Hypersensitive to criticism

Avoidant Personality Disorder - Mental Health Disorders

Mark Zimmerman

, MD, Rhode Island Hospital

Full review/revision May 2021 | Modified Sep 2022

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Avoidant personality disorder is characterized by avoiding social situations or interactions that involve risk of rejection, criticism, or humiliation.

People with avoidant personality disorder are afraid of being rejected, criticized, or embarrassed and thus avoid situations where they may experience such reactions.
Doctors diagnose avoidant personality disorder based on specific symptoms, such as avoiding situations that involve interpersonal contact because of fear of rejection and disapproval or feelings of being socially incompetent, unappealing, or inferior to others.
People with this disorder may benefit from cognitive-behavioral therapy, other psychotherapies, and antianxiety drugs and antidepressants.

Personality disorders Overview of Personality Disorders Personality disorders are long-lasting, pervasive patterns of thinking, perceiving, reacting, and relating that cause the person significant distress and/or impair the person's ability to function... read more are long-lasting, pervasive patterns of thinking, perceiving, reacting, and relating that cause the person significant distress and/or impair the person's ability to function.

People with avoidant personality disorder feel inadequate. They manage these feelings by avoiding situations in which they may be evaluated negatively.

Avoidant personality disorder occurs in over 2% of the general population in the United States. It affects men and women equally.

Other disorders are also often present. They include one or more of the following:

Major depressive disorder Major depressive disorder A short discussion of prolonged grief disorder. Depression is a feeling of sadness and/or a decreased interest or pleasure in activities that becomes a disorder when it is intense enough to... read more or persistent depressive disorder Persistent depressive disorder A short discussion of prolonged grief disorder. Depression is a feeling of sadness and/or a decreased interest or pleasure in activities that becomes a disorder when it is intense enough to... read more
Obsessive-compulsive disorder Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) Obsessive-compulsive disorder is characterized by obsessions, compulsions, or both. Obsessions are recurring, persistent, unwanted, anxiety-provoking, intrusive ideas, images, or urges. Compulsions... read more
An anxiety disorder Overview of Anxiety Disorders Anxiety is a feeling of nervousness, worry, or unease that is a normal human experience. It is also present in a wide range of psychiatric disorders, including generalized anxiety disorder,. .. read more , such as panic disorder, particularly social phobia Social Phobia Social phobia is fear or anxiety about certain social or performance situations. These situations are often avoided or endured with much distress. Humans are social animals, and their ability... read more (social anxiety disorder)
Another personality disorder (such as dependent Dependent Personality Disorder Dependent personality disorder is characterized by a pervasive, excessive need to be taken care of, leading to submissiveness and clinging behaviors. People with dependent personality disorder... read more or borderline Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) Borderline personality disorder is characterized by a pervasive pattern of instability in relationships, self-image, moods, and behavior and hypersensitivity to possible rejection and abandonment... read more )

People who have social phobia and avoidant personality disorder have more severe symptoms and are more disabled than those who have only one of the disorders.

Genes and environmental factors may contribute to the development of avoidant personality disorder. For example, people may have an inborn anxiety in social situations, and/or they may experience rejection and marginalization during childhood. Avoidance in social situations has been observed in children as young as about 2 years old.

People with avoidant personality disorder avoid social interaction, even at work, because they fear that they will be criticized or rejected or that people will disapprove of them. For example, they may do the following:

They may refuse a promotion because they fear coworkers will criticize them.
They may avoid meetings.
They may avoid making new friends unless they are sure they will be liked.

People with this disorder assume others will be critical and disapproving until there is clear-cut, indisputable proof to the contrary. Thus, before joining a group and forming a close relationship, people with this disorder require repeated assurances of support and uncritical acceptance.

People with avoidant personality disorder are reluctant to talk about themselves lest they be mocked or humiliated.

People with this disorder are very reluctant to take risks or participate in new activities for similar reasons. In such cases, they tend to exaggerate the dangers and use minimal symptoms or other problems to explain why they are not participating. They may prefer a limited lifestyle because of their need for security and certainty.

People with avoidant personality disorder are very sensitive to anything critical, disapproving, or mocking because they constantly think about being criticized or rejected by others. They are vigilant for any sign of a negative response to them. Their tense, anxious appearance may elicit mockery or teasing, thus seeming to confirm their self-doubts.

