Ever since I can remember I’ve had breakdowns.
They would come in like a tidal wave in high school: one thread would break and I’d be bedbound, drowning in feeling.
Usually I’d emerge at the end of the day feeling lighter, more renewed, cleansed.
My parents and mentors didn’t understand. They thought I was overly sensitive, easily overwhelmed, and that something was “wrong.” I believed this too about myself: judging the times when I would slide into the chaos of feelings and pain that ripped me open.
Over the years, I began to learn ways to process my emotions more frequently so they wouldn’t pile up into an intimidating avalanche, but the truth is I still have these moments: where the wild waters of emotion ride me so deep that I lose a grip on my personality and sense of self.
I’m learning to see these times as moments of re-making, cracking my vessel open wider to hold even more love. I’m learning to suspend the judgement against myself for being a deeply sensitive person.
Because the more I allow the feelings to course through my being, the more I open to intimacy - with myself, with the moment, with all things.
And then I see that what is pathologized is actually a deep gift - to myself, to humanity, to the aching longing of life itself to be experienced in totality.
If you are a deeply sensitive person, my question to you is: what would it be like to lift any judgement you have about your sensitivity? What would/could you do to honor it as a sacred gift?