This month there have been an abundance of “windows of opportunity,” as my wise colleague Sherri Cortland calls them. As I like to say, whopper-tunities. Not only because there have been so many of them, and not only because they’ve been seismic, but because so many of them have shown up in my energetic field of LEUs: Love Energy Units.

I moved to a new house in a new location last year. Since then I have had plenty of opportunity to repair, paint, and so on, and then, more recently, replace a bathroom, a water heater, and just this week, a furnace. So, yeah, you might say, lots of windows of opportunity for taking a good look at my feelings, responses, and beliefs around money and whether I am walking my talk.

Moolah. Buckeroos. Benjamins. Bacon. Chalupa. Cheddar. Clams. Dinero. Dough. You know, dollars and cents. All words that describes that almost intangible, yet profoundly tangible, element of life. Calling this element Love Energy Units is my way of purposefully, with the utmost conscious awareness, reminding myself that I don’t have to buy into (literally and figuratively) the collective’s perspective. Because when money is involved, if I get caught up in the drama of the world’s collective view that there is never enough, it’s too easy to go off the rails. When that happens, the picture of a draining bank account colors everything. Suddenly all you see are depleting resources…of your own and of the world, from the environment to democracy.

How interesting that when we think about having an abundance of something it always sounds good. An abundance of love. An abundance of wealth. An abundance of food in the refrigerator. And yet, when we have an abundance of financial whopper-tunities, um, not so much.

• The bathroom came first. I told myself it needed to be done anyway, sooner than later, so why not now?
• The water heater was next, a leak discovered under the house only because the pest people showed up to do their thing. Oh, well….
• Then came the furnace. No wonder I’d been freezing last winter after I’d just moved in. It seems the furnace had finally given up the ghost and had been pumping out only cold air no matter what temperature I set it to.

You might say the universe has been altogether too willing to supply me with lots of amazing whopper-tunities. With prices about three times what they might have been a couple of years ago? I’d say the whopper-tunity factor has been easily tripled as well.

When I started calling money Love Energy, I got a lot of pushback from people.

What could be further from the “reality” of life? We might want to believe that money can’t buy love à la the Beatles, but in the world we live in, the message is all too clear: “If you give me what I want, I will love you” and “I need lots (unspecified amounts) of money to be happy.” This kind of convoluted message further separates us from the more holistic concept of abundance. Of having “enough” to go around. Of viewing monetary resources as a means to spread, share, and receive love.

I think this is where it gets confusing. How can money be love energy, on the one hand, if I’m also saying that money cannot buy love or equate to it? The key is in its un-conditionality factor. When we remove the conditionality of what we expect the money to do for us on an emotional level, we lose the connection to what it really means on a spiritual level—the level where true acceptance that there is always more than enough takes place.

When I am paying my bills, if I find myself looking at the balances and groaning, I immediately laugh. That’s right, laugh. Oh, yay, more Love Energy that I’m sharing with the world!!! I remind myself that I simply cannot be abundant in other areas of my life if I feel depleted in this one area, and vice versa.

I’d wanted to replace the moldy shower anyway down the road, so why not when it had become necessary? I was so lucky that the pest people noticed the leak under my house before it had become a  much worse problem—what’s a new water heater compared to that likelihood? And the furnace? That’s an easy one. Replacing the old system with a new, energy efficient, one means I’m waking up to a warm house that automatically cools off at night because I set it to do that! No more down vests 24/7 as I work at my computer, taking them off only when it’s time to make a video and look like all is well in my world. How magnificent is that!?

My gratitude for all these whopper-tunities is the really amazing thing.

My potential for love knows no bounds, so why should my potential for love energy to flow in and out of my energetic bank account be any different?

***

Read about how HSPs can shift their level of abundance in

Elevating Your HSP-ness: How To Live a High-Frequency Life by Amplifying Your Vibration, Celebrating Your Sensitivities, & Uplifting the World!

The post Love Energy Units–LEUs–are the true currency of the world first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up As An HSP?

When I was about five or six, I decided I wanted to play the flute. From that age to about 30 it was my dream to be a great flautist.