Low self-esteem and a sense of inadequacy inhibit these people in social situations, especially new ones. They hold back in interactions with new people because they think of themselves as socially inept, unappealing, and inferior to others. They tend to be quiet and timid because they tend to think that if they say anything, others will say it is wrong.

People with avoidant personality disorder long for social interaction but fear placing their well-being in the hands of others. Because these people with avoidant personality limit their interactions with others, they tend to be relatively isolated and to lack a social network that could help them when they need it.

Doctors usually diagnose personality disorders based on criteria in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5 Classification and Diagnosis of Mental Illness In 1980, the American Psychiatric Association published the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III), marking the first attempt to approach the diagnosis... read more ), published by the American Psychiatric Association.

For doctors to diagnose avoidant personality disorder, people must persistently avoid social contact, feel inadequate, and be hypersensitive to criticism and rejection, as shown by at least four of the following:

They avoid job-related activities that involve interpersonal contact because they fear that they will be criticized or rejected or that people will disapprove of them.
They are unwilling to get involved with people unless they are sure of being liked.
They are reserved in close relationships because they are afraid of being ridiculed or humiliated.
They are preoccupied with being criticized or rejected in social situations.
They are inhibited in new social situations because they feel inadequate.
They view themselves as socially incompetent, unappealing, or inferior to others.
They are reluctant to take risks or participate in any new activity because they may be embarrassed.

Also, symptoms must have begun by early adulthood.

Cognitive-behavioral therapy that focuses on social skills
Other types of psychotherapy
Antianxiety drugs and antidepressants

General treatment Treatment Personality disorders are long-lasting, pervasive patterns of thinking, perceiving, reacting, and relating that cause the person significant distress and/or impair the person's ability to function. .. read more of avoidant personality disorder is similar to that for all personality disorders.

People with avoidant personality disorder may avoid treatment.

If people have social phobia and avoidant personality disorder, the following treatments can be effective:

Cognitive-behavioral therapy Psychotherapy Extraordinary advances have been made in the treatment of mental illness. As a result, many mental health disorders can now be treated nearly as successfully as physical disorders. Most treatment... read more that focuses on acquiring social skills, done in groups
Other group therapies if the group consists of other people with the same difficulties

People with avoidant personality disorder benefit from

Psychodynamic psychotherapy Psychodynamic psychotherapy Extraordinary advances have been made in the treatment of mental illness. As a result, many mental health disorders can now be treated nearly as successfully as physical disorders. Most treatment... read more may be helpful. This type of psychotherapy focuses on underlying conflicts.

Antidepressants Drug therapy for depression A short discussion of prolonged grief disorder. Depression is a feeling of sadness and/or a decreased interest or pleasure in activities that becomes a disorder when it is intense enough to... read more , such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), and antianxiety drugs Drugs Used to Treat Anxiety Disorders can help reduce anxiety enough to enable people to manage new social situations.

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Overly Sensitive to Criticism: Adult ADHD and RSD

I’m completing a Ph.D. in history. It’s been a long, increasingly expensive, and emotionally taxing process. There are few things in this world I want more than to achieve this goal that I’ve been working toward since I started my undergrad education in 2005. Only one task stands between me and those coveted letters after my name: dissertation defense.

Academia is founded on criticism. A crucial and unavoidable part of this process is receiving feedback from my committee. So, I recently sent out an email requesting necessary revisions so I can be done with this. This is time-sensitive stuff. To defend my dissertation this semester, and avoid additional financial expense, I have to implement the feedback to get the project ready for defense. So, when responses to my email started coming in, I hurried to open them so I could see what my mentors said.

Not really. I was terrified of the content of those emails. Despite my intense desire to complete my degree and the ticking clock on defending this semester, I spent hours, if not days, working up the nerve to read what my advisors think of my work. This was followed by hours, if not days, of recovering from the criticism they provided, no matter how constructive, no matter how kindly it may have been offered.

The Surprise of RSD

When I started the Ph.D. program, I assumed that the forgetful, inattentive aspect of my ADHD would be the most difficult part to overcome. And it has been difficult — sitting through classes, reading boring books, and consistently attaining and maintaining a level of focus and concentration necessary for this work. But I’ve spent the last 15 to 20 years developing strategies to overcome these challenges of ADHD. So instead, my greatest challenge is something I didn’t know existed until a couple years ago: Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD), the intense emotional discomfort and pain I feel due to criticism or rejection (perceived or real) from others.

