The job market today is like watching a season of The Bachelor. If you are unemployed and have been struggling to find a role you may understand why I compare the rose ceremony with today’s job market. You can have stellar interviews, provide immpeccible references and still not receive an offer or “rose”. And if you are one of the many who have highly sensitive personality traits (HSPs) and are unemployed, struggling to find work, then you are feeling everything even more so.
highly sensitive personality (HSP)
I am a crier. I will get emotional during commercials (especially the ASPCA ones), movies, news stories and just about anything that will pull at my heart. Kids movies for me are tough. The ending of “Wild Robot” got to me.
About 20% of the population has highly sensitive personality traits, although the number could be higher. When my therapist diagnosed me I was in the middle of my divorce and just about everything during that time was a struggle. Struggle because people with HSP feel more. We pick up on everything and our ability to read the room is instantaneous. We take everything inward. Which is why loud places and crowds can feel at times over whelming. People pleasing is the heart and at the same time the demise of HSPs. When our children hurt, when our fiends hurt…..we hurt. We want so badly to make them feel better. So much so that we sometimes put ourselves 2nd. It can be a slippery slope for a parent with HSP to hold your ground with your child while also managing your emotions.
Managing emotions can be a tricky thing for HSPs. We pick up on the smallest of details; details that others may see as frivolous. Because of our high intuitive abilities, we are labeled as being “too sensitive”. This can be a challenge to share how we feel with loved ones, especially when we see something amiss and they do not.
Managing the emotions
I’ve heard that “rejection = protection”. This can be true in relationships and definitely in the workplace. I’ve tried to keep this in mind every time I receive a “thank you for applying but we’ve decided to move on with another canadate” email. But its the managing of emotions, the over thinking and over analyzing, that brings on the overwhelming feelings…..that everything is too much. It can be difficult if not almost impossible for anyone to not take these rejections personally. I recently posted on LinkedIn. Sharing my HSP traits and fustration with the hiring system. Feeling connected and not feeling alone is fundamentally what drives and sustains us as good citizens. Not just HSP’s but everyone.
