Have you ever heard yourself say, “I can only relax when I’m alone”? Sensitive people are keenly attuned to people around us, and for some of us this attunement can morph into exhausting vigilance. Read on to understand how this pattern develops and how you can change it.
Mary, my friend and colleague, emailed me recently. She had recently realized the extent to which a painful pattern had been affecting her life. Mary wrote,
I had a Focusing session today that brought up a lifelong issue for me: my inability to feel safe and to fully relax and be myself except when I am alone, with no other living thing in my environment. I am continuously aware of other people and animals in my environment. This can include plants inside and outside! To say the least, this has hampered my self-care and personal practices.
Mary asked, “Do you think this is a boundary issue, or an HSP issue, or both?” I believe it is both: a boundary issue that is closely related to being highly sensitive (HSP). I’m grateful to Mary for bringing up a challenge that many of us face.
To be clear, all HSPs need the boundary of time alone with no new stimuli coming in. We need to rest, and to process our experiences. But Mary is describing an additional need: the need for freedom from perceived demands from other living beings.
Mary commented, “It feels to me that there is no separation between me and others and my actions are determined by how I perceive their needs to be.” When we struggle to keep boundaries around other people, plants, or animals, solitude becomes a necessary strategy— not only for rest, but for emotional freedom and self-connection.
How do we become so sensitized to others’ energy?
How might Mary have come to this point? For many sensitive people, this pattern starts in childhood. If you are a sensitive child under stress, you will turn to your natural strengths in order to cope. Those strengths include:
- A marked ability to sense the emotions of people around you
- A keen eye and ear for subtleties of phrasing, expression, tone of voice. Combined with empathy, this helps you read others’ moods, and even their intentions, with surprising accuracy
- A thoughtful approach: you watch and learn, then adapt your behavior to your surroundings
You may recognize these strengths— emotional intensity and empathy, sensory sensitivity, and deep processing— as three of the traits all HSPs share. We also share a fourth trait: we get overaroused more easily than most people. We find this overarousal highly unpleasant. And few experiences are more painfully overarousing than when people we care about disapprove of us, criticize us, or shame us.
In an attempt to avoid these unbearable feelings, we turn our formidable powers of attention outwards. We use our sensitive strengths to monitor our environment, adjusting our behavior to avoid trouble. We adapt a stance of emotional vigilance.
The architecture of vigilance
I lived in Hawaii for five years, where cockroaches are a fact of life. Being forced to observe my cockroach roommates, I developed a respect approaching awe for their survival instincts. The humble, horrible cockroach can help us better understand our HSP vigilance. They have hairs all over their legs that can detect the slightest movement of air. They have eyes with two thousand lenses that can take in a 360 degree view of their surroundings. In short, cockroaches are survival machines.
If this cockroach talk is grossing you out, please forgive me. I want to drive home the degree to which sensitive people leave our bodies when we are in a vigilant mind state. It’s as if all our attention-energy goes out to the end of those movement-detecting hairs. And that means there is no one home to “mind the store.” We completely lose touch with our own body—which is the only place we can truly sense whether we are safe or not.
“I can only relax when I’m alone”
This habit of vigilance becomes so ingrained that you do it unconsciously. You’ve learned that taking good care of others and being exquisitely attuned to their needs is a way to keep the waters calm. If your childhood trauma was pervasive, your vigilance will extend beyond situations that are overtly conflictual or overarousing. It will be activated any time you feel remotely responsible for any other being—even plants, in Mary’s case.
I’m guessing this may explain Mary’s feeling that she can’t relax— even around her plants. As a child, Mary likely used her sensitivity to attune to others in an attempt to avoid the overarousal of intensely painful situations and emotions. Now, it’s hard for her to “turn off” that vigilance. No wonder she can’t relax unless she is utterly alone. Sadly, too, our vigilance can sustain a vicious cycle in which we attract self-absorbed partners. Mary had experienced this herself, commenting that “I have had many men in my life who seem able to be completely oblivious or unconscious of others in their environment.”
How can you learn to feel safe around others?
Have you experienced this vigilance Mary and I have both struggled with? Fortunately, there is a way out. You’ve been accustomed to send all your attention-energy outwards. Now, you have to train yourself to bring your attention back inside your own body.
But here’s the problem: our vigilant parts truly believe their vigilance is preventing disaster. So pulling them away from their sentry posts is like trying to separate your dog from his bone. If you make an aggressive move, you will get “bitten”.
