3 ways meditation is life-changing for highly sensitive persons
You KNOW meditation is good for you. You’ve heard about all the benefits: it improves focus, reduces stress, leads to better sleep, helps to calm down our mind and quiet down our negative, critical inner chatter. It helps us better deal with all the chaos and constant stimuli around us.
We know all this, but still: it seems difficult to start meditating.
Meditation has, over and over again, been scientifically proven to have major benefits for our general wellbeing and health. But I argue that meditation is even more beneficial if you are a highly sensitive person (HSP). And here’s why:
Meditation helps HSPs deal with overstimulation
As a HSP, our nervous system is constantly on overdrive. We sense everything intensely and deeply, whether it’s the traffic noise on the streets, the smell of strong perfume when someone enters the room, the bright halogen lights in the office, the sound of the dripping faucet or the aircon — we absorb it all. It seems impossible to “switch off” and not pay attention and be overwhelmed by all the sensory stimuli we deal with daily.
In addition to the overwhelm caused by sensory stimuli in our environment, we also pick up on all the subtleties of the environment we are in. We sense other people’s energy and their intentions.
Our intuition is strong, also supported by the laser sharp perception we have on constantly, in all environments. While these traits can be a blessing and a gift, sometimes they can lead to overwhelm and a sense of total depletion.
Meditation is helpful for everyone but because HSPs have heightened levels of sensory perception and processing leading to nervous system overstimulation, practising meditation and mindfulness helps us even more.
When we meditate, we can learn to gradually tune down the effects that external stimuli and overwhelming sounds, smells, sights and feelings have on us. Meditation gradually brings us to a state of inner silence and calm.
Sure - this sense of total calm doesn’t stick with us as intensely when we stop our meditation practice. If we lived our life in a state of non-thought and constant meditative bliss, it could be a bit difficult to navigate life and get things done. Sometimes we need our thinking mind and analytical skills. But the more we meditate, the more we are able to access these states of inner calm and lack of internal chaos, no matter what happens around us.
When we keep our meditation practice consistent, it gets easier to drop into these silent states of calm, no matter what chaos or mix of sensory stimuli the world throws at us.
Meditation helps us build a type of energetic shield that protects us from total overwhelm and helps us deal with life’s complex daily stressors.
2. Meditation supports HSPs to silence inner chatter
As highly sensitive people, we have vivid inner worlds. We tend to overthink to the point of exhaustion and our inner critic is pretty loud. You know, the voice inside of you that generally doesn’t have many positive or encouraging things to say, but never forgets to berate and remind you of the times when you made mistakes or did something seemingly embarrassing.
Meditation and mindfulness exercises are powerful in tuning down the voice of our inner critic and the constant inner chatter we go through as HSPs. This might seem counter-intuititive because when we meditate, we ARE tuning inwards. You might think this would just increase the levels of anxiety and overthinking that HSPs face. But it’s actually the opposite.
This is also the reason why many (especially HSPs) avoid starting meditation - you feel like it is impossible for you to meditate because you can’t shut down your thoughts and reach any level of inner silence. The good news is: you don’t have to.
Meditation is not about stopping all thinking (because that would be pretty impossible). The first stage of meditation practice is only about learning to observe our own thinking and mind processes in order to slowly start to create distance from them and understand that we are not, in fact, our minds. Our thinking and our brain does not define us and they don’t need to control us.
When we live as HSPs without tools to support us in this world, it can seem like our minds are controlling us. Overthinking 24/7 is just a fact that we cannot really control. It seems like we are at the mercy of our ever-fluctuating thoughts and emotional rollercoasters.
But when we learn, through meditation, to better understand our own minds with compassion, we can start to create distance from our thoughts and emotions and no longer be completely drained by them.
It’s a process and a practice like most important things in life, but one that definitely pays off.
3. Meditation strengthens self-compassion and acceptance of our sensitivity
Navigating life as a highly sensitive person is filled with challenges. But one of the first steps that helps us embrace our sensitivity and see it as a gift is learning more about the HSP trait, understanding ourselves better and accepting ourselves for the way we are.
When we go through life not understanding why we react to things differently from non-HSPs or why some things seem overwhelmingly difficult to us, it’s exhausting. Self acceptance starts with cultivating self-compassion and awareness of ourselves, and that’s where meditation and mindfulness come in as excellent tools for HSPs.
I don’t see meditation primarily as a tool to increase our “effectiveness” and “focus” to get more done in our hectic, busy lives. I know it’s often framed and marketed in this way, but it doesn’t really sit right with me.
For me, meditation is above all about strengthening our connection towards ourselves with kindness and self-compassion. It’s not about becoming a “better version of ourselves” but embracing and accepting what we already and always deep down are.
I see meditation as a powerful tool for HSPs in the path towards self-discovery, empathetic understanding, kindness and compassion towards our trait of sensitivity. When we practice meditation through different techniques, we start to know ourselves in a deeper way.
In my meditation classes, I like to combine aspects of mindful self-compassion to strengthen these skills. But no matter what type of meditation you are practising, it will strengthen your ability to know yourself better and cultivate self-acceptance. And this effect will also trickle down to all your relationships in life, not only to the one you have with yourself. You will become more patient and compassionate towards others and small things no longer irritate you to the same extent as before.
The famous lines in the Bhagavad Gita say that yoga is "a journey of the self, through the self, to the self”. And so is meditation (as also being the core essence of yoga). And I believe this is one of the greatest gifts that meditation can offer for HSPs - a better understanding of ourselves and who we truly are, with a total, loving acceptance of our sensitivity.
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If you are looking to start your journey to discovering the benefits of meditation and making it a part of your self-care practice as a HSP, I am offering an 8-week online live meditation programme starting on 1 February 2024. You can find all the information and details HERE.