RSD is a disabling feature of ADHD. Like all other aspects of ADHD, it’s a feeling that everyone feels at various times. Yet the frequency, and intensity of these feelings, separate these feelings from typical responses to perceived rejection. It is difficult to find words to describe the intense emotional discomfort that rejection or criticism produce. As with much of my experience with ADHD, it is when I research and see how intensely this can affect people that I realize how fortunate I am to experience a version of it that is manageable.

[Do I Have Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria? Take This Test]

The Pain of RSD

Almost all teens and adults with ADHD are more sensitive than others to perceived criticism, and nearly a third report that this is the most difficult aspect of ADHD to live with. While RSD is not ubiquitous — like inattentiveness, forgetfulness, impulsivity, and the features most commonly associated with ADHD — it is, for me, the most painful symptom.

RSD can dominate people’s lives, driving them to please and impress those around them. Or it can produce the opposite effectt, leading individuals to withdraw from social interactions. When it is internalized, its effects range from low self-esteem to suicidal ideation. When it is externalized, it often results in intense and inexplicable anger directed at the source of the rejection.

Those of us with RSD are more sensitive to criticism, often perceiving it where none exists. Yet, it is not always imagined, since most of us grew up labeled the “problem child,” receiving more than our fair share of criticism from those we looked to for approval. It can degenerate into a self-fulfilling prophesy, with our sensitivity to criticism causing us to act in ways that draw the very criticism we fear.

For me, RSD often manifests as general anxiety, caused by a subconscious fear of embarrassment. It also results in my feeling that those in my life me don’t like me as much as they seem to (pretend to). The feelings can be acute. The knowledge that I am overreacting does nothing to alleviate the crippling agony that criticism can produce, especially when it comes from a source that is important to me and touches on important subjects.

[Use This Free Resource: Understanding Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria]

The Way Forward with RSD

Which brings me back to those emails, written by people I respect and admire, written about a project into which I have invested so much of myself that it feels like an actual part of me. That reluctance to confront the criticism contained in these messages suddenly makes a bit more sense. Soon, I will tear off the bandage — a metaphor that seems so inadequate in describing the intense, personal, emotional discomfort I feel.

If I’m lucky, it will turn out to be a good day, and I’ll be able to set aside that pain and feel inspired to improve my dissertation. If it’s not a good day, I’ll take my embarrassment and my certainty that, no matter what they say, these folks are deeply disappointed in me. I’ll climb into a hole somewhere while I go through the routine of pain, embarrassment, anger, and eventual acceptance.

Assuming I can overcome the sense that I am simply not good enough to do this — the feeling that this perfectly ordinary struggle to bring a dissertation to defense is a sign that my reach has exceeded my grasp — I’ll sit down and write. If I go through this process enough times, I will soon defend and earn a Ph.D. in history. It will be worth it.

Overly Sensitive with RSD: Next Steps

Understand: Exaggerated Emotions: How and Why ADHD Triggers Intense Feelings
Read: New Insights into Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria
Learn: Why You Feel Rejection So Intensely

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Hypersensitive People: 13 Steps to Understanding

87,309

Knowing Yourself A Man Among People

“When I was in kindergarten, a boy in my group threw my favorite book off the balcony,” says 20-year-old Anna. “I remember crying terribly—not because of the book, but because I hated that boy.” The main sign of hypersensitivity is strong emotions that can arise due to the most insignificant reasons.

Some of us are just more sensitive to everything that happens to them, and this is not necessarily a bad thing. According to psychologist Elaine Eyron, there are about 20% of hypersensitive people (hypersensitives) in society. This means that at least one of your acquaintances, friends or relatives belongs to their number.

What should be remembered when dealing with hypersensitives?

1.

They cry often

Hypersensitive people may cry when they are happy, sad or irritated. This does not mean that they are bad. They just experience everything that happens to them very intensely, and tears help emotional release.

2. They are not necessarily introverted

Introversion can go hand in hand with hypersensitivity, but this is not always the case. Elaine Ayron found that a third of hypersensitive people are actually extroverts. Often they require even more attention because they find it difficult to regulate their emotional state, they are more dependent on others and may experience a kind of intoxication from impressions.

3. They get nervous when they have to make a decision

The ability to make decisions quickly and confidently is not the strongest feature of hypersensitives. Even when it comes to such banal things as choosing a cafe for lunch. The reason is that they are very afraid of making the wrong choice: suddenly the food in the cafe will be too expensive, the music will be too loud, the waiters will ignore them, and their companion will not like it there.

