High sensitivity comes with many gifts and many challenges. There is perhaps no one who is more aware of this than the creative.
Rick Rubin notes in his new book, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, that:
"The best artists tend to be the ones with the most sensitive antennae to draw in the energy resonating at a particular moment. Many great artists first develop sensitive antennae not to create art but to protect themselves. They have to protect themselves because everything hurts more. They feel everything more deeply."
This sentiment is echoed in the work of Dr. Elaine Aron, one of the primary researchers on the highly sensitive person (HSP). Dr. Aron says:
"Highly sensitive people are all creative by definition - because we process things so thoroughly and notice so many subtleties and emotional meanings that we can easily put two unusual things together."
Rubin & Dr. Elaine Aron both recognize high sensitivity produces a natural inclination toward the creative process. Rubin says, effectively, 'creatives become creatives in order to survive.' Dr. Aron says, effectively, 'highly sensitive people process the world in a way that is inherently creative, and thus, the correlation between high sensitivity & creativity makes sense.' Regardless of the chicken-and-egg determination of the link between high sensitivity & creativity, the continually seen relationship between these two traits has significant ramifications for those who identify with them.
Namely, those inclined to sensitivity and creativity must manage the simultaneous gifts and burdens of their inclinations. The same mechanisms that make highly sensitive people such gifted writers, artists, and performers also make highly sensitive people susceptible to experiencing high levels of emotional pain. As Dr. Aron and Rick Rubin both note, sensitivity means attunement. Highly sensitive creatives thrive when they are able to manage their attunement to the pain around them through their work or as part of their creative process.
The 'deep feelings' Rubin recognizes sensitive creatives have make for some of the most powerful & impactful art. But sensitive creatives must also manage their gifts carefully, knowing they are likely to be knocked down more easily by experiences like heartbreak, loss, and suffering. The mission, then, of a sensitive creative, is to manage the burdens of sensitivity, so that the gifts might take center stage more frequently.
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