From the time things went all kablooey and sideways with that dream until about 40, all I wanted to do was figure out what I wanted to do that I wouldn’t hate doing.

For the next seven or so years the best thing about work was leaving at the end of the day.

From the day that job ended and I began writing and editing and publishing books, I felt I’d found something I was not only good at, but creatively fulfilling. Still, I can’t say I felt as if I were me, completely doing me.

That’s why, when the other day a friend told me, “You’re just so Heidi,” and my response was, “And getting

every day,” I knew something big had happened.

Which reminded me of all the times over my lifetime that people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. No one, not even my parents, who supported me through flute and piano and theory lessons, were particularly enamored when their friends asked the question and I said, “I’m going to be a musician.” I mean, you could see their eyes roll. “Oh, that’s nice,” they said. Meaning, “Your poor parents.”

I decided to ask myself this long-honored traditional question again today. And no, we won’t get into the fact that I’ve of a certain age that might preclude that kind of question. Fageddaboudit.) Anyway, I closed my eyes and posed the question: Heidi, do you know what YOU want to BE when you grow up?

And do you know what the answer was? You coulda smacked me upside the head with a V8. Because what came out of my mouth was, “YES! Absolutely! I want to be more of me!”

I was so excited by my own spontaneous response that I did a little jig. It hasn’t been this way in the past, which is why it’s so important now. The thing is, that if you don’t really know who you are, how can you possibly want to be more of it?

How can you possibly go around thinking, “Well, this is so groovy. I think I’ll just go on being more of me and diggin’ it?” You can’t. And, while I’m absolutely positively no Pollyanna, I’ll take a moment here to give you just a taste of how much my life has changed.

What does “more of me” mean now? I love that I can say this. That I have the words to express what “more of me” means because I know it’s true—I FEEL it’s true. MORE OF ME means more capacity for love, ease, generosity, freedom, abundance, creativity, inspiration, joy, and the sheer doggedness to live a life of alignment.

So, if I were to ask you, my lovely HSPs, “What do YOU want to be when you grow up?” what do you think your answer would be?

That’s all for today, folks. Join me next time on the Celestial Professor channel when we’ll dig a little deeper into what makes us high sensitives tick.

And DON’T FORGET to join us for the very first Expert HSP Summit of its kind on Saturday, October 15 @ 1 PM PT

at https://youtu.be/McDwEL-ISMo

Heidiconnolly.com / hspness.com / f-b elevatingyourhspness

The post What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up As An HSP? first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

In this video, I talk about what it means to live as a Vacationing Angel: Spirit choosing to live yet another lifetime in the biodegradable human suit we call human form.

And remember, it’s not whether you can PROVE something is REAL or TRUE, it’s how you feel whatever you feel when you see it, hear it, sense it, smell it, taste it, or touch it. The fact is…

Reality and truth exist only in the mind, heart, body, and spirit of the beholder.

Life as an HSP is often feels like you’re in the middle of a downpour every single minute of the day. Like you’re carrying around your own little raincloud everywhere you go. It doesn’t always feel “bad,” in the sense that an ice-cold rain in winter might feel, but it doesn’t necessarily feel good either, mostly because of its constancy. It’s always raining. It’s always there. It’s a never-ending deluge.

What’s the analogy?

Being highly sensitive means that you do not interact with the world purposefully, but that the world is forever “out there” having its way with you. Affecting you; often bombarding you–and, often, without your knowing it.

To change that paradigm, we need to change our thinking.

1. It’s not about changing the “out there” (the world).
2. It’s not about changing the way people respond to us.
3. It’s not about praying we’ll change because if we don’t we’ll never survive.

What it IS about:

1. Loving being human IN SPITE OF all the things that make being human seem like “too much.”
2. Understanding that all those things that seem to be “too much” are simply signs that there is more to life, and to us, than meets the eye (and ear and nose, etc.).
3. Joyfully accepting that evolving as a human is what evolves us spiritually
4. Appreciating that being responsible for our own sense of self is the key.