4. They react to the slightest change

“If you are used to ending messages with a smiley, but this time you put an end to it, be sure: we will definitely notice it,” Anna says. “And we’ll probably start to get nervous.” Hypersensitives tend to be very sensitive to what's going on in their environment and instantly notice when things aren't going their way.

5. They are always ready to listen

If you need a friendly shoulder, feel free to contact them. Hypersensitives can make small talk, but they do best in the role of an attentive listener. You can be sure that they will not interrupt you, will not become distracted and change the subject.

6. They hate noise and loud noises

A high speed train, car horns, overly sociable colleagues... All this not only annoys us - we suffer, as if every sound is driven into our head with a hammer. According to Elaine Ayron, it's all about the reduced threshold of sensitivity, because of which any stimulus is felt more strongly.

7. Their work habits are rather unusual.

Work from home or any quiet place is ideal. This allows you to focus and keep your nerves in order. “Hypersensitivity people are able to take advantage of their ability to observe,” says Elaine Ayron. “They have a knack for thinking about ideas and then presenting them in a way that will be taken seriously.” Their analytical skills and attentiveness to other people's comments make them excellent teammates (as long as they are not put in charge of making major decisions).

8. They don't like to tickle their nerves

A horror or thriller film is not the best choice if you want to invite a hypersensitive person to the cinema. The tendency to empathize, combined with an increased susceptibility to emotionally charged images, can cause shock in them.

9. They do not take criticism well

Avoidance of anything that can cause too much excitement is a hallmark of hypersensitivity. As a result, they try to do everything possible so that they themselves do not hurt the feelings of others and not cause their displeasure.

10. They take everything to heart

When dealing with hypersensitives, avoid ridicule. Of course, they themselves can love good jokes and try to relate to life with humor, but even the hint that something may be wrong with them makes them nervous.

11. They are very sensitive to pain

Pain is also a kind of stimulation. Not surprisingly, hypersensitives perceive it more acutely. Elaine Ayron's research has confirmed that hypersensitive people have a low pain threshold, and the expectation of pain (for example, in the dentist's office) can make you feel pain even when no one touches them.

12. They dream of a deep relationship

Hypersensitivity finds it difficult to make new acquaintances. The stress of uncertainty, the anticipation of possible embarrassment, the torturous guessing of what the interlocutor is thinking - all this tires them. Hypersensitive people tend to find a reliable, empathetic partner with whom they can relax and who they can completely trust.

13. They cannot change

Oversensitivity is not a whim or a lack of character. The psychologist found that areas of the brain associated with empathy and cognition in hypersensitive people become more aroused when they are shown photographs of a face with traces of strong emotions. In other words, this behavior is biologically programmed.

If there is an oversensitive person in your environment, try to be sensitive to him. Most likely, he himself understands his own characteristics well, therefore he behaves carefully and considerately. But he expects understanding from you too.

About the author

Elaine Eyron — psychologist, author of the book “The Hypersensitive Nature. How to succeed in a crazy world” (Azbuka-Atticus, 2014).

Text: Anton Soldatov Photo Source: Getty Images

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Often this opinion is erroneous: emotionality and exactingness to the environment are associated with the physiological characteristics of a person. Such features are called hypersensitivity of the central nervous system, and people with it are called hypersensitive. They react more sharply than others to various stimuli: external - those that relate to the environment around them, and internal, emanating from their body and mind.

The spectrum of stimuli is very wide: pain and hunger, labels on clothes and fabrics that are unpleasant to the touch like coarse, prickly wool, caffeine and alcohol, loud noises and intense smells, criticism and stress, one's own emotions and the feelings of others.

Hypersensitivity is not so rare: according to various estimates, it is characteristic of 15-30% of people. To test yourself, you can take a test by a psychologist, the author of the term "hypersensitive people" Elaine Aron - the original version in English or an adapted version in Russian.

/resilience/

5 Tips for Resilience to Stress

Oversensitivity can make life very difficult: too many stimuli can be draining and cause chronic stress. We tell you what a hypersensitive person should do to prevent this from happening.

