Jun 21

“Sensitive”: New Book About the HSP

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Sensitivity is defined as the ability to perceive, process, and respond deeply to one’s environment. This ability happens at two levels: (1) perceiving information from the senses and (2) thinking about that information thoroughly or finding many connections between it and other other memories, knowledge, or ideas. (From Sensitive by Granneman and Sólo)

In this year’s Sensitive: The Hidden Power of the Highly Sensitive Person in a Loud, Fast, Too-Much World, Jenn Granneman and Andre Sólo have written about something they know well, sensitivity and introversion. Granneman has the previous The Secret Lives of Introverts (2017) and with Sólo cohosts the online community Sensitive Refuge at https://highlysensitiverefuge.com. Sólo‘s pertinent blog is located on Psychology Today. And those are just some of their credentials.

Like the authors, could you also be a highly sensitive person (HSP)? (See my previous post on this topic.) Take their test here.

From the publisher:

Everyone has a sensitive side, but nearly 1 in 3 people have the genes to be more sensitive than others—both physically and emotionally. These are the people who pause before speaking and think before acting; they tune into subtle details and make connections that others miss. They tend to be intelligent, big-hearted, and wonderfully creative; they are wired to go deep, yet society tells them to hide the very sensitivity that makes them this way. These are the world’s “highly sensitive people”…

The authors note that to be sensitive is too often likened to “a defect that must be fixed.” But in actuality, although it can be a liability at times, it’s also an asset. For example, sensitivity is linked “to increased empathy and creativity” and “finely tuned observational and processing skills” (Publishers Weekly). Another plus can be “advanced sensory intelligence (a close awareness of detail in one’s environment), though this can also result in overstimulation.”

Guidelines suggested for how to lessen overstimulation include developing an “early warning system,” taking breaks, using calming techniques, having a “sensitive sanctuary,” setting healthy boundaries, and making fun time.

Special attention is given in this book to “the pain of empathy.” As sensitive people may be prone to compassion fatigue, it is important to prioritize self-compassion for balance and to “focus on catching positive emotions” around us. Various unique challenges in dealing with relationships are also addressed.

Selected Quotes:

The Sensitive Way is the belief, deep down, that quality of life is more valuable than raw achievement, that human connection is more satisfying than dominating others, and that your life is more meaningful when you spend time reflecting on your experiences and leading with your heart.

Sensitive people, it appears, are not hothouse orchids who wither in anything but the most perfect conditions. Rather, they are akin to succulents: No drop of nourishment escapes them, and they continue to absorb it until they swell with lovely blossoms.

Physical and emotional sensitivity are so closely linked that if you take Tylenol to numb a headache, research shows you will score lower on an empathy test until the medication wears off.

May 30

Therapy Quotes (Humor)

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The following therapy quotes find the humor in what clients and therapists experience.

My therapist says our sessions are a safe space, a judgement-free zone, but I think she only told me that to see how I’d react. Avery Edison

My therapist gets so upset when she walks into her waiting room and finds me treating her other clients. Jenny Mollen

Do you ever feel like your therapist is the priest from the Exorcist who catches your demons and then jumps out a window? Trevor S

Dear creators of every new fall sitcom: I am sorry your parents were so noisy and shitty, but can’t you punish a therapist instead? Dave Holmes

I go to therapy just so someone will talk to me without looking at their phone. Patrick Walsh

Next time I try therapy I’ll bring up how I’ve never been more than once since my need to please makes me feign recovery after 1 session. Erin Whitehead

Can anyone recommend a bad therapist? (I need a good scapegoat). Josh Comers

˝Gonna talk about you in therapy today˝ -21st century romance. Jake Weisman

Therapists are the atheist’s confessional. So long as you tell your therapist about it, you can keep doing it with a guilt-free conscience. Erin Whitehead

Therapy hasn’t really made me feel any better, it just made me understand why I feel bad. Corey Pandolph

i go to therapy to deal with people who don’t go to therapy. Lauren Ashley Bishop

I like to call therapy baggage claim. Aparna Nancherla

my therapist gave me homework to do before our next session so now I can never go back to therapy maura quint

Among other therapy quotes I’ve found is this one from Laura Munson‘s memoir, This Is Not the Story You Think It Is…:A Season of Unlikely Happiness:

Probably the wisest words that were ever uttered to me came from a therapist. I was sitting in her office, crying my eyes out. . . and she said, “So let me get this straight. You base your personal happiness on things entirely out of your control.”