Accordingly, when I realized I needed to let go of my vigilance habit, I had to start very small. I began in a safe, manageable environment: my Focusing partnership sessions. My goal was simple. Could I keep some awareness of my own body in the presence of another person?
I found this effort surprisingly physical. It was as if my attention were a Great Dane on a leash, and it wanted to run towards the other person. I had to determinedly hold it back. For many weeks, my vigilant “inner dog” kept pulling like this. If I forgot even for a moment to pull my awareness back into my own body, my inner dog would surge forward and pull me out.
Replacing vigilance with Presence and spiritual intuition
I gradually began to build the new “muscles” I needed to rein my attention inwards. But this created a new challenge. Whenever I succeed in keeping some of my attention inside, my vigilant parts would panic. To them, it felt like driving with a blindfold on.
I needed an additional strategy: to cultivate Loving Adult Presence towards my vigilant parts. I quickly discovered these parts had no idea I existed. So it was slow work. And no wonder: functionally, I hadn’t existed for them in the past. Every time I had left my body, I had left them alone, too.
I spent a long time sensing what kind of company would help these parts know I was there. Then I spent more time hearing how terrified they had been, managing on their own. By practicing these two skills—keeping my awareness inwards, and being present with my vigilant parts—I gradually retrained myself, giving myself the lived experience of safety that comes when only when we are present in ourselves.
From this kind of Presence, we can use our formidable sensitive abilities to sense what is truly needed to keep us safe. On an even deeper level, we can access our spiritual intuition and begin to trust that it is our ultimate source of safety. And as we let go of our habit of vigilance, we can let go of feeling responsible for others, and fully relax around them.
Image © Emily Agnew 2019
Thank you so much, Emily, for this particularly relevant post! (I love all your posts, but this one really hit home). It’s given me some really valuable insight, and some good ideas about upping my self-care management game 🙂
Thank you. I will show this to my husband as I’ve tried to explain things like this to him but not being able to get the words out properly. I’m permanently tired, actually exhausted. I have 2 children 16 year-old boy not very demanding. 11 year-old very demanding girl. A dog a cat and a guinea pig. I wouldn’t be without any of the but they all need me and it’s very draining. Its like I don’t have an off button and the times when I’m not needed I’m constantly on high alert. I’m even worse when I visit family, I don’t sit down when I’m around them. I use the analogy that I feel like and octopus, needed in all different directions but not enough head space. Idon’t feel like I’m in tune enough to be able to use the tools you mentioned above, I’m kind of a bit stuck. I will read though it again and really try to make an effort for my own sanity. Again Thank you 😊
Geraldine, I’m hearing how exhausted you are. I wonder if some in-person support (like therapy) might really help you find your sanity…it sounds like you would need to physically get out of the house to be able to think straight when you are so used to being on call for everyone who needs you there. Staying in a state of exhaustion like you describe is hard on your body and while on the short term it may feel like you are serving others by working so hard, on the longer term your body will come to a point where it can’t go on like that. Having been through that, I’d say it’s very worth it to do anything you can to catch things sooner. Sending my best.
You are welcome Sarah! Sounds like you may also have an inner “Great Dane”?:)
For me too, Emily, this hit home to a really startling degree. Your title hooked me in, depsite my very busy day. And it’s funny. i don’t think of myself that way, but i noticed how something in me was really relating.
And I was riveted as your first 2 sections described me to a fairly breathtaking degree. What a great job of laying that out so clearly and insightfully.
It was lovely to read your process of making that transition from the unconscious automatic habit to a gradual reclaiming of self. Very heartening to read as i am making a fresh start on that same transition. Hope to see more posts ans tories on that process.
Adelia, thank you for naming what is happening here: the “transition from the unconscious automatic habit to a gradual reclaiming of self.” That is one of the trickiest aspects of this vigilance is that it becomes SO automatic, we truly don’t realize we are doing it. I found it took tremendous intentionality to even remember to try not to do it! I wish you the best as you dive into this territory–it is not easy but it is so very worthwhile.
This is a wonderful article! it is so conforting to feel understood… through the shared experiences. Thank you! … love this”as we let go of our habit of vigilance, we can let go of feeling responsible for others, and fully relax around them”
I recognise that when I fully relax around others and stay with me… I wonder if Am I still connected with them?! or even if Am I allowed to be connected with me while with others?! … and the most difficult one… Will it be boring if I am just relaxed in presence?! I still feel that I can only relax when I am alone…
loved the article!