What you need to know about the work of the brain

The main thing about effective ways not to succumb to stress and thinking errors is in your mail twice a month on Fridays. Free

TIP #1

Learn your characteristics

Hypersensitivity manifests itself in different ways. Some respond most strongly to sensory stimulation: loud noises, strong smells, bright lights, the sensation of skin touching tissue. Others experience such intense emotions that it is difficult to contain them, as well as to step back from feelings and switch to business. Still others are especially susceptible to the experiences of others: they easily catch a change of mood and become infected with it.

Every hypersensitive person who wants to improve his life should start by studying his reactions: to determine what annoys, frightens, overexcites and tires most of all. And first of all, you should pay attention to your answers in the hypersensitivity test.

But this may not be enough: discomfort in some situations is so habitual that a person may not notice it. So the second step is to observe your reactions to other stimuli that disturb highly sensitive people. Here are the most common:

Sounds: fireworks and ambulance sirens, cafe music, people speaking loudly and emotionally.
Light: garlands and disco balls, bright artificial lighting in stores.
Smells: perfumes, fragrances, diffusers, gasoline, tobacco, exhaust gases.
Tactile sensations: labels on clothes, synthetic fabrics and coarse wool.
Empathy: anxiety, sadness and other emotions that are transmitted from those with whom you communicate, the desire to anticipate other people's desires and fatigue after communication.
Caffeine, alcohol and other stimulants and psychoactive substances.
Multitasking: fatigue, irritation and overexcitation if you have to do different tasks at the same time or if there is simply a lot of things to do.
Hunger: if you do not eat on time, the mood deteriorates dramatically and dramatically, concentration of attention disappears.
Change: it is frightening and overwhelming.
Scary, violent or sad films and books.
Competition: when you have to compete with someone, it causes a lot of tension.

Once you have established which stimuli affect you the most, you can look for specific solutions. Let's say you are sensitive to noise, but like to sit with your laptop in a cafe and work. Then you can buy noise-canceling headphones - not necessarily expensive ones, you can also those designed for construction work - and always take them with you when you leave the house.

Psych3Go project video about different types of hypersensitive people

TIP #2

Set personal boundaries

People with normal sensitivity of the nervous system can create a lot of inconvenience for a hypersensitive person without even noticing it. For example, turn on music loudly, demand a lot of communication, use intense perfume.

Partially, such situations can be minimized by clearly telling others what exactly does not suit you and why - or, in the language of psychology, by setting healthy personal boundaries.

How to respond to relatives who violate your boundaries: 10 phrases

To set personal boundaries, you need to clearly formulate your request to another person, focusing on what specific result you want to achieve. It is best not to criticize the person's behavior, but to explain why it is uncomfortable for you. For best results, use the principles of non-violent communication.

Be prepared for the fact that setting personal boundaries will not be easy. During the conversation, you may feel guilt, shame, and fear that the relationship will be destroyed. This is normal: the belief that expressing your needs is selfish is fairly common, and many people pick it up as a child, either from their parents or teachers at school.

Video of the Psych3Go project - about the main problems that hypersensitive people face and which are difficult for people with normal sensitivity of the nervous system to understand

TIP #3

Avoid overstimulation of the nervous system

Psychologist, author of the book “Supersensitive People. From difficulties to advantages "Ted Zeff advises hypersensitive people to assess the load on their nervous system in advance and plan their movements, business and rest in accordance with it - this helps from overloading the nervous system due to the abundance of stimuli.

The first rule is to avoid situations where you have to be in a noisy, crowded space. To do this, you can leave for work earlier, and leave later, so as not to move around the city during rush hour.

/chill-out/

How to relax: 5 tips

It is also worth planning lunches and dinners outside the home during hours when cafes and restaurants are less busy, and choose familiar places where there is no loud music and not too busy, loud visitors. The same should be done if you need to go to the store: it is better to visit the supermarket late in the evening, and not immediately after work, and go to the shopping center on the weekend morning, as soon as it opens, and not after lunch.

The second rule is to allocate sufficient time for rest after encountering stimuli. For example, if you still had to be in a noisy crowd, then you should be alone in a quiet and darkened place - take a bath, put on a sleep mask and lie in bed, take a walk in the park among the trees.

TIP #4

Practice monotasking

One of the signs of hypersensitivity is difficulty multitasking. Faced with the need to do many things at the same time or in a short period of time, a person experiences irritation, confusion and quickly gets tired. This is due to how the work of the brain changes under such conditions.

In a study by American neuroscientists, volunteers were given different tasks: read descriptions of happy, sad, and neutral events, look at photographs of faces of strangers and their partners with pronounced emotions, count backwards, and then relax and not think about anything. All this time, scientists have been monitoring their brain activity using fMRI.