Also, from Sofiya Alexandra‘s Tumblr:

“Ten Things My Therapist Says That Make Me Angry,” Sofiya Alexandra

  1. “Exercise does wonders for depression!”
  2. “You’re of course aware that alcohol is a depressant?”
  3. “Maybe we should consider medication.”
  4. “It seems like your boyfriend had a point.”
  5. “Maybe we shouldn’t consider medication and just stick to exercise.”
  6. “It’s warm in here, isn’t it, I’m going to turn up the air.”
  7. “You’re of course aware that marijuana can be a depressant?”
  8. “You seem angry.”
  9. “This is going to require a lot of patience and hard work.”
  10. “I no longer take Blue Shield.”
May 24

Short-Term Therapy Vs. Long-Term Therapy

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Is short-term therapy better than long-term therapy? Or is it vice versa?

It depends who you’re asking.

If it’s clients, on one end of the continuum are those who prefer the briefest of therapies (à la Bob Newhart‘s “stop it!”)—or even no therapy at all—while, on the other end are those who love having a therapist to see over the course of their lifetime, if not continuously at least on an as-needed basis.

But then there’s the money factor. For some without means (underinsured, uninsured, or unable to pay) it doesn’t feel like a choice: short-term therapy is a cost-saver and therefore preferable.

Enrico Gnaulati‘s Saving Talk Therapy: How Health Insurers, Big Pharma, and Slanted Science are Ruining Good Mental Health Care (2018) cites a number of other factors that work against longer-term therapy. They include Big Pharma‘s pushing of psychotropic medications directly to consumers via TV and other ads, the ability to get such medications from one’s physicians versus having to see a mental health practitioner, and the fact that health insurers push quicker treatments (again, the money issue).

Gnaulati believes (Psychology Today) talk therapy is “seriously under threat; at least as it applies to varieties of talk therapy that are relatively non-directive, time-intensive, in-depth, and exploratory in nature—typically under the psychodynamic and humanistic umbrellas of care.”

The newer trend, indeed, is to provide “evidence-based” treatments, which according to Gnaulati are “CBT-type, short-term psychotherapies supposedly tailored to reduce the symptoms associated with a given diagnosis.” He regards the studies that tout such treatments as somewhat misleading, however:

Evidenced-based treatments such as these are problematic because they measure progress strictly in terms of symptom reduction over the short term, not greater social and emotional well-being over the long term.
It turns out that evidenced-based really is evidenced-biased because the bulk of current empirical evidence substantiates that ‘contextual factors’ in psychotherapy are most predictive of positive outcome—empathy, genuineness, a strong working alliance, good rapport, favorable client expectations. And when you survey clients they overwhelmingly want a therapist who is ‘a good listener’ and who has a ‘warm personality,’ not someone skilled in the latest techniques.  So, CBT-type evidenced-based treatments should not be monopolizing the field right now in the way they are.

Whether shorter or longer, talk therapy, I agree, does need to be saved. “Fifteen Facts About Mental Health That Show Why We Need to Save Talk Therapy” was posted by Gnaulati’s publisher, Beacon Press. A sampling:

  • 90% of people claim they would rather meet with a therapist to talk about their problems than take medications.
  • Only about 3% of Americans ever enter psychotherapy, even though roughly half the population meet lifetime criteria for a serious emotional problem.
  • Of the approximately 49,000 psychiatrists in the United States, the vast majority exclusively prescribe medications. Fewer than 11% provide talk therapy to their patients.
  • 58% of emotionally troubled people take medications only, with no psychotherapy. About 10% of emotionally troubled people attend psychotherapy only and opt out of medication usage.
  • 50% of research articles in the field of psychiatry are ghostwritten in some shape or form, penned by outsiders and published under the names of prominent academics, all whom draw paychecks from pharmaceutical companies.

In sum, as a talk therapist myself, I don’t believe one size (of therapy) fits all. Medications may be all some people need, while others may need to talk things out, some over a longer period than others. When talk therapy is the choice, the relationship between each particular therapist and client is what often matters the most. And last but not least, money should not have to be an issue—needed therapy should be made affordable for all.

May 17

Happiness: Quotes from the Experts

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I use the term happiness to refer to the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being, combined with a sense that one’s life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile. Sonja Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness, on finding happiness

Finding happiness is a preoccupation for many. The following quotes from various authors and experts may help point you in the right direction.

Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis: Happiness is not something that you can find, acquire, or achieve directly. You have to get the conditions right and then wait. Some of those conditions are within you, such as coherence among the parts and levels of your personality. Other conditions require relationships to things beyond you: Just as plants need sun, water, and good soil to thrive, people need love, work, and a connection to something larger. It is worth striving to get the right relationships between yourself and others, between yourself and your work, and between yourself and something larger than yourself. If you get these relationships right, a sense of purpose and meaning will emerge.

Matthieu Ricard, Happiness: Happiness is a state of inner fulfillment, not the gratification of inexhaustible desires for outward things.