I’m fond of saying that I only know what I know. Which really means that my way of seeing things and doing things and living life is my own. There are no answers that “work” for everyone. When people market their products and services touting they are the “one sure way to achieve success” or “it worked for me so it’ll work for you, so all you have to do is do it right,” well, for me that’s a sure sign that whatever they’re selling is not something I’m interested in buying.

The thing I do know that seems to start everyone I work with off in the right direction is the idea that being an HSP is not only okay, and not only not too bad, and maybe even okay, but it’s actually the thing that can make life infinitely worth living.

*** Please leave your comments below to share how you are evolving as an HSP using the HSP Toolbox tools in these articles. ***

Heidi Connolly, The Celestial Professor, heidiconnolly.com | hspness.com

The post Tired of being a too-human HSP? – Life as a Vacationing Angel first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

“It’s not about what the world thinks about you; it’s about how you think about yourself that counts.”

You’ve probably heard that before–that we’re not supposed to worry about what other people think. But, come on. Let’s be real. What is the world we live in saying to us every day in every way? That’s right. That we’re being judged.

It could be on anything: Our financial success, how big our house is, how thin we are, how smart we are. Pretty much anything.

But the thing about judgment by others is that their judgment is based on their own criteria. To some people a dollar might seem like a lot. To some, not worth picking up off the street.

So what do we do? We decide to look at the consensus. If “most people” agree that such and such is true, then it must be true.

• If most people agree curly hair is a drag, it must be.
• If most people think a house under 3,000 square feet is less than adequate, it must be.
• If most people agree that highly sensitive people are “too sensitive for their own good,” then it must be true.

I say . . . Bullshit.

We spend our whole lives looking for approval to prove our adequacy in the eyes of others. Some of this behavior makes sense in that we do live in the world and engage with other people, so it’s not as if we can go along dismissing all of society’s standards. Yet, on the other hand (such a handy expression), and from the point of view of an HSP, if you spend your time wishing the world would understand you, or even be interested in understanding you, you’re bound to be disappointed.

I have found that my sensitivities are really only interesting to one person: ME.

Yes, my friends and loved ones care about me and would not do anything to hurt me, but that doesn’t mean I need them or expect them to get my low pain threshold or my intolerance for the scent of perfume.

Which is why, once again, it’s only about whether I understand myself. With that said, there are different ways to go about “understanding yourself.”

1. You can delve deeper and deeper into your sensitivities in order to defend them.
2. You can delve deeper and deeper into your sensitivities in order to get other people to make things comfortable for you.
3. You can delve deeper and deeper into your sensitivities in order to be in the position to reject rather than give anyone else the opportunity to reject you first.

You could, however, go about understanding yourself in another way.

You could decide that what really matters is how you experience life. Do you feel joy? Do you feel free? Or are your closely held sensitivities keeping you captive? If they are, it’s time to flip the switch.

• Your sensitivities are the BEST thing about you, not the worst.
• Your sensitivities are what provide the guiding light for making empowered decisions.
• Your sensitivities are the spark for bringing you into conscious awareness.
• Your sensitivities invite you to go within to find your core alignment.
• Your sensitivities remind you that being in alignment with your authentic self (some might say your higher self) is the key.
• Your sensitivities are right there to remind you when you’re not in alignment by kicking you in the you-know-what.
• Your sensitivities are asking you to **amplify your vibration**, not send out your tentacles to attach to every other person, place, and thing in the environment.

“You’re not in alignment, Heidi,” says my sensitivities, “so get yourself back in alignment so you can feel comfortable, regardless of what’s going on around you.”

Gee. What a concept.

The post Understanding yourself as an HSP, a highly sensitive person first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

The concept of “mindfulness” is one that caused a little itch in me that never seemed to go away. I didn’t quite know why at first. What could be “wrong” or even uncomfortable about being “mindful,” right?

But now I get it.

Just think about it.

Mindful  =

Mind + Full (your mind is full) =

Full of the Mind (your head is full of thoughts) =

In Your Head

Which basically means, not in your heart.

