these, they might help you understand and manage your triggers better for next time.

1. Your love language is words of affirmation

Gary Chapman launched a revolutionary theory that identified five relatively common love languages for people. One of the love languages happens to be ‘words of affirmation’, For these people, positive words are the best gift. Words lift them up, motivate them, and help them feel loved. On the other spectrum, harsh words deeply wound their soul, maybe more so than for other people.

So, if harsh, indifferent or reprimanding words make you feel like someone stabbed you in the chest, your love language might be ‘words of affirmation’.

Understanding this can be very liberating because it helps shift the narrative from “You are too sensitive” to “You are an empathetic persona and deserve the same empathy you extend others”

If this speaks to you, embrace it and slowly start to build yourself up by affirming your beliefs.

It can also be very constructive to share your love language with your partner to help then support you better. Here is a fantastic article that drills down on this love language and provides guidance for loved ones.

2. You have a lot on your plate

If there are situations when you find yourselves a tad bit more reactive to words than usual, it might be time to step back and assess. It is likely that you have been dealing with a lot. If I hit you with the same intensity on both a healthy arm and a wounded arm, it is going to hurt much more on the wounded arm.

Similarly, if you are stressed, wounded or challenged in some way (more than usual), then it is likely that you find yourself feeling more vulnerable to words that were harder to move past before. Your body is activating the ‘fight’ response in distress.

This Harvard Health Publishing article lays out our physical and primal response to a stressful situation

When someone experiences a stressful event, the amygdala sends a distress signal to the hypothalamus. This area of the brain functions like a command center, communicating with the rest of the body through the nervous system so that the person has the energy to fight or flee.

If this is something that resonates with you, maybe it is time to find ways to self-soothe and take care of yourself. Ways of engagement and communication with loved ones that worked for you may not work for you now as you first need to replenish yourself. If you are operating at a 40% version of yourself, your responses in stressful situations are likely going to be the 20% version of you.

3. You are seeking validation

Sometimes it is important to understand who speaks the words that hurt. Do you feel pained by judgments, assumptions and indifference of every tom, dick and harry (likely not)? Or do you feel pained by the words of specific set of people in your life. It is time to ask what you might be seeking by looking for kinder words or stronger understanding from them.

As Gloria Steinem put it,

The most hurtful thing is not what comes from our adversaries, it’s what comes from our friends.

Are you looking for a validation for your decisions or actions? When you are served a dose of reprimand instead of validation, it is likely to scrape your heart. Maybe it is time to identify and release the need to be validated. The only person who needs to validate your decisions is the one looking back at you in the mirror.

4. They speak the truth

This is hard for many people to understand but sometimes words hurt because they are true. Our ego steps in very strongly and turns on our defense gear. Such words, though rough, can be useful if spoken by someone at the right time and with tact.

Dr Marny Lishman, a Psychologist and Coach, throws light on this phenomenon in her article

One of easiest ways to recognize if this happened with you is by looking back at the situation a few hours later and asking yourself if your heart feels there is any element of truth in the words. More often than not, your gut will tell you the answer.

Slowly, your moral and intuitive compass will get stronger and you will be able to accept words of truth and admonish misleading or misjudged words, without driving yourself to the depths of analysis.

5. They are tactless

Sometimes, there is no inner work or introspection that needs to go into the situation. Sometimes people are just a tad less sensitive, a tad more tactless. Their words might hurt, but it is good to remember in such circumstances that their words are a reflection of them and not you.

Michael Thompson (a Medium writer) identified 11 things that socially aware people do not say. I could not agree more!

If you find yourself in a situation where someone is repeatedly tactless with you — maybe it is time to adjust your expectations of them. Maybe they are not aligned to be in a position of confidants or friends.

Hurt is inevitable and we are all constructed differently. At these challenging times, it is likely that our weak spots are rubbed again and again as people around us are also challenged. A small sit-down introspection of the times we found ourselves in a conflict or painful circumstance, can help us start to build a deeper understanding and acceptance of our true nature.