S4:E7 - This is for the Woman Who Was Told She's "Too Sensitive" (and Believed it!)

Have you ever been told you’re too sensitive? And after hearing it enough times, did you start believing it?

In this episode, we’re diving into what happens when emotionally sensitive women learn that feeling deeply isn’t safe. The women who notice everything, absorb everything, care deeply and sense things others miss, yet somehow end up believing there’s something wrong with them because of it.

We’ll be talking about emotional suppression, nervous system survival, intuition, hyper-independence, numbness, people pleasing, the witch wound and the subtle ways women learn to disconnect from themselves in order to fit in.

Because eventually, many sensitive women stop trusting their feelings, because they stop trusting their intuition, and stop trusting themselves. 

We’ll also explore why sensitivity has been treated as a weakness for so long, why so many women have been taught to apologise for who they are, and why feeling deeply might actually be one of your greatest gifts.

So if you've been told you're "too sensitive", I say F*ck That!! You've just been taught to distrust the very thing that makes you POWERFUL 🔥 

Transcript

0:00

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to the Witchy Woo Podcast. I cannot thank you enough for returning and allowing me to spend this time with you and be in your ears. And today I am speaking to the woman who feels everything so very deeply. Because of that, she's slowly learned to shut down parts of herself just to cope. So if that strikes a chord with you, then listen in, my lovely, and know that you're not alone. Because I think this happens to so, so many spiritually sensitive women or empathic women without them even fully realizing that it's happening. Because at first it doesn't look like something big or dramatic. It looks like someone who answers, are you okay? with yeah, I'm fine. Everything looks fine. And you know how I like to do my finger quotation marks. I'm doing that around the word fine. It's where you become less expressive, you become less emotional, you become less reactive, less open, less trusting, less excited, less vulnerable. And you stop saying what it is that you really think, and you stop asking for what it is that you need. You stop letting people see when you're hurt, and you stop sharing the things that matter to you deeply because you're tired of feeling misunderstood or feeling as though you've got to explain yourself even further. And so you think to yourself, Well, why even bother? Why even start that conversation? And over time, all of that self-protection starts becoming part of your personality instead of just something that you have developed in order to survive. And I think there are so many women who are walking around right now who are not actually disconnected from their emotions at all, they're disconnected from their feeling of safety around emotions, and there is a big difference there because a lot of sensitive women grew up in environments where their emotions were almost treated like a bit of a problem or a bit of an inconvenience, you know. You may have been told that you were being dramatic or you were too emotional, too sensitive, too intense, too much, you know, and maybe your feelings were dismissed. Even if the person dismissing them didn't feel that way. Maybe you felt as though they were dismissed or ignored or punished or minimized in some way, and maybe you learn very early on that your emotions made other people feel uncomfortable, and children are so incredibly clever at adapting. And I know in myself, when I lost my mum, she she wasn't, I was 10 years old. And so whenever the subject came up, you know, as a child, if someone would ask me, I don't know, something about my mum, what does your mum do? Or where's your mum? Or you know, whatever. As soon as I would answer them with, oh, she's passed away, they would become noticeably uncomfortable. They would, you know, it was almost like they were squirming in their seats, like not knowing what to say to that. And I completely get it because you know, a child saying to you, Oh, yeah, my mum died, you'd feel awful for kind of bringing that up, awful for the fact that they had to tell you that one of their parents had passed. But in my child brain, I interpreted that as I need to keep that to myself because anytime I say that, even if I'm not emotional when I say it, even if I just matter-of-fact say it because I'm answering a question, people become noticeably uncomfortable at that topic. So I need to minimize that part of myself. I need to not tell anyone that part of myself because it's going to make them feel uncomfortable. And so, of course, as the years went on, it became I couldn't show my grief fully because I didn't want to hurt people. And especially, you know, like my family are the most supportive family. They are gorgeous humans and they only want what's best for me. But I know as a child that every time I cried about my mum, it really hurt them because they couldn't do anything to make me feel better. And I get it, you know, I'm a mum, and you hate seeing your children in any kind of pain, and you just want to make things okay for them. You want to make them happy, but obviously, we know that actually leaning into your emotions, leaning into your sadness, leaning into your grief, leaning into your anger, whatever it is, is really healthy for us to do. But it took me a long time to be able to accept that because I had spent years trying to cover up that part of my life because I didn't want to make other people feel uncomfortable. So I'm sure that you have your own stories as well of where your, you know, emotion or the way that you feel had to be minimized in order to make