I mean, the whole idea of meditation is that we “get out of our heads—our minds, our thoughts—to go somewhere else. Somewhere where our thoughts don’t rule the day, the hour, the moment, and every waking second. Where we have a chance to simply BE without thinking about it, stressing about it, needing to figure it out, needing to be right about it, needing to succeed, and so on.

This is how most of us spend our lives. In a place that feels extraordinarily normal because we’ve been there so long. Not only is it a place of comfort just by virtue of how long we’ve lived there, but because we actually convince ourselves that we don’t have to think about it anymore. We’re so used to it, to living the way we do, that even while we’re thinking, thinking, thinking, we believe we are gliding along without all that heavy thinking and heavy lifting we have decided we don’t want to do.

The trouble is . . .

The trouble is that all that Mind+Full-ness doesn’t help. It doesn’t help us meditate, that’s for sure. Because being all up in your head is more like living in that witch’s caldron. You know the one.

As Shakespeare once said:

Fillet of a fenny snake,

In the cauldron boil and bake;

Eye of newt and toe of frog,

Wool of bat and tongue of dog,

Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,

Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,

For a charm of powerful trouble,

Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Thoughtless Awareness

Lately I have turned to the phrase “thoughtless awareness” to describe a state in which I somehow continue, on some level of my being, to feel aware or sense I’m aware, but experience no recognizable thought patterns. No mind chatter. No disturbing “what ifs” and “what if nots.”

But the truly fascinating thing about all of this is that, ultimately, even the idea of “thoughtless awareness” takes thought. Call it a paradox or a conundrum or a dichotomy or a Catch 22, in the end if I don’t think about not thinking—if I don’t spend some time deliberating the process of becoming thoughtless, then I’m probably still thinking before and during my meditation.

However—and  this is where I get excited—I seem to have developed a step-by-step method of thinking that leads me to not thinking every single time, which then leads me into a meditative place that I only know I’ve been once I come out of it.

Those who meditate probably know what I mean. All that really matters, though, is that feeling it feels so darn good that when you come out of it you wish you were back in it—even if you can’t say where you were, how you got there, or what happened when you were there.

There are always the times, like this morning, on the other hand, when the message of this writing appeared. Did I hear it? See it? Sense it? I’m not at all sure. All I know is that it came to me and I felt inspired and full of renewed passion for the day and whatever was to come.

I was sure only about 10 or 15 minutes had gone by, but it was 30. I didn’t know where I’d been, but I knew I felt better, more expansive. I was feeling joy at the prospect of writing about something that “came to me,” as if by magic.

The best part, in my estimation, is that the proof is in the pudding.

All my life I’ve been told to USE YOUR HEAD and USE YOUR COMMON SENSE and EMOTIONS ONLY FOG UP YOUR THINKING.

Well, guess what?

The proof is in the pudding. The less I think, the more I feel my way into and out of things, sense my way through things, with my mind in the passenger seat rather than the driver’s seat, the more my life is filled with ease.

The more time I spend feeling my experience during meditation instead of thinking about it—or thinking about not thinking about it—the more deeply my meditations invite me to go. All of which leads to a clearer state of being (not only thinking or doing) that guides me through the days.

I hold the concept of thoughtless awareness dear because I love that I can be aware on so many levels other than the mental level, or even the emotional level. It’s what Eckhart Tolle would probably agree is “being in the now.” I’d like to call it “being” because even thinking about how to be in the now can take me to places I’d rather not go—places of self-judgment or unworthiness or anxiety.

My colleague and friend Dana Stovern of the Somatic Money Podcast would likely agree with me when I say that sensing the way you feel—not emotionally but somatically—provides the insight you need into what you really need to know, whether it’s money and finances or love and relationships. If I feel something in my body, there’s always, without fail, a thought that preceded it and brought it into corporeal form. So, once again, the true paradoxical enigma is that nothing really means anything if we don’t think about it. Yet, in order to get to the truth of the matter, we have to stop thinking about it.

It’s about now that I wonder if what I’m writing makes as much sense to my readers as it does to me.

Which just might be overthinking it.

The post What happens when you take the mind out of mindfulness first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

“The Package Came C.O.D.”

by Heidi Connolly

The package came C.O.D.

