Are there regular times in the week when you feel distressed and preoccupied by anxious feelings about work, school or other significant responsibilities? One client describes difficulty falling asleep on Sunday night, another woke every morning filled with a feeling of dread and anxiety. His mind spun with relentless fantasies about making poor decisions at work or about being fired from his job. Another woman found herself feeling exhausted every morning, even though she had had a good night’s sleep... Underneath their anxiety and fear there was a great deal of powerful rage.

Stimulation comes in on all sensory channels: sights, sounds, smells, vibrations, touch. HSP’s typically respond strongly and quickly reach their natural level of tolerance in loud, bright or chaotic environments. Managing this kind of overstimulation could be treated as a “technical problem” of reducing environmental intensity or leaving it when possible. Five kinds of over-stimulation can contribute to depression.

More and more adult clients arrive at psychologist's offices suffering from stress and an inability to concentrate that makes them worry that they may have ADD. Often they are just overstimulated and overwhelmed. Stress is what we experience when the world moves too fast, when there is too much to do and too little time to do it. We feel stressed when the emotional world around us is strained or endangered. Through emotional contagion we feel stressed when others around us are stressed.

Infant research shows that this sensitivity seems to be present from birth. Carl Jung was apparently not far off the mark in his sense of its prevalence since current studies suggest that 15-20 % of all humans (and even animals) show the trait of high sensitivity and that it is equally divided between men and women. This non-trivial rate of appearance in the population suggests that it offered an evolutionary advantage. ... High sensitivity then is both a blessing and a curse and a normal part of the colorful spectrum of human character.

In a way, HSP's share a common problem with the approximately 10% of persons who are left-handed. The world is not set up to accommodate left-handers. ... There are many satisfying ways to lead a human life and highly sensitive individuals are uniquely able to appreciate the subtle changes which can make a noticeable difference in their existence. The first step, however, is to make the invisible forces and assumptions visible through reflection and conversation.

A temperamental connection has been observed between between high Sensitivity and creativity. Individuals may manifest extreme sensitivity to stimulation, or psychic over-excitabilities, in any of five areas: intellectual, psychomotor, imaginational, emotional, or sensual. Individuals who have an innate tendency to experience and express themselves in certain combinations of these areas have the potential for a higher level of development.

The personality attributes of the creative individual, as well as the characteristics of creative performance, can be seen as, in part, deriving from or serving the Sensation-seeking temperament... Dr. Cramond identifies several studies which describe creative people as having unusually high energy levels... as do individuals diagnosed with ADHD.