2021-07-12
1 小时 8 分钟Hey, so if you've ever heard the term highly sensitive person, or maybe even been called highly sensitive, maybe even recoiled just a bit when that happened, you'll be deeply moved by the work of today's guest doctor Elaine Aron.
She first identified high sensitivity as a distinct character trait more than 25 years ago, introducing the term highly sensitive person to describe someone who is easily overwhelmed by strong sensory input, subtleties in environment and other people's moods, and deeply feels pressures and overstimulation, but also processes the world very differently.
Since its publication in 1995, her preeminent book on the subject, the highly sensitive person, has gone on to become an international bestseller, translated into 30 languages.
She's also the author of the highly sensitive parent and many others really credited for first recognizing high sensitivity as an innate trait and pioneering the study of highly sensitive people.
Since 1990, she's established the foundation for the study of highly sensitive persons, maintains the website and online research hsperson.com, and has published numerous scientific articles on sensitivity in the leading journals in her field.
And it turns out today's conversation was also personal because in many ways I have discovered I am a highly sensitive person.
But I also discovered so much more about the way I move through the world, how this trait reveals itself in life, its relationship to introversion and extroversion, which was really surprising to me, and how you can be both highly sensitive while also being what she describes as high sensation, which I'd never heard before, but explained so much about the way I interact with the world.
And maybe it'll help you too.
So excited to share this conversation with you.
I'm Jonathan Fields and this is good life project.
So, you know, it's funny, I was first exposed to your work probably the way a lot of people was, which is Susan Cain is actually an old friend of mine.
Oh.
So when she wrote the book quiet, I sort of had an inroad into your work and both her book and your work.
I just kept reading more and thinking to myself, I'm seeing so much of myself in all of this work and it is so explanatory and forgiving on so many different levels.
I've been actually looking forward to having this conversation for years now.
Good, good.
And then recently, I don't know how I missed this, that you've actually been collaborating with your husband for, I guess decades now.
Yes, in really related work.
And, you know, I stumbled upon his work, I think, when a lot of people saw the piece in modern love in the New York Times a number of years back.
Yes, the 36 questions that just went crazy, just viral.