Ingrid, these are important questions you are asking: “When I fully relax around others and stay with me… I wonder if Am I still connected with them?! or even if Am I allowed to be connected with me while with others?! … and the most difficult one… Will it be boring if I am just relaxed in presence?” My short answers are “Yes”, “Yes”, and “No”…but your questions are ones that can only be definitively answered by experience. That is, if you can help your vigilant parts trust you enough to let you try staying in yourself, you can see for yourself what happens. This is of course a project that unfolds over months and years. I still have a level of vigilance that kicks in sometimes, but not nearly like it used to, and I’m quicker to catch it.
Hi Emily, i just read this after reading your “Why is it so hard just to be yourself” article, which resonated so much with me. It’s heartening to know that you have managed to overcome much of that pattern because it is what i am trying to do. I loved what you said about the vigilant parts feeling like you’re “driving with a blindfold on” when you try to pull the attention back in – those words describe the sensation for me exactly. It’s really helpful to have the next step laid out for me – to sense the fear of those scared parts and what kind of company they might need. Thank you 🙂
You are very welcome, Bear. Loving Adult Presence will really help with this…the actual experience of feeling good in your bigger body while simultaneously holding these vigilant parts. When you hold the good feeling and the vigilance at the same time, it helps your brain re-wire.
Hi Emily
This article describes me completely. So interesting to read and very comforting to read that it’s not just me. I’ve been vigilant and outward facing. It served a purpose. But I’ve held onto the behaviour and strategies for far too long. Interestingly my small garden is overlooked; there is not a single part of it where a neighbour couldn’t see me and so I never go and sit out there to relax. A real shame. I’m working out what to do about it. Also when I socialise I often/usually totally forget my needs. And end up exhausted, eating the wrong things etc. Thank you for another great article.
Hi Fiona, this is a lot of insight coming for you! Yay for that. In social situations, you get “extra credit” for any effort you make to keep some of your attention in your body, because the pull to “go out” of yourself is so strong. It can help to sent your intent before going in to the situation. I have a small buzzer (it’s intended to be used as an interval reminder for exercise) that vibrates in my pocket every 10 minutes…you could use something like that to remind you to take a breath and check in. But also just remember that being highly sensitive, you are taking a lot in from your environment, which makes it harder to track your eating. As you become less vigilant, you’ll feel more comfortable keeping your awareness inside where you can notice whether you really want more guacamole or whether you are just mechanically eating it:)
Yes, I think so….and it does take a lot of practice and new habit forming to rein it in. You know, just coming back to this page and re-reading, something clicked–the inevitable Zoom meetings of recent moths have been proving a distilled version of being with others. I get craaaazy Zoom fatigue–like need-a-long-nap fatigued! Next step to remind myself that I am safe, even in this weird-feeling disembodied format. Thanks again for all the wonderful things you write!
Hi Sarah, I hear you about Zoom fatigue. I think it is particularly strong when there are multiple people on the call. Even if there is no trauma-related vigilance going on, it’s tiring staying tuned in to the levels of attention of multiple people. In “in-person” meetings, we adhere to unspoken contracts of behavior. In video calls, these unspoken agreements are are subtly or not so subtly broken:
someone suddenly shuts off their video, or drops off the call, or gets up and walks away, etc. the ‘container’ of the call is much looser, which is really confusing psychologically. The exact reasons for your fatigue would be interesting to explore…maybe watch yourself in calls and see if there are ways some part of you is tense or vigilant.
Hi Sarah, I hear you about Zoom fatigue. I think it is particularly strong when there are multiple people on the call. Even if there is no trauma-related vigilance going on, it’s tiring staying tuned in to the levels of attention of multiple people. In “in-person” meetings, we adhere to unspoken contracts of behavior. In video calls, these unspoken agreements are are subtly or not so subtly broken:
someone suddenly shuts off their video, or drops off the call, or gets up and walks away, etc. the ‘container’ of the call is much looser, which is really confusing psychologically. The exact reasons for your fatigue would be interesting to explore…maybe watch yourself in calls and see if there are ways some part of you is tense or vigilant.
Hi Emily, Great article, this explains a lot about my behaviour around others, even the people I love. Do you have some more resources or reading materials, books about this? I would like to work on this behaviour. Thank you!
HI Miguel, focusing is a powerful way to be with vigilant parts. There’s a page of articles and videos about Focusing on my site under “free stuff/about focusing”.
