The Light and Dark of Being So Truly Human
– Rollo May
Could ‘feeling too much’ turn into ‘feeling too little’?
Can being overly empathic becomes shutting down?
Many people who come across as detached and stoic might be highly sensitive, emotionally intense and gifted ones in hiding.
From a young age, the weight of their emotions can be so heavy that it is unbearable. And so, as a means of self-preservation, they choose to distance themselves from their feelings and from others. This detachment is not a conscious choice but rather a coping mechanism learned over time. Often they cannot even help it.
If you were emotionally intense and highly empathic from a young age, you would find that you tend to care too much and feel too much, and the degree to which you invest in a relationship almost often exceeds what the other side gives.
You tend to dive in too quickly, too soon, assume too much good nature in others, neglect the dark side, be overly naive and hopeful, and prematurely use your highly imaginative faculty to envision a future.
As a young person without enough knowledge of what most people are like, you had erroneously assumed that most people are like you. So when you like someone, you readily express your affection, surprising and sometimes ‘burning’ others with your authenticity. This may then cause you to be called ‘weird’, ‘ a freak’, or be harshly rejected by your peers. Without the right guidance and emotional training, this pattern simply repeat itself.
Highly sensitive, gifted and emotionally intense individuals usually have a rough childhood where they had many confusing episodes of not understanding why they were chastised, rejected and why their love never seem reciprocated.
This causes them to eventually shut down, whether they want it or not. As much as they want to preserve their innocence, passion and hope in humanity, their wounds would no longer let them.
We are all wired with a protective mechanism that is geared to protect us from too much harm and emotional wounds. If your experience of ‘being yourself’, of speaking your mind without editing, and spontaneously expressing how you feel has repeatedly caused you to be extremely hurt, you would inevitably shut down.
Then, you go through life with much less intensity. Everything seems more lukewarm, with less vivid color. You miss the old days when you seemed to be able to live with so much vitality and drive, but somehow you could no longer open your heart so easily.
Yet
There are times when you catch a glimpse of your inner intensity.
These are the moments where you get back in touch with the depth of emotion that resides within you, rippling beneath the surface and about to burst.
It could happen during a moment of connection with a group of like-minded individuals or when you stumble upon an experience that speaks to the very core of your being. It could be a piece of art, a melody that strikes a chord, or a sunset that sets your soul ablaze.
These moments fill you with a sense of both wonder and fear.
Wonder, because in that moment, you feel truly alive. Your senses are heightened, colors are more vivid, sounds are more musical, and emotions are more intense. Fear because you know that everything ends and you will be engulfed with sadness.
In those moments of intensity, you are reminded of impermanence, of your own mortality, of the unbearable lightness of being. Your intensity, fear of your own intensity, and heart tenderness all comes flooding in. It is a feeling that comes in waves, washing over you with a sense of nostalgia for what once was or anxiety for what is yet to come. It can be overwhelming, this flood of emotions that threatens to engulf you at any moment.
It’s in these moments that you remember just how deeply you can feel, and how much creativity runs through your vein. Once again, you tap into a wellspring of energy and creativity that you have forgotten about.
But as you look around, you realize that not everyone experiences the world in the same way.
Some people seem to glide through life, barely registering the highs or the lows. They might even seem envious of your passion, your fire. But you know the truth: that intensity can be both a blessing and a curse. It can be the source of your greatest joys and your deepest sorrows.
You carry with you perpetually, existential loneliness. It leaves you feeling isolated and disconnected from those around you.
You wonder how others can seem to connect causally or remain stoic in the face of change and endings. To you, every deep soul exchange, every touch with the beauty and the transcendental, can feel like a mini-death, the closing of a chapter that holds a piece of your soul.
And yet, despite the complexity and the weight of being you, I hope you would not give your intensity up for anything else.
Your love for humanity and your ability to travel deep within are what makes you so truly human.
Even when your despair sometimes feels like it hurts more than you can bear, I think you can bear it. The universe has made you the way you are because you are also endowed with the capacity to transcend your pain and turn your existential loneliness into creative work.
Please do not trade your intensity for anything in the world.