The delivery guy said it was for me

I signed for it, opened it, put it on, claimed it

I owned it then; it sure owned me;

I could have thrown it down

Kicked it to the floor

I could have sent it back

And slammed the door;

I could have just said no

I could have stood my ground

I should have watched it leave

Sent it back where it belonged;

’Cause when you live your life in denial

Of who you really are

The light you hold inside you

Sounds like whispers from afar;

You learn of love and how it hurts

For reasons of remorse

It churns and gnaws inside of you

And charts a deceptive course;

When fear is allowed to lead the way

The truth is buried alive

Without a chance to breathe and grow

With no chance to survive;

When doubt grows into hatred

It traps you like a snare

The burden of a thought

That’s really not ours to bear;

If you let it, it will cut you

Your wings clipped in despair

Every minute a sad reflection

Everyday another correction;

When the package came COD

And the delivery guy said it was for me

My life went driving down the street

I lived a lie in defeat;

But now I keep only what is mine

Whatever arrives must be divine

When it’s for me it’s whole, intact

This is a promise and a pact;

I close the door on everything else

I send it back much blessed

For only in the vibration of love

Is fear ever laid to rest;

I lift the veil of denial

I lift the weight of pain

I become the one I’m meant to be

Like a desert freed by rain.

I wrote this song in 2004 and “came upon” it today as I was searching for another file. You might call it a coincidence, but I would much rather land on the side of synchronicity, if for no other reason that it feels good when I do.

Yesterday I posted a poem by Becky Hemsley. Today I found my song. Notwithstanding my lack of songwriting ability and without knowing Becky’s intention for certain, it seems to me that we are talking about similar ideas about accepting who we are. As HSPs. As Highly Sensitive People. As individuals. As humans. As creative souls who live and breathe and identify and share and grow and touch and feel and respond and love and all the rest of it…the whole messy enchilada.

What amazes me is that I wrote this in 2004, not 2012 after my husband died or 2014 when I began hearing from him. Not all these years after discovering that my HSP-ness was directly related to my psychic and mediumship abilities and being witness to my own growth as an author.

I had to ask myself: If I didn’t know then what I know now, where did the words come from? Was I already channeling, if you want to call it that, my higher self? Had I entered some kind of 5^th-dimensional reality or parallel universe? Had I time traveled?

I really don’t know.

Yet here I sit before you today (well, before my computer writing to you) and feeling every word of this song.

I have lifted the veil of denial

I have lifted the weight of pain

I am becoming the one I’m meant to be

.

The post Fear came wrapped in a package and arrived C.O.D. first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

Heidi Winkler, colleague, author, and founder/ CEO of the Winkler Leadership Academy agrees that people who are highly sensitive, such as many of the sales reps she trains, are quicker to adapt to their customers, what their underlying motivations and needs are, and, as a result, write more business.

Naturally, I am not surprised.

In a Forbes interview in 2020, Dr. Elaine Aron, author of The Highly Sensitive Person, and pioneer in this field of work, said:

“John Hughes [HSP, successful entrepreneur, author, sponsor of the movie Sensitive–The Untold Story], wrote an article [that] describes the three specific abilities that he believed HSPs to be [that make] them uniquely effective leaders.”

3 Reasons HSPs Make Better Leaders, by John Hughes

According to Hughes, the first is Subtleties (“taking in environmental subtleties is an invaluable leadership ability”). The second is Processing over Action (“HSPs are better equipped to lead because they naturally fall to the background, allowing team members to freely speak and share and shine”). The last is Resonance (“Resonant leaders seem to say and do the right thing at just the right time. This isn’t luck or magic, it’s their innate ability to feel deeply, process richly, and patiently consider the right words and actions for the moment”).

Hughes, on his website, goes on to say: “We also carry a responsibility to do something with all that we create inside our minds and hearts–as if it’s not ours, but something we owe back to the world. This emotional sensitivity, deep connectedness, and rich inner life feed an HSP’s ability to lead teams in a way that others simply can’t.”

Wait!

