What is the sensitive human? Is it our weakness or our power and are we wielding it responsibly? Do we even know how to be responsible for our sensitivities or the potential of them? How can we find out?
We explored our human sensitivities in two collective group conversations and followed many a tributary to the edges and back to the centre of the slow and sometimes turbulent topic of ‘the sensitive human’.
Cancel culture, triggers and the new era of political correctness has dawned and it has had an almighty polarising affect upon society at large.
Is it conspiracy to divide and conquer a growing dissatisfied population becoming too aware of the system’s short comings and its oppressive affects upon humanity?
Or is it the natural unfurling of our vulnerabilities as the external world becomes less threatening with the growing comforts of convenient technology?
Or are we becoming weak and reactive as life’s discomforts are becoming easier to avoid, leaving our level of tolerance near to nil?
Perhaps it is all of these things culminating in a wild evolutionary soup that is sending us towards spiritual enlightenment and ascension into the 5th dimension?
My feeling is uneasy and I am naturally biased. What I see in this reactive culture is a lack of internal locus of control; being responsible for our own experience of life. However this may simply be the adolescent stages of our sensitivity and knowing the stoic context I have emerged from I need to give more regard to acknowledging and appreciating sensitivity, starting with my own.
What is your sensitivity?
Judgement, criticism, misinterpretation, being left out, abandoned, forgotten, dismissed, etc, and to make it all the more worse we all seem to be triggered by other’s triggers, with the assistance of social media, creating a cascading effect of reactivity, polarisation and retreat to the echo chambers of tribal culture.
As human beings we have little tolerance within the vulnerable space that triggers throw us into.
Is it possible to be triggered, to be sensitive and vulnerable and not attack the stimulus with a vengeance?
It is safe to say an uncomfortable bodily sensation is stimulated via an appropriate trigger and as meaning making machines we practice a story to make sense of the discomfort and provide the tools to navigate our way out of the uncomfortable sensation. The problem is, we have written these stories at a young age and from that initial secondary layer we have added more and more meaning and attached ourselves to existing mainstream media or cultural templates of story that fit within the original narrative.
So we have the primary layer of sensation, the secondary layer created at a young age; abandonment, self-worth, self-love, for example. Then we have added very clever journey of meaning to compensate the gapping holes committed to from the secondary layer.
As Landmark puts it, we establish our winning formulas through the over compensation of proving self-worth from the starting line of worthlessness. Sadly our education system and our entire tangible value system does not acknowledge or give worth to our individual essence, nature and soul. Treated as empty vessels, we must fill ourselves with identities, stories, success in order to simply exist and value ourselves.
We are not empty vessels and for as long as we seek self-worth outside of ourselves we will not find it.
To paraphrase Dr Gabor Mate, we are addicts, running away from the discomforts of the primary layer of our sensitivities (sensation) and we have created all the passive drugs in the world, technology at large; narrative, social media and materialism, to bandaid this deep wound upon our souls.
So where to now?
Our sensitivities are being unearthed signalling the opportunity to address them. Just as sitting vipassana gives us the opportunity to feel the sensations without the usual scapegoats that confirm the narratives we practice, we must simply practice being within our sensitivities, doing our best not to avoid them by creating unnecessary meaning making and owning our subjective experience.
Our triggers and sensitivities are our saving grace pathway to a beautiful world our heart’s know is possible but it is also used against us to divide us, and steer us by over reaching powers that are infected by scarcity. Not evil, just out of touch with humanity and the abundance that only relying upon relationship creates because relationship is not scarce but an overflowing abundant spring. Our essence, if acknowledged and appreciated knows this truth.
So let’s honour our sensitivities by listening deeply to what they have to say and remind ourselves how lucky are we to be in an age of triggers giving us ample opportunity to respond differently and truly see our beautiful unique essence.
Who knows what potential this will bring?
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