Quotessence
Home / Authors / Elaine N. Aron

Elaine N. Aron Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllSensory Processing SensitivitySpsHigh SensitivityHighly Sensitive PersonHspPsychologyCultureSelf HelpSensitivityDifficultyOverarousalPossibilitiesVocationAdulthoodAffectAnimalsAnyoneArtistsBalanceBehaving

Famous Elaine N. Aron Quotes

“How discouraging to watch your friends enjoying something you are too afraid to try. Do not underestimate such discouragement. It can be just as present in adulthood as you see friends taking on careers, travel, moves, and relationships that you would fear. Yet deep inside you also know you have the same or more talent, desire, and potential.”

DesireTalentFriendsPotentialAdulthoodDiscouragementInsideUnderestimationSensory Processing SensitivitySps
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“And while a difficult past may seem at first to hamper our living our life's purpose, sometimes it serve the purpose, too. Or it is the purpose—to fully experience and understand a certain kind of human problem.”

PastPurposeUnderstandingLivingExperienceDifficultySensory Processing SensitivitySpsLife S PurposeHuman Problem
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“Envy can wake us up to one of two truths: We want something and better do something about it while we still can, or we want something and just cannot have it. […] If your envy is strong and you decide you want to do something, you probably can.”

WantEnvyDecisionsSomethingTruthsWaking UpSensory Processing SensitivitySpsHigh Sensitivity
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“Our culture has an idea of competition in the pursuit of excellence that can make anyone not striving for the top feel like a worthless, non-productive bystander. This applies not only to one's career but even to one's leisure.”

CultureCompetitionExcellencePursuitIdeaAnyoneSensory Processing SensitivitySpsBystanderHigh Sensitivity
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“We make it especially hard for others to observe our trait when it means we are observing and not "behaving," at least at first. Further, we are so responsive to our environments that we can be something like chameleons when around others, doing whatever it takes to fit in.”

ObservationWhatever It TakesFitting InResponsivenessEnvironmentsSensory Processing SensitivityBehavingHigh SensitivityChameleons
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“Some of you may be struggling with discovering your vocation and feeling a little frustrated that your intuition is not helping you more. Alas, intuition can also stand in your way because it makes you aware of too many inner voices speaking for too many different possibilities.”

StruggleDiscoveryIntuitionFrustrationHelpPossibilitiesVocationSensory Processing SensitivitySpsInner Voices
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“You and I are learning to see our trait as a neutral thing—useful in some situations, not in others—but our culture definitely does not see it, or any trait as neutral. The anthropologist Margaret Mead explained it well. Although a culture’s newborns will show a broad range of inherited temperaments, only a narrow band of these, a certain type, will be the ideal. The ideal personality is embodied, in Mead's words, in 'every thread of the social fabric—in the care of the young child, the games the children play, the songs the people sing, the political organization, the religious observance, the art and the philosophy.' Other traits are ignored, discouraged, or if all else fails, ridiculed. What is the ideal in our culture? Movies, advertisements, the design of public spaces, all tell us we should be as tough as the Terminator, as stoic as Clint Eastwood, as outgoing as Goldie Hawn. We should be pleasantly stimulated by bright lights, noise, a gang of cheerful fellows hanging out in a bar. If we are feeling overwhelmed and sensitive, we can always take a painkiller.”

CultureTraitsSensory Processing SensitivitySpsHigh SensitivitySocial FabricClint EastwoodMargaret MeadThe TerminatorGoldie Hawn
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image

“But now you know the specific cause of your difficulty with [certain tasks] and can explore ways around the overarousal they create. So there's really very little that you can't do if you find a way to do it in your own style.”

CreationDifficultyExplorationCauseFindingSensory Processing SensitivitySpsOverarousalYour Own Style
Book:The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You
Create image