Listening to Your Inner Voice: Entrepreneurship and the Highly Sensitive Person

Skipping recording a podcast episode last week was the wake-up call I needed, a stark reminder that even as a mentor, I must listen to my body's whispers before they become screams. I've walked the tightrope between pushing limits and self-preservation, and in this intimate exchange I share with you today, I draw back the curtain on how to recognize when you're on the brink of your own thresholds. 

Whether you're a fellow sensitive soul, navigating neurodivergence, or managing chronic conditions alongside entrepreneurial demands, this dialogue is for you. I open up about the dangers of glorifying the hustle over well-being and invite you to explore the empowering act of setting boundaries for long-term fulfillment.

For anyone who feels the weight of their sensitivities in a world that often fails to accommodate them, this episode paints a picture of thriving through self-awareness and respect for our unique capacities.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 1:11

Today, I want to talk about thresholds identifying them, accepting them, honoring them and respecting them, especially if you are a highly sensitive entrepreneur. If you've been following my podcast, you know that I've been putting out weekly sessions, but last week I missed a session. The reason why is because I was approaching a threshold and something had to give, and what gave was me recording a podcast episode. So, as you know, I'm a highly sensitive person. I'm neurodivergent and I have chronic illnesses like endometriosis and autoimmunity, and these conditions, for the most part, are well managed. For the most part, you could say that they're in remission. However, I still need to be very conscious about respecting my limits. This is a non-negotiable. Otherwise, I can't create the impact I desire or fully enjoy what it is that I know that I'm here to be doing. So I want to talk to you about that and how to honor, address, identify and respect your own thresholds so that you can be your best and work at your fullest potential. The first thing to become aware of is where your limits are. What is your threshold? Somebody has a different level at which their threshold is in terms of where that sand in the line is drawn before you hit a wall, before you reach burnout, before things become too overwhelming or too much for you to handle and you cannot continue the way that you're continuing. You need to stop, you need to take a break, you need to take a nap, you need to go to bed, you need to be all sick, your symptoms come back, you get a flare up. These are all examples of reaching a threshold and it gets to the point where your body says that's enough, we can't do this anymore.

Speaker 1: 3:20

Awareness is always the first step, recognizing the signs that you've not only reached threshold, but what are those signs that you're approaching it? Your body and mind gives you signs and messages leading up to your limit, signs that you're at 75% capacity, 50%, 25%, even 5% or 10%. They're usually whispers that get louder the closer you reach your personal threshold. These signs can be different for different people. Some examples can be feeling overwhelmed, shutting down, starting to get irritated, losing interest in what you're doing. You might notice physical sensations like tight or sore muscles, and they might be just a little bit at the beginning and get worse and worse with time the further and further you are approaching threshold Exhaustion, intolerance to sounds, bright lights or exercise, or physical symptoms like digestive issues, sleep disturbances or headaches. These, of course, are just a few of a thousand other examples, and of course, they might indicate other things as well.

Speaker 1: 4:33

I'm not here to diagnose or treat anything. This is just information, and you might notice that at different levels of approaching threshold, different types of signs or messages might occur. So you might notice you get tight muscles at around like 25% threshold, but it's the digestive symptoms that show up at 50%, and then maybe the migraine starts at 75%, for example. It could be anything, and I'm not saying that this is something to avoid approaching threshold, because sometimes it's important to challenge ourselves. However, it's about finding that fine balance between challenge that helps you grow and overstepping the boundaries that cause you to be in challenge too much, because what happens is, especially with our nervous system little bits of challenge helps your nervous system to widen its window of tolerance, but what happens is over time, if it's constant and you don't give your nervous system breaks, opportunities to relax and finding your way back down from being in challenging moments for your nervous system. It's been proven scientifically that allostatic load over time, if not relieved, does lead to physical symptoms, physical ailments, physical dis-ease, and so this isn't a made-up thing, and for those of us who are highly sensitive, people who are neurodivergent, who do have chronic illness, it is more important than ever for you to identify your limits, identify your threshold, identify the signs that you're approaching threshold, so that you can accommodate your needs Instead of enduring them, instead of gaslighting yourself.