It turned out that during the execution of tasks, the cingulate and premotor areas of the brain involved in information processing are more active in hypersensitive people than in people with normal sensitivity of the nervous system. Including - in a state of rest, when they seem to be doing nothing.

Research has shown that the hypersensitive brain deeply analyzes everything even at rest - Highly sensitive refugee

In other words, the brain of a hypersensitive person intensively thinks over a variety of external and internal signals, does this for a long time and rarely rests.

In addition, highly sensitive people have a higher sensory sensitivity - thanks to it, a hypersensitive person picks up more details and becomes overloaded with information more quickly. Together with a greater depth of information processing, this feature makes a person especially vulnerable to the damage from multitasking.

The way out is to always try, whenever possible, to practice monotasking - that is, to concentrate on one thing and not be distracted by others until it is completed. In practice, this can be done by competently planning your day.

/list/messengers-and-psycho/

How communication in messengers affects the psyche: 5 conclusions of scientists

First of all, you need to evaluate what things you have to do - work and personal. Then - think about which of them are the most difficult and important. For this category of tasks, it is worth planning a separate time during the day when you can retire, turn off notifications and not be distracted by anything.

Psychologist, author of the term "hypersensitive people" Elaine Aron - about research into hypersensitivity

TIP #5

Sleep during the day

An oversensitive person may benefit from the habit of sleeping during the day.

Research shows that naps help reduce stress and improve the ability to regulate emotions, which is especially important for those who are hypersensitive. It also improves productivity, concentration, and memory—more effectively than coffee, scientists found in one experiment.

Benefits of caffeine, naps and placebo for memory compared - PubMed

However, it is important to remember that naps must last 10-20 minutes or the effect will be the opposite - fog in the mind. This happens because the first half hour after a person falls asleep, he is in the REM sleep phase - and can wake up without difficulty. Then slow-wave sleep begins - deeper. If it is interrupted, the so-called sleep inertia sets in - a person is half asleep and cannot focus.

The impact of daytime sleep on improving the quality of life - ScienceDirect

Don't start napping after 3 p.m. - this is fraught with sleepless nights.

Sleep researcher Matt Walker on the pros and cons of daytime naps and how to get the most out of it

TIP #6

Meditate regularly

Hypersensitive people respond more strongly to various stimuli, including negative ones, and therefore are more vulnerable to stress. This was demonstrated, for example, by a Japanese study of the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on mental health.

COVID-19 Sensory Sensitivity and Stress - ScienceDirect

Scientists tested about 500 volunteers with two tests - the first measured nervous system sensitivity, the second measured stress levels due to the pandemic. People who scored high on the sensitivity scale tended to score higher on the stress test—that is, they coped worse with difficulties.

However, this rule did not work for all hypersensitive people. Some reported less stress levels - apparently they had more developed stress tolerance.

Meditation for Non-Meditators: 6 Easy Ways

Psychologists believe that highly sensitive people who grew up in a supportive environment are more resistant to stress. But even those who are less fortunate can increase their resistance to stress.

Meditation has been shown in studies to reduce anxiety, improve the ability to regulate emotions, and improve stress tolerance.

The experience of meditation is associated with differences in the network of the passive mode of the brain - PNAS

To get the most out of meditation, the most important thing is to do it regularly, ideally every day, scientists say. A longer meditation, such as a 20-minute meditation, also seems to affect a person more than a short 5-minute one.

Positive Emotional Correlates of Meditation Practice: A Comparison of Mindfulness and Loving-Kindness Meditation - SpringerLink

Neuroscientist Sarah Lazar - on how meditation changes the brain and makes a person more resilient

TIP #7

Perceive hypersensitivity as a superpower

Although hypersensitivity can make life very difficult, it should not be considered a harmful trait. This is indicated, for example, by the fact that scientists detect it not only in humans, but also in more than 100 species of organisms, from fruit flies and fish to cats, dogs and monkeys. And if hypersensitivity occurs in such a huge number of species, most likely it provides some evolutionary advantages.

Why some children are orchids and others are dandelions - PsychologyToday

For example, the powers of observation of a hypersensitive person - or a cat, or a horse, or a fish - help him notice danger early and avoid it, and his ability to subtly read the signals of others allows him to see more mating opportunities.

Learn more