Sonja Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness: If we observe genuinely happy people, we shall find that they do not just sit around being contented. They make things happen. They pursue new understandings, seek new achievements, and control their thoughts and feelings. In sum, our intentional, effortful activities have a powerful effect on how happy we are, over and above the effects of our set points and the circumstances in which we find themselves. If an unhappy person wants to experience interest, enthusiasm, contentment, peace, and joy, he or she can make it happen by learning the habits of a happy person.

Raj Raghunathan, author of If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Happy? in an interview with Joe Pinsker, The Atlantic: On the one hand, we are hard-wired to focus more on negative things. But at the same time, we are also all hard-wired to be seeking a sense of happiness and the desire to flourish, and to be the best we can be. Ultimately, what we need in order to be happy is at some level pretty simple. It requires doing something that you find meaningful, that you can kind of get lost in on a daily basis.

Paul Dolan, Happiness By Design: Change what you do, not how you think. You are what you do, your happiness is what you attend to, and you should attend to what makes you and those whom you care about happy.

David Steindl-Rast, Music of Silence: Look closely and you will find that people are happy because they are grateful. The opposite of gratefulness is just taking everything for granted.

Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project: The belief that unhappiness is selfless and happiness is selfish is misguided. It’s more selfless to act happy. It takes energy, generosity, and discipline to be unfailingly lighthearted, yet everyone takes the happy person for granted. No one is careful of his feelings or tries to keep his spirits high. He seems self-sufficient; he becomes a cushion for others. And because happiness seems unforced, that person usually gets no credit.

Sonja Lyubomirsky, The How of Happiness: To be sure, most of us do become happier at some point during our lives. Indeed, contrary to popular belief, people actually get happier with age.

Daniel M. Gilbert, Stumbling on Happiness: We are happy when we have family, we are happy when we have friends and almost all the other things we think make us happy are actually just ways of getting more family and friends.

May 10

How to Change Habits: Five Books

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The following five nonfiction books about how to change habits, listed from newest to oldest, are recommended reading.

I. Wendy Wood, Good Habits, Bad Habits: The Science of Making Positive Changes That Stick (2019)

Author Adam Grant calls Wood, a long-time researcher on this subject, “the world’s leading expert” on this subject.

A key quote from Wood: “On average, it takes us sixty-six days of repeating a simple health behavior until it becomes automatic. In other words, identify a new behavior, do it repeatedly for two months and a week, and it will become a habit.”

The Kirkus Reviews summary states, Wood “notes that the same learning mechanisms responsible for bad habits also control good ones.” An example given: exercising and cigarette smoking. How one winds up choosing either activity and how one engages in either repeatedly is also the key to how to produce change.

II. BJ Fogg, Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything (2019)

Fogg professes that “only 3 things will change your behavior in the long term”:

Option A:  Have an epiphany
Option B:  Change your environment
Option C:  Take baby steps

However. Spoiler Alert! Epiphanies are extremely hard to come by, so B and C are really your options. It’s all spelled out in Tiny Habits, but he also offers a free five-day program on how to change habits; click on https://tinyhabits.com/join.

III. Sean D. Young, Stick With It: A Scientifically Proven Process for Changing Your Life–for Good (2017)

Young states, “Fortunately, you don’t need to change who you are as a person to make change last. You just need to understand the science behind lasting change and how to create a process that fits who you are.”

The Stages of Change Model developed in the 1970’s and 80’s by James O. Prochaska and Carlo DiClemente began with studying smokers’ attempts to give up their habit. The end result was the development of a tool to assess one’s readiness to work on change of any kind as well as one’s readiness to stick with it, or to persevere.

IV. Gretchen Rubin, Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives (2015)

According to her Four Tendencies framework, people generally fall into one of four groups. The key to these characterizations is how we respond to expectations. Per Rubin, a brief description of each:

  • Upholders want to know what should be done.
  • Questioners want justifications.
  • Obligers need accountability.
  • Rebels want freedom to do something their own way.

Selected quotes:

Habits are the invisible architecture of daily life. We repeat about 40 percent of our behavior almost daily, so our habits shape our existence, and our future. If we change our habits, we change our lives.

The desire to start something at the “right” time is usually just a justification for delay. In almost every case, the best time to start is now.

The most important step is the first step. All those old sayings are really true. Well begun is half done. Don’t get it perfect, get it going. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Nothing is more exhausting than the task that’s never started, and strangely, starting is often far harder than continuing.

V. Charles Duhigg, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business (2012)

According to Duhigg, any “habit loop” consists of a cue, a routine, and a reward. Taking alcoholism as an example of a habit/addiction, he states that groups like AA (or NA or GA, and so on) often provide a way to form new but similar habit loops.

Duhigg’s ideas about keystone habits, or “habits we develop that lead us to make better choices in other parts of our life,” are particularly important. David Allen, author of Getting Things Done, states, “His chapter on ‘keystone habits’ alone would justify the book.”