Speaker 1: 6:35

It's so common to say things I've done this too to say things like oh, it's not that big of a deal, oh, it's nothing, I just need to be less sensitive. These were common phrases in my vocabulary. I would get these signs telling me hey, it's time to slow down. Hey, it's time to take a break. Hey, it's time to back off. Hey, it's time to support your nervous system, hey, it's time to accommodate your needs. And I would ignore them. I didn't trust them. I thought I needed to be pushing myself more and doing more because other people were, so I need to be like them, and so I would ignore my own signs and signals and just keep plowing forward until I would blow my threshold, and then I would be in a whole world of hurt. Basically, my whole system would shut down, my mind would stop functioning, my physical symptoms would flare up and I would be in a world of hurt, sometimes to the point of bedbound, because I didn't listen, and eventually my body and soul stepped in and said well, if you're not going to respect your threshold and give yourself what you need and support yourself, then we're going to force you to do it.

Speaker 1: 7:50

This can be challenging, especially in today's hustle culture, especially when so many people operate from those conditioned shards and the people pleasing, especially in a world built for neurotypicals and for those of us who aren't neurotypical, there's been this tendency, if we've been conditioned into this world, to believe that we need to do what's necessary in order to fit in to this world of neurotypicals. To avoid rejection, to find acceptance, and ignoring our own needs was one of these ways in order to do that. Now the rub is, the more you don't accept where you are, who you are and what your particular physical and emotional needs and limitations are, the things that you don't accept control you, so all these things that you don't accept about yourself end up controlling you and they become a shadow that runs your life. This was a huge learning lesson for me and I'm really grateful that I've finally figured this out, and it's one of the lessons that I help my clients master to greater and greater levels through our work together. When you understand your body and your nervous system, your threshold as well as your capacity, and you accept, respect and own these things about yourself, they no longer control you and then you're free to find your flow, to operate in a way that works best for you, instead of operating from the shoulds, so you can set your own schedule and work at your own pace and work in ways that work best for you and your nervous system, instead of trying to force yourself to work in ways that your industry or profession said that you should. This was a huge learning lesson for me.

Speaker 1: 9:46

I know in the past, when I was a naturopathic doctor working in clinic, the model was you see back to back patients, one after another after another, and I would see my patients for 60 to 90 minutes and I would have enough time in between the session to go take a wash and break and quickly review the chart for my next client and see another patient. And sometimes I would see upwards of six, eight, ten patients in a day like this. Back to back to back to back, and I wondered why I was burning out. I wondered why, at the end of the day I would go home and crash because I had nothing left for myself. I didn't respect my own nervous system needs, my own self care needs.

Speaker 1: 10:32

I didn't understand back then that I am a highly sensitive person and I pick up on other people's energy. So I was picking up on the energy of every single one of my patients. They were all impacting me and while I understood at that point a little bit about energetic hygiene, I didn't really fully accept it, own it, respect it Like I do now, and because of that I was able to help my patients get better, find healing, improve their symptoms. But because I wasn't respecting my own nervous system and energetic needs, I was only able to show up for them as much as I was able to show up for myself, and if I'm not respecting my threshold, then I'm not showing up for myself all that much. So how much can I show up for them? I tricked myself and fooled myself into thinking that I was there for them, but it was hollow energy. I couldn't be fully me grounded, centered and fully energetically contained and energetically full when I wasn't taking care of my needs and when I was not respecting my threshold.

Speaker 1: 11:47

Now that I do, I get so much more accomplished and I'm able to show up for my clients in such a different way, because now I am making sure that I'm prioritizing my own energy, my own nervous system, my own needs first and foremost, so that I can be centered and solid for the client that's sitting in front of me. And some of those things that I've had to do for myself in order to respect my threshold is to adjust my schedule so that I work less hours and have more free time to do things outside of work, like going for walks in the forest with my dog in the middle of the day and having the time flexibility to be able to do other things as they show up, so I can be in the moment with my life, especially when it comes to my life with my sweetheart, so that I can pick up and go on dates in the woods with him, so that we can pick up and go and run errands together, so that I can enjoy presence with him, because I'm not trying to recover from having my threshold blown. I've spoken a little bit more about the details of some of the shifts that I've made as a highly sensitive person to respect my threshold in a previous podcast episode. So I definitely suggest that you go and check that out if you want more details about some of the more fine-tuned real-time adjustments I've made to respect my highly sensitive nervous system.

