Whom Does the Grail Serve?
Who are HSPs, and why does it matter?
{Note: I wrote this post in advance, and it feels important to proceed with sending it - for each of us to take what small steps we can in spreading hope. This has been a painful and difficult week for many people; please take care of yourselves and each other. Sending lots of love to all . . . }
Since Dr. Elaine Aron’s groundbreaking research in the 1990s, HSPs—Highly Sensitive Persons—have moved from relative obscurity into the realm of mainstream media. I recently searched for an HSP podcast to send to someone who’d requested information, only to discover there are now so many available that you can find Top Ten lists of HSP podcasts!
There is also a lot of misinformation out there, so I’m glad you’re here to learn more.
Basically, there are about 15-20% of the population who are more affected by sensory and emotional stimuli than the other 80-85%. This is true of both people and animals! It seems there is a creative-evolutionary advantage to having a minority of each species who feel more deeply, notice more keenly, choose more thoughtfully. HSPs are much more intensely affected by our environments than non-HSPs, meaning that we tend to really flourish in healthy situations and really suffer in unhealthy situations. Of course, everyone experiences flourishing and suffering, but physiological studies show that HSPs’ nervous systems are more vulnerably calibrated than the norm; our threshold for becoming overstimulated is lower than in others’.
The technical name for HSP (Highly Sensitive Personality) is SPS, which stands for Sensory Processing Sensitivity and is the search term to use in scientific journals. It is thought to have a genetic basis and is different from the kind of acute sensitivity that people experience when they have been traumatized (though of course the two can overlap).
Four indicators of HSP are: 1) depth of processing, 2) awareness of subtleties, 3) vulnerability to overstimulation, and 4) a tendency to be emotionally reactive as well as very empathic.
I first learned about HSP in 2013 from a therapy client who had read Elaine Aron’s first book, The Highly Sensitive Person, and found it tremendously helpful. As I read about it, I soon realized that I was definitely an HSP, as were most of my friends and creative community! (I also suspected that it connected with transliminality, the personality trait I was researching for my PhD dissertation, but that’s a topic for a future post. :)
In and of itself, HSP is a neutral trait with pros and cons, just like introversion or extroversion. But in our loud, fast-paced culture, HSPs are often viewed as an anomaly, criticized, and misunderstood. The same trait that makes them more apt to be kind, creative, and spiritual also sets them (that is, us!) up for depression and anxiety. HSP is a type of neurodivergence and sometimes overlaps with autism or ADHD, but not always.
CATHARSIS Nashville seeks to serve Highly Sensitive Persons. Our tag line, owed to the brilliant Michael Dukes, is “Highly Sensitive Healing.” I love this phrase because it captures the fact that not only will HSPs be our main client base; most of the therapists on our treatment team will also be HSPs. So the healing will be both “for” and “by” the Highly Sensitive!
(Fun Fact: Our first board is 100% HSP, too, ranging from “slightly HSP” to “definitely HSP” like myself.)
https://catharsisnashville.org/our-board/
Why are we passionate about serving HSPs?
As I mentioned in last week’s post, HSPs are 15-20% of the general population but estimated to be some 50% of therapy clients.
HSPs constitute an invisible minority and are more vulnerable to mental "illness," yet have gifts and potential that our society most needs, such as empathy, creativity, a tendency to "pause to check" before acting and to consider long-term effects of their choices.
We especially seek to prioritize HSP clients who are also BIPOC and/or LGBTQ+, thus facing the challenges of having more than one minority status.
CATHARSIS Nashville will treat HSPs with mental distress ranging from mild (stress/anxiety/depression) to severe (psychosis/bipolar/schizophrenia).
Because HSPs are keenly affected by positive stimuli as well as negative, we respond well to healing interventions and environments. Hence a place like CATHARSIS— built around beauty, gentleness, creativity, and care—will be a game changer for the mental healthcare landscape of Nashville, which is known as Music City and home to many HSP artists.