No one is saying that HSPs can automatically lead teams, or that only HSPs are good team leaders, or that others aren’t potentially great team leaders. However, we do have innate abilities that allow us to lead, should that be our choice, in uniquely rich and profound ways. Some generalizations include:

1. We’re the ones who notice when the normally chatty manager stops talking.
2. We’re the ones who normally sense discomfort or tension in a room and, instead of ignoring it, look for its cause and for ways to diffuse it or address it.
3. We’re the ones who listen as much as we talk because we want to hear what others have to contribute.
4. We’re the ones who believe that promoting, elevating, and praising others is a significantly improved way of increasing production.
5. We’re the ones who want others to succeed.

And yet . . .

Being a good leader when you’re an HSP does not always come naturally if you’ve led a life where you have felt underestimated, undervalued, and/or misunderstood. If our sensitivity to language, conversation, non-verbal cues, sound, scents, emotions, and so on, is something we have determined is a deterrent, it is unlikely we will use those traits in ways that contribute, not detract, from anything we choose to accomplish.

Withdrawing into the background will not, in most cases, bring us the attention we deserve for the work we do and will not, in most cases, reveal our invaluable leadership qualities.

We need to believe that our sensitivity is our secret weapon in whatever environment/field in which we choose to invest.

We need to believe that we are better equipped to lead because we do not have the common need to push our own agenda.

. . . And that it’s not luck that causes our success, but our inherent abilities put to use in ways that serve us and the world around us.

The post Why Highly Sensitive People (HSPs) Make Great Leaders! first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

Good fortune and gratitude

I am so fortunate in so many ways. To be met at the airport by my gracious sister is only one of them. It might seem like a small thing, but to know that someone who loves you will be there when you walk through the baggage claim doors after a flight into a whole different world, let alone a whole different state and frame of mind, is like waking up to breakfast in bed when you’re normally responsible for making enough breakfast to feed ten hungry mouths.

I’m also incredibly fortunate to have been welcomed home by my house: quiet, serene, backed by woods full of gently swaying trees, and stocked with enough coffee and toast so I didn’t have to stop off at the supermarket at 10 pm on the way.

(I did just notice a giant spider on my window as I type these words, so forgive me while I go make sure it’s happily spinning or resting or meditating, or whatever spiders do on the outside of the window. I’m one of those people who prefer the insect world and mine don’t coexist too closely. …Okay, we’re good. It’s out there. I’m in here. Back to business.)

The “City of Angels”? Really???

As a highly sensitive individual, and someone who appreciates solitude, quiet, and self-reflection, Los Angeles did not unexpectedly exist at a vastly different vibration. Everything seems to be turned up several notches in intensity there. I’m am proud of the way I held my alignment during my time in the City of Angels and while I traveled back to Washington.

The old me (the unhappy hermit crab)

The old me would have lost my boarding pass, misplaced my Kindle, and spilled my coffee by the time I got to the gate. On the plane, by the time I’d landed, I would be stricken with flu-like symptoms and sure I had Covid. I still take a baggie full of Kleenex with me when I travel because I’ve had that happen so many times—step on the plane, start sneezing; get off, symptoms dissipate, although sometimes it takes days.

It never once occurred to me in all my decades of life that such symptoms were indicators of my HSP-ness. Not in the sense that I understand it today. You run around doing your life, going places, interacting with people, etc., but the apparent reasons for your reactions can always be tied to one “logical” thing or another.

• You’re sneezing/coughing: There must be something in the air that’s making you sneeze because you’re so sensitive to chemicals and perfumes or you’ve caught a bug from someone.
• Your heart is pounding: You must be afraid of flying or crowds make you wanna hide.
• Your stomach hurts: It must be something you ate or you could be getting colitis.
• Louise Hay, Bruce Lipton, and other “biology of belief” advocates would say otherwise. They—and I—would suggest your body is responding to some sort of belief that you have integrated long enough for it to manifest on a physical level.

I’m pretty sure I’ve talked about HSP “indicators” before, and how everyone’s vary. Mine kind of sound like the ones I mentioned above. So, last night, as I made it to the gate without mishap . . .