other people feel more comfortable, you know. And as I say, children are incredibly clever at adapting, and eventually they stop expressing what they really need because they don't want to make other people feel uncomfortable, and they start editing themselves instead. And I think that this is one of the saddest things about emotionally sensitive and empathic women, because so many of them were never too much at all, they were just feeling things in environments that couldn't hold them properly. And I think sensitivity gets such a bad reputation in the world, just like generally, because people treat sensitivity like a weakness when honestly, it's it's often the complete opposite of that. Sensitive people notice things and they feel things and they sense things and they can read energy and they can pick up shifts in people instantly. You know, they can feel when the atmosphere drops or heightens, they they feel deeply, and of course, that can be extremely overwhelming sometimes, but it is also an incredible gift when we can harness it and nurture it properly, and certainly not if it's being shamed or being made to feel like it needs to soften or be smaller than it is. And the problem is that most sensitive women weren't taught how to work with their sensitivity, they were just taught to suppress it, and after enough years of suppression, eventually you just stop trusting yourself altogether. So you stop like trusting your intuition, trusting your feelings, your reactions, your knowing, because somewhere along the line you learn that if I feel this deeply, there must be something wrong with me. And I think this is where so many spiritually sensitive women disconnect from themselves entirely. You know, how many times have you felt that your emotions are too much and you've stopped yourself from crying, for instance, during a conversation, or you've apologized to the other person for crying, apologized for feeling a certain way. I mean, that is, I feel so incredibly sad when we we feel the need to do that, and felt that we have then suppressed our intuition, our feelings, our knowing. Obviously, there are many other factors that contribute to this as well. We are conditioned from very early on that thinking is much better than feeling, and that you know, having a regime or some kind of routine is better than working intuitively, and of course, there is place for both of those things, but we are taught to ignore our intuition and ignore our feelings and instead favor logic and thinking and doing, and that is why you know part of why I think we have a world full of people who only feel productive. Again, I'm doing my my air quotation marks with my fingers, who only feel productive when they are doing, and they don't feel comfortable in the being, and I think eventually the body just adapts by shutting things down totally, and this can show up in so many ways. It can show up in us feeling a sense of numbness or disconnection or pure exhaustion emotionally, you know, people who perhaps struggle to cry properly or feel flat or detached from their own sense of joy, feeling like they're watching their own life instead of fully living within it. And sometimes women think that this means they're healed because they no longer are emotionally reactive anymore, when actually they're just emotionally shut down, and there's a huge difference between peace and numbness. You know, peace still feels alive, whereas numbness feels completely disconnected, and I just think it is one of the saddest things when we misinterpret our numbness for peace and healing. And I also think that spiritually sensitive women often become, you know, hyperdependent emotionally because they get tired of feeling misunderstood. So instead of expressing themselves, they internalize everything. They become the I'll deal with it myself type of woman. They become the strong one, the reliable one. You know, the women who comfort everyone else but quietly disappear when they need that support themselves. And I know this pattern very well, too, you know, on a personal level. There have been so many periods in my life where I've shut down emotionally because it just felt easier, because I've needed to be able to do it. You know, it's been easier than explaining exactly how I feel or what I think, easier than feeling misunderstood by other people or feeling that I'm being too sensitive. And the frustrating thing is that when these sensitive women shut themselves down, people often praise them for it. You know, because to them they're suddenly easier and calmer and less emotional and less difficult. It's perceived as a good thing, and they are praised for not causing a fuss, for not standing out, you know, but internally they're just disappearing and disconnecting from themselves. And I think this is why so many women feel disconnected from their sense of joy as well, because the body doesn't kind of selectively numb which parts of itself it's gonna numb. It it numbs emotion in general. You know, you can't numb pain without also dulling pleasure and creativity and excitement and desire and connection and love. And eventually everything starts to feel muted. I think so many women are carrying years worth of unprocessed emotion inside their bodies because they've just never truly felt safe enough to properly feel it. So instead, they intellectualize everything, you know, analyze everything and rationalise everything and explain everything away, but rarely feel it fully. Because there can be so much pressure to always be high vibe and healed and evolved and positive and regulated all the time. It's real, you know, toxic positivity. Because, yes, of course, it's wonderful when we're feeling happy and joyful and we're leaning into all the wonder in our lives, but it's perfectly