To get up every day to ‘what wonder my way comes’ is gratifying. We haven’t moved to a different home, but all the same I feel a shift occurring around us. I’ve mentioned it before, the KonMari Method, the method conceived by Marie Kondo, an organizing consultant; that my daughter and I are employing to tidy up our space. It’s been a couple of weeks since we’ve been active though. We are learning to pace ourselves. It’s changing things around here. It truly is a life-changing magic.
We are both highly sensitive people and susceptible to the impact of our surroundings. Someone, a highly respected someone in his field, once told me being highly sensitive was not a blessing. He equated it to having a deep and painful sunburn and being crammed into a crowded elevator. Well, he’s wrong! Being highly sensitive is a gift. Being highly sensitive puts one on a different plane or dimension. It’s being given the ability to touch and see the divine in the world. It is experiencing glimpses and sometimes more into the realms of creativity and Oneness.
It’s extra. It’s seeing more than what others see. The colors are more intense and can be felt. It’s being able to hear silence. It’s hearing thoughts, sometimes from across the world.
Okay, maybe he is right about the sunburn and the elevator. There are long days when the clothes of the day feel as if they will brand my skin if they are left on me one minute longer. Years ago, when my husband was sharing some deep and profound teachings he had learned in Yeshiva with an elaborate set up. (Regrettably, I forget the intellectual fill-in answer to the question. I think it’s either fear, or maybe apathy.) The set-up goes like this, “What is the worst thing known to us? What is debilitating and painful? What do we seek to find a cure for? What is the scourge to mankind?”
To the newly learned, one might expect to hear guesses of social ills or physical maladies, but my husband knew I was not unfamiliar to this way of thinking, as it was this exact spiritual and mystical searching that had brought us together in the first place.
My husband was theatrical in his presentation. Painstakingly, he embellished each question. The appropriately placed pause at the end of each. The direct eye contact questioning me and silently asking me to search my soul and come up with the right reply. It was our shared moment. I met his gaze and I metaphorically danced in his arms, matching him step for step. It was our shared entwining of our souls, one we would relive throughout our relationship. With all due modestly, may I say, it was climatic.
“Pantyhose!” I said emphatically.
I was not wrong, but one who intensely feels the scourge of pantyhose after a long day at work also feels intensely the wonder that is all around us.
We feel the electric energy of love being emitted from one to the other before the actual physical contact. We feel something in the air, something coming from the trees. It enables us to relish in the wonderment of forest-bathing. We feel the undeniable energy of Universal Oneness all around us, all the time. It is wondrous.
You can see the challenge, I’m sure. I have a suspicion we are all highly sensitive by default and most have simply become desensitized by design or by choice. I am happy to realize I am still experiencing the wonder of newness and novelty at the gift of sensitivity. I am yet learning to pace, and to appreciate, and pave my way through my day to day.
Clutter too can have an impact on us all. It has affected me for too long.
The other day a phrase came up, coined by the professional organizer, Barbara Hemphill:
“Clutter is postponed decisions.” That gave me pause. For the longest time I believed it was procrastination. Looking up the cause of procrastination, one finds anxiety or fear. (Remember fear is right up there with pantyhose!) For me, besides years long being physically unable to tend to the herculean clearing task, yes I see it was fear or worry. If one has had too many painful experiences because of heightened sensitivity we learn to watch out for new threats. All the time. Ever watchful, we rapidly develop a tactic of: okay, next; okay, next; okay, next! If we are too rapid and leave out the step of assigning each object its rightful place in the universe, things will pile up. We have left out the decision of placement. What do I do with this? If worry or fear is the main focus, we simply sift through each piece and fly off rapidly to the next object of our concern. Convinced when all is safe, we will deal with it later.
Unless we learn to quell our fear or worry, the places of feeling safe may be few and far between.
As we clear and tidy up, I see more and more paths of opportunity and doors opening to peace and well-being. More beauty and more love is coming my way and I am grateful. I am striving to be mindful and to appreciate the abundance of goodness in the world.
Love and goodness can be seen, heard, and felt in everything around us. Being highly sensitive gives one the edge to have them in abundance. All the time.
The other day my son shared a podcast with me. The author Anne Lamott was the guest. There were many great lines to relish and remember. Something in particular made an impact on me. She said although safety had always been her main focus, she had always been addicted to unsafe people. She questioned if that had been driven by her trying to get it right this time.
That resonated with me. It also troubled me a bit. What was the answer?
Later as the quite pleasurable talk wound its way through many aspects to be pondered, she concluded with a line that is my current affirmation as I navigate my day to day.
“You are loved and you are safe.”
If you, like many of us, haven’t heard that enough: You are loved and you are safe.
May you hear it, may you feel it, and may it be so.
With love,
Rachel Stein
I Googled: ‘Highly Sensitive’ and this is what I found.
Photo credit: Rachel Stein
(The End)
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