Ann Weiser Cornell’s book, The Power of Focusing, is a good resource. And if you want the direct experience of being guided in the process of going inwards in this way, that’s the 1:1 work I do, combined with Inner Bonding (under “services”)
One thing is unclear for me, what do you mean with
“being present with my vigilant parts”
Can you give an example of a vigilant “part”?
HI Miguel, a vigilant part scans the horizon for danger. It might watch other people’s expressions, listen for a certain tone of voice, or be alert to a movement. It’s part of our human makeup to seek safety: we all have a neurobiological alert system that evolved long before our prefrontal cortex came online. These impulses can get mixed up with traumatic events: it’s like a new inner part springs up to deal with the overwhelming event, and its job from then on is to scan the environment for anything that resembles the traumatic event. We can learn to hold this kind of trauma-scanning part and relate to it in a way that brings a shift so the “part” can let go of its “job.”
Emily, the biggest “aha” moment while reading “why can I only relax when I’m alone” was; “And few experiences are more painfully over arousing than when people we care about disapprove of us, criticize us or shame us.”
This is probably the biggest issue with me.
I just discovered your website this morning after receiving an e-mail from Margaret Paul and just beginning to learn Inner Bonding. I am hooked on your website as I so resonate with what you write. It’s so validating to know someone really “gets it” on so many levels. Thank you for all the beautiful work you do.
Daun, thank you for your appreciative comments, which mean a lot to me.
You are not alone with this. Because we interact with others all the time, the fear of the pain of overarousal due to shame, criticism etc can loom large in our lives. The key is to nurture a kind inner relationship with yourself so that whatever other people do or say–even when that is painful–you know who you are, what you stand for, and that you are fundamentally OK.
Hi please keep what I’m about to tell you confidential
My husband of 30 years passed away at 53 from colon cancer
In 2013
A good friend of ours from 30 years ago moved in and we started a relationship about 3 months after my husband passed
I had a good marriage and my late husband and I were like peas and carrots the pain and feeling lost even to this day is very real
I think I took in too much too soon
I’m 62 years old he is 65 but he is an alcoholic when drinks he is wonderful warm funny caring when he is not drinking he is very distant I care a lot for him and he says he does too but I don’t feel the connection I had with my late husband he has to have a movie on when he sleeps and I need quiet I have anxiety
Cut a long story short
We stopped making love over 5 years ago but he likes for me to give him hand jobs and I’ve done this but I don’t feel loved he gets tremendous pleasure and so I feel guilty if I don’t want to …. Then I do ….. and I dont feel relaxed or cared for or connected
I have no idea what a mess I got myself into day to day we function more like very good friends
I have a fear of doing this to him and at the same time don’t want to but I do ??????
He said that he tried to masturbate but can’t just can’t nothing happens he said it would take the pressure off me
He is a nice person but I feel so lost and this inner nervousness
And low self esteem I never had before
Thank you so much for this article. The title was literally what I put in the search bar and this was the first thing that came up. This is me. Everything you said is me. I have never been able to explain it before either. I have known why I am this way as I’m an ACoA. I have always been interested in self improvement, ironically because I want those around me to be more at peace in my presence because I could feel their discomfort, lol. This helped so much! I have subscribed to Sustainability Sensitive and I can’t wait to read through everything. Thank you!! ❤️
Hi Rachel,
I am an Introvert, HSP, and emotional, energetic Empath. I am also an ACoA. The ACoC part really confuses the HSP, Empath part of me. I understand wanting to always improve myself. This is a cognitive distortion. ..thinking by improving myself others will BEHAVE better. Just typing this almost makes me sick. I guess that means I have hopefully developed enough respect and care for myself that I don’t try to improve myself for others anymore. It’s a difficult journey. My father had to stop drinking after 40 years because he ended up in a Long Term Care Residence after breaking many bones due to a fall. His speech and behavior for 40 years messed up my brain and emotions. Now he speaks to me from a sober stance and wow…..this is messing my emotions up even more as an HSP. It’s very crucial that as ACoA HSPs we really protect our energy and set limits to what we can handle. It’s a very sad experience to live eh? I wish you much healing and health.
Rachel, I’m so glad this was helpful. As an ACoA, you must have learned to be very vigilant, paying very close attention to others. The good news is, you can turn that attentiveness inward, towards yourself. It will feel scary at first, but you can do it….