Speaker 1: 13:28

Today I want to talk more about what happens when you do respect those limits and create those boundaries and standards for yourself and prioritize yourself and no longer gaslight yourself around ignoring those limits and thresholds and approaching them. When you respect your limits and threshold, you create the environment that aligns with your nervous system. When you respect your limits and threshold, you exclusively focus on the topics and work inclined to how that you most enjoy and you give yourself permission to leave the rest behind. And there's some mindset and perspective shifts that go along with making that shift. And once you make those mindset shifts, once you see the perspective of how important it actually is to actually do that for yourself, it brings so much more fulfillment in so many ways in your work as well as your private life, as well as within your relationships, because you have more capacity for your clients, for your relationships and for yourself.

Speaker 1: 14:35

And that changes everything, even if other people don't understand because not everybody will especially if they're operating from the perspective of the socially conditioned rat race belief of you always need to be doing, you need to always be pushing yourself, you need to constantly force yourself to move past your limits and, in a sense, like this is not a black or white thing. There's some discernment to be had here, like I've mentioned earlier about building your window of tolerance, but the key is, especially for highly sensitive people, is to understand that you can't always be in that state, because if you do, you're not going to be able to bring all that you can into your work and be all that you know that you are destined to be. When you don't respect your limits, you cannot operate at your fullest potential. And some people don't get this because everybody's operating from a different lens of perspective based on their own beliefs, and beliefs are created when you have an experience and you put meaning to that experience, and it sets up a certain belief. That is what influences the lens of perspective that you are looking through.

Speaker 1: 15:48

And when other people make comments, especially critical or judgmental comments, about your choices that you are doing for you and for your business and for the clientele that you serve, and they are making critical, judgmental, harsh or unapproving comments, they're speaking from their own inner projections. They might tell you things like you're selfish for focusing on a specific subset of clientele, that you shouldn't just be so selective to zone in on just one specific zone of genius, that you shouldn't be limiting your schedule, that you should, as an entrepreneur, be making your business the number one priority in your life, that you're just being selfish for prioritizing yourself. And the thing is that their criticisms say more about their own inner strife than anything to do with you and your choices you've made to support you and to support the results that you're able to facilitate for your clientele. When you honor your threshold, you feel better. You're more energetic, clear-headed, focused and satisfied because you're caring for yourself in the ways that nurture you deeply. And when you feel better, you do better work, you enjoy it more and the impact that you know that you're here to make for the people you serve grows exponentially. You know that you're a leader in your work and to lead by example means honoring who you are and how you operate. Especially if you identify as a highly sensitive person, neurodivergent or have some type of chronic illness, like me, these things don't need to control your life. When you understand, accept and own these aspects of yourself and use your body and intuition as a guide, you take the driver's seat, and that not only improves your own well-being, but your impact, income and inner fulfillment from what it is that you do. As a highly sensitive entrepreneur, I must respect my limits and honor my threshold. It makes me more successful in every sense of the word, and this is one of the many pillars I guide my clients to master more deeply than ever, because it does make such a difference and sometimes it can be easy to veer off track.

Speaker 1: 18:20

So recently I ended up stepping away from respecting my own threshold. My own mentor helped shed light on where I had fallen back into old patterns, and I'm so grateful that she did, because this is the thing is, you can't see. What you can't see, especially when you fall back into old patterns like pushing yourself to do things oh, it's not that big of a deal. And this is especially problematic when you actually do really enjoy what you're doing, like I do In my work. I really do enjoy what I do, and sometimes that means that I end up over focusing on the work that brings me joy, to the point of losing balance with the rest of my life. I had fallen back into that old pattern of doing that and I was starting to notice that it was impacting how I was feeling. Having a conversation with my mentor, we were able to piece together oh, that's why I'm feeling this way. Oh, I see I'm like at like 75% threshold right now. Okay, yep. Having her point that out before I blew my threshold really helped me see more quickly how I could realign myself and bring myself back to the most balanced position I can and accept and own my needs, capacity and threshold and make sure that I'm taking care of my nervous system needs and accommodating them. And so one of the things that I did for myself to help accommodate my needs and recover from pushing my threshold was taking a break from podcasting last week, which is why you didn't get a new episode last week. I allowed that to be okay.