• ate my snack of sushi in a nice corner surrounded by empty seats,
• got to my seat easily and my bag stowed away above my head,
• sat on a crowded plane and found there would be an empty seat next to me,
• saw that the man sitting a by the window was the man I’d noticed in the boarding area whom I’d known spirit would bring into my field somehow because we were supposed to meet,
• he and I spent the next two and a half hours gabbing about every subject under the sun . . . .

It wasn’t until I actually stepped off the plane that I realized I’d sneezed only once. Could it be a new me??? Could I be the happy hermit crab who’s carrying her over own “home of alignment” with her everywhere she goes?

• I hadn’t coughed at all.
• I didn’t have a headache.
• I wasn’t worried that I wouldn’t be able to find my sister in the bedlam of “no-idling zones” outside baggage claim,
• and I wasn’t feeling that I’d traveled across the planet instead of state lines.

Would you like to switch it up so the experiences that once had you crumbling are now, dare I say, pleasurable? You can. You’re an HSP. You’re awesome. You have the HSP Toolbox in your hands.

Go forth and be awesome.

The post HSPs are like hermit crabs, carrying ourselves everywhere first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

The day has come. I packed that bag I mentioned recently, got my loving sister to accompany me to the airport, and here I am. On a plane. In the air. On the way to Los Angeles. Los Angeles: one of the densest cities on the planet.

The truth is that I’m not much of a traveler anymore. To some people, just the idea of going somewhere—anywhere—using any mode of travel is enough to set their pulse racing. In a good way. But for me, traveling takes concentrated…well, concentration.

Just your average HSP

We’ve already established that I’m basically your average, intensely active HSP. Highly sensitive to pretty much everything. During the height of this pandemic, I was grateful for several things—reconnection with family and friends near and far being the most wonderful—but another benefit that rocked was not feeling pressured to travel.

I’ve pushed myself through the years to drag suitcases through Taipei and Bali and Rome and Greece and Canada. I always thought it was worth it. That once I got there it would be worth the effort, anyway. You know, all the hours, the close proximity to all those bodies and energies and minds and emotions.

The past: Manifesting what you don’t want

There were some beautiful moments, to be sure. But the rest of the time, I went home early due to illness (bad water in Greece; you don’t want to know), heat stroke (summer in Rome), and incidences like that. It was as if I was determined to manifest the most unerringly challenging, sometimes menacing, and unbelievably uncomfortable situations I could possibly manifest. You might say I did a really, really good job.

Too bad that wasn’t my intention. I swore my travelin’ days had come and gone. Why should I pressure myself to pretend I’d like nothing more than to jump into a van and camp out on a beach in southern Baja for the winter or fly for 24 hours to some way-off place to scuba dive and nearly drown? I decided I shouldn’t.

Self-reflection for the well-initiated

What’s the reason for this self-reflection? As I said, here I am. Up in the air somewhere above Washington State, sandwiched in between a young dude eating chips that smell like onion and garlic and another dude who’s trying his hardest not to let his large frame spill over his seat’s boundaries into mine. I’m wearing my mask and my elbows are glued to my sides. I’m grateful, as always, that I’m a relatively small person (okay, fine, I gained the Covid 10, but I’m working on forgiving myself for it) because it makes the whole sardines-in-a-can thing a little less offensive.

But what really amazes me is the difference between how I used to deal with traveling and my more recent experiences. Sure, I’ve stayed stateside, but still. To me, traveling is traveling. Here’s what normally happens.

In the days before traveling, as I’m mentally going through what I need to do to prepare and the clothes and shoes I need to bring depending on the weather at home and afar and all that other stuff, I notice that it’s not until around two days before that the wind-up kicks in. By the time the night before the day of the flight arrives, I have a hard time falling asleep and often have strange dreams.

The in-between: Discovery

Since discovering my Psychic Octopus, however, and the magical effect its practice has on my sanity, self-sufficiency, peace, and overall wellbeing, I cannot—I mean, I really cannot—believe how smoothly life unfolds.

Last night, although I admit it took about an extra half an hour for my eyes to close for good, I felt none of the panic I have felt so many times in the past. I did not have dreams that woke me in a cold sweat.