natural for us to feel every range of emotion, for us to feel sad, to feel grief, to feel anger, all of these things are not considered to be socially acceptable and not even in a spiritual space, but it's so important for us to be able to feel all of ourselves, you know, and there may be people that are sat there feeling grief and rage and heartbreak and loneliness and fear and exhaustion underneath all of this numbed pain. And instead of allowing these emotions to move through naturally, to you know, kind of move through our energetic being, we start shaming ourselves for having them in the first place. But emotions are not in any way evidence that you're failing spiritually, they're evidence that you are human, you are a soul living a human experience. And I also think that sensitive women can become incredibly good at reading everyone else while completely disconnecting from themselves. So you may be really good at sense intention in a room instantly, or knowing when someone's energy shifts, or noticing really subtle changes in tones and picking up on everyone else's emotions, but then when someone asks, How are you? it's like your brain suddenly completely leaves the chat and you know you're not sure because you haven't checked in with yourself. So your automatic response might be, Yeah, I'm fine. But actually, are you? If you have a quick body scan, like right now, during this podcast, let's do this together, let's spend a couple of seconds having a body scan. So obviously, only if it's safe to do so, close down your eyes for a minute, and imagine a scanner going from the very top of your head, moving down through your face, your neck, your shoulders, your arms and torso, your hips, your legs, your feet. And ask yourself, where do you feel? And you may notice that you have a tingly sensation, you may have a horrible feeling somewhere, you may have an excitement, you may just notice energy somewhere, a heaviness, for instance, and then ask yourself the question, how am I? How am I feeling? And notice what comes up for you. Notice whereabouts in your body you feel this energy, and that can really help you to kind of just stay in tune with how you are actually feeling rather than going on to autopilot and I'm fine, thanks. Actually feeling into how you're feeling. I'm not saying that you have to share that with the world when you're asked the question, how are you feeling? But you want to know how it is you feel, you don't want to be cut off from your feelings emotionally, you know, you don't want to carry on being so concerned with and focused on everyone else's emotional world that you stop checking in with yourself altogether. And I think the healing starts with creating this safety inside of your own body again, you know, not forcing yourself to become less sensitive, not hardening yourself, not trying to become colder at all, but learning how to stop abandoning yourself every time you feel deeply, learning that your emotions are allowed to exist without needing any justification, and learning that sensitivity is not weakness in the slightest, and that softness isn't fragility. And I think some of the most powerful women I know are deeply sensitive. They have just stopped apologizing for it. And I really feel that this is especially important within conversations around the witch wound as well, because obviously historically, sensitive women often were punished. Women who sensed things, who spoke their truth, who felt deeply, who noticed things that other people ignored. You know, sensitivity became something dangerous instead of something sacred. So many women learn to suppress their intuition, their emotions, their knowing in order for them to survive and be safe. And I think many of us are still kind of untangling all of that now, you know, slowly learning how to trust ourselves again and how to soften again, how to feel again without instantly shutting ourselves down. Because we all know that the goal isn't becoming emotionless, it's becoming safe enough within yourself that you no longer need to disappear every time that life hurts you. And I think many women listening to this are not too sensitive at all. In fact, I'm gonna go on further. I know that many women listening to this are not too sensitive at all. It's just that they're carrying years and years of emotional suppression inside your body that you were never designed to hold on to for this long and all by yourself. So if this episode has resonated with you, I really want you to ask yourself honestly, where have you disconnected from yourself in order to survive? Where have you become emotionally unavailable to yourself? Where have you mistaken numbness for healing? And what would it look like to slowly let yourself come back again? Obviously, not all at once. We're not talking, you know, dramatic transformations, although it may come like that for you, but usually it's kind of little by little getting to know yourself again and bringing back the sensitivity into our lives as we tell ourselves that, and well, we assure ourselves that we are safe to feel into everything, we're not too sensitive. You know, your sensitivity was never the problem. The world probably needs more women who can still feel deeply without turning cold. So thank you so much for listening to today's episode. I have love, love, love being in your ears, and I would also love to hear from you as well. You know, hear your thoughts on this subject, hear whether this resonated with you, whether this is where you are right now or whether you've felt this in the past. I would love to hear from you. So know that you can send me a friend request on Facebook, Kylie Anna. You can email me Kylie at witchywoo.net. I would just love to hear from you. So until the next time, I'll speak to you soon.