Speaker 1: 20:04

In the past I would have beat myself up for that. I would have put all sorts of inner pressure on myself. My inner judge would have been screaming at me what are you doing? You can't do this. What are people going to think? Now I can have gentle, compassionate, loving conversations with those protective parts of myself and say, hey, I understand, you're scared, you're feeling like maybe everything's going to fall apart If you miss a week of podcasting. What's important here is making sure that I'm taking care of and that my nervous system is taking care of. That means taking some time for myself, reminding those protective parts that taking that time for myself is better for us in the long run, because then I can maintain my center and my groundedness and my energy and I can be here fully for my clients and for you. That is more impactful than me trying to burn the candle at both ends, watching that thread fray away to the point where I have nothing left to give. That doesn't help anybody.

Speaker 1: 21:20

Today's podcast is a little reminder about thresholds seeing your threshold, understanding your thresholds, identifying when you're approaching threshold, and also a point to mention here about thresholds is sometimes your threshold will be different depending on what's going on in your life. The more challenges are going on, the more external stressors are showing up for you. You might notice that your threshold looks different than when things are maybe smooth sailing, fully stable. You might notice that the signs of approaching threshold might be different as well in each of those different situations. It's not a cut or dry, black or white situation. It's very nuanced. This is where really paying attention to yourself and connecting with your intuition and your inner knowing and understanding the language of how it speaks and not ignoring it and not gaslighting yourself away from hearing it, trusting it or responding to it. That's huge and sometimes it's hard to see for yourself.

Speaker 1: 22:34

Sometimes it can be helpful to have someone help you understand these aspects of yourself and help you to see when you are veering off track. Help you to see and identify the practical steps to take if you are starting to approach threshold, because it's in those moments that you're probably going to have the least amount of clarity about what's actually going on. And I say this from personal experience myself, and that's why, even though I'm a mentor for other people, I have my own people that I work with to help me see what I can't see. And when I guide and mentor my own clients, I help you understand all the nuances about yourself, your superpowers and how to use them in your work, as well as your threshold and how to understand how your threshold works, identify the signs leading up to reaching your threshold and the strategic plan of how to prevent blowing your threshold and how to support yourself in recovering. If you do, I help you to get to know yourself even more deeply, understand your threshold, accept it and also to identify your capacity to deeper and deeper levels and own them, so that they don't own you. And when you do that, more freedom, fulfillment and flourishing success are on the other side of that.

Speaker 1: 24:16

Life is a journey, with its ups and downs, with its challenges. We don't live in a bubble, and working with your threshold and your capacity and your intuitive guidance that helps you understand and see where your threshold is being approached is going to help you to be more productive and be more centered, present and powerful in the work that you are doing and so that you can enjoy what you're doing so much more, because you have the energy and clarity and vitality to do so. And sometimes it's not always easy to see it on your own, and that's where I can come in and help you. If that's something that you're interested in is to help you really identify and understand where your threshold is and what to do if you're approaching it, and, through mentorship, is to support you along the way, to help you identify and see when you are veering off track and going into old patterns again, so that you can do the integration work to turn that around for yourself, and that's what improves absolutely everything.

Speaker 1: 25:28

I hope this episode was helpful for you in some way to help you understand a little bit more about honoring your threshold, identifying it and where you might be on that path and journey for yourself, especially if you are a highly sensitive person, neurodivergent or someone with a chronic illness. If you would like my personalized guidance, I invite you to check out the different options in the show notes and if you feel called to any of them, I invite you to fill out the application and we can organize a conversation in order to see whether or not working together makes sense for both of us. I'll be honest if I don't think that we're an aligned fit to work together, because it's when we are an aligned fit to work together that the transformational magic really happens. I look forward to speaking to you again next time.