• I woke up to my alarm, got up.
• I calmly preceded to make coffee, meditate, drink said prepared coffee, and drag my butt to the gym  (much earlier than usual).
• After the gym, the shower, another cup of coffee and a slice of toast, I finished packing up my bag, checked for windows and the rest of the house-related tasks, shut down my computer, made sure I had all my phone, plugs, etc.,
• I locked the door and bid my home farewell.

The present: Manifesting ease

When I got in the car I couldn’t believe it. I. Felt Calm. Not just okay, as in managing and pretending to be calm, but actually calm. I drove the hour or so to the airport, did not hit any major traffic snafus, blah-blah-blah…yada-yada-yada…

…And here I am. Up in the air. Octopus in. No sniffles, no coughing, no thumping heart, no panic. Just this feeling that Heidi is still Heidi. She hasn’t left the building. She hasn’t absconded with the goods. She hasn’t freaked out and become a pile of misery. And she hasn’t decided once more that This is definitely, absolutely, the last time I’ve ever going to travel!

This Heidi, the one with her UES in alignment and her psychic octopus tentacles safely reeled in?

Yeah, this Heidi will be just fine.

The post Travels with an HSP is just more time “up in the clouds” first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.

How about we cut all the BS and get to the real point. Some of us see things differently. Some of us hear things differently, or sense things other people don’t. We come in all different colors, shapes, and sizes . . . and still we’re all human and we all share commonalities.

But, call it what you will, when we’re talking about HSPs, or those who are highly sensitive, intuitive, empathetic, telepathic, and so on . . . When did it become such a shameful thing to call IT for what IT is?

I had a brilliant convo today with a colleague with whom I passionately agreed that since time immemorial—or at least since there have been human beings—there have been people who have such gifts and have been branded in less than desirable ways. In derogatory ways that I choose not to even put on paper. We have reached a point where just about any label is better than “psychic.”

• To some it means charlatan.
• To others, it means you can read their minds.
• And to others still, it means you are plain crazy.

Labels, Schmabels

Well, I’m here to say that I don’t need to couch what I am or what I do in terminology that might make it more palatable for others. Making sure other people are comfortable is a long-time MO of mine, as it is for so many HSPs. (Not that it ever really worked in the long run because people still have to deal with their own you-know-what eventually.)

My recent article on Psychic vs. Sensitive struck a chord with lots of people. The chord got louder when my colleague reminded me about a book she’s reading on HSPs and empathy. The book’s focus (apparently) discusses the similarities and differences between being highly sensitive and being empathetic. I haven’t read the book, so I can’t answer to how valid the author’s point is, especially since the author is a talented researcher and writer. My only purpose here is to pose the question: Why is it important to distinguish between the two? If empathetic means “showing an ability to understand and share the feelings of another,” and psychic means “relating to the soul or mind,” should I apologize for being a psychic or a medium? Would it be easier to swallow if I called myself an empath—which I most assuredly am?

Does different matter?

I’ve already discussed the difference between psychic and mediumship, that the first is perceiving information from other humans and the second is receiving information from the Spirit World (Source/your Higher Self/God, etc.). This is a difference that means something to me because I avoid using my “psychic octopus” to glob about in other people’s minds, hearts, or spirits. If I get a message, I’d rather it be straight from the source, so to speak. But, in the end, the labels only matter as much as we give them credit for mattering. I use the label Highly Sensitive to invite those of us who are any or all of these things to the table where we can honor each other and the greater discussion about who we are, our purpose, and our potential.

* * *

Private coaching sessions with me are available here,  plus multiple healing musical recordings here.

Keep an eye out for my new book, soon to be published: Elevating Your HSP-ness

Check out my posts on the Psychic Octopus (globbing onto other people’s energy); your UES (how to identify and stay in your Unique Energetic Signature); and your IGS (how to confidently and consistently tap into your Intuitive Guidance System.

Thank you for shining your light into the world!

The post HSP: Sensitive, Empathetic, Psychic, or just plain messed up? first appeared on Elevate Your HSP-ness!.