Welcome And Episode Roadmap

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to the Husband Material Podcast, where we help Christian men outgrow porn. Why? So you can change your brain, heal your heart, and save your relationship. My name is Drew Boa, and I'm here to show you how. Let's go.

SPEAKER_02 0:19

Thank you for listening to my interview with Mike Vaughn about sensitivity. This is such an important topic. As men, we often carry shame about our sensitivity and confusion about what to do with it. In this episode, you are going to learn what a highly sensitive person is. Sneak peek. I actually discovered that I am one, and you'll get some fascinating ideas about how sensitivity relates to addiction and unwanted sexual behavior. You'll hear Mike's personal story as well as some really helpful strategies about how to steward this superpower of your sensitivity for good, for health, and for healing. Remember that the views expressed by guests on this podcast are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Husband Material Ministries. Featuring a guest is not an endorsement of their beliefs, methods, products, services. We believe in discernment. So, as with any resource, listen thoughtfully, test everything, and take what's helpful and leave the rest behind. Enjoy the episode.

Meet Mike Vaughn

SPEAKER_02 1:16

Welcome to Husband Material. Today I am delighted to be talking to Mike Vaughn, who is the executive director of Bethesda Workshops. He is a certified sex addiction therapist, a mental health counselor, an intensive counselor, and a highly sensing person. Welcome, Mike.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Thank you so much. It is great to be with you. Yeah, I know we're going to talk about the highly sensing piece. And that is something, I mean, for any of those listening, like, what is that? Like, that is something that honestly, for me, I've only come to know better about myself just even in the last few years. So after kind of all these years and being a therapist and all that good stuff, it's kind of, I mean, it's not a brand new kind of awakening for me, but it is a new ish. And so, you know, I'm always excited to talk about it in hopes that maybe there are others out there like, wait a minute, is this does this either apply to me or does it apply to other people that I know? And I know we'll we'll probably get into the numbers, but yeah. So thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here. You're welcome. Why are you passionate about this personally? You know, two reasons. The first is the personal, which is I fall very squarely in the highly sensing category. So I'm a highly sensitive person. So that's one. The other is the professional and then how they merge, which, you know, at Bethesda, we do workshops for sex addiction recovery, right? And couples and partners and all the things related. And also in my practice, when I was in private practice as a therapist, I have did that for for many years. And so my interest in this really is the combination of how I've experienced it in my own life, but also how I experience have experienced it in the lives of my clients and the people at our workshops. Because if you read about being highly sensing, the numbers are that roughly about 30% of the world's, and that's just like the entire world's population, are fall into the highly sensing category. Which, if you do the math on that, is many, many people. And then I always tell people, you know, it's not just like maybe you're listening to this and you're like, well, I already know that I'm not in the highly sensitive category, right? And we'll talk about what that means, but I guarantee you that if you have any friends at all, if you have any family at all, there are people around you that do fall in this category. And I think it can create a lot of misunderstanding and missing in our relationships. And, you know, we are nothing without our relationships, right? And so both from a recovery perspective, we know like we need that really strong community in order to recover, but just to be healthy people, God created us to be richly connected with each other. And highly sensitive people really have that ability to richly connect. And yet when it's not understood or when others don't understand, it just creates that missing. So I guess to answer your question, my my interest kind of is in different areas. And I'm I'm always looking and I'm always curious. I know you and I have talked about this in recovery, about thinking about, well, what

Why Sensitivity Can Raise Addiction Risk

SPEAKER_00 4:20

maybe what are we not talking about or not talking about enough? What are we missing? I think we're having fantastic recovery conversations, but sometimes I think, like in for with this, for example, we probably need to talk more about this. This is impacting a lot of people. I mean, I'm sure you probably know Gabor Matei. I mean, he writes about addiction, right? And uh, he was on a podcast, and this is what struck me. He said, you know, his belief is that the number one risk factor for addiction is sensitivity. And when I heard that, I was like, whoa, why are we not saying more about that? And I and I don't know that he has any data around that, or I mean, it just may just be his belief, right? But once we start talking about what it means to be highly sensitive, it's a short, it's a very short drive to understand. Well, people in the highly sensing category are gonna go seeking medication for all the noise, like all the stimulation, right? So I'll pause. But like those are some of the reasons I'm I'm passionate about it.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

That is so insightful because if porn or unwanted sexual behavior is an attempt to regulate the nervous system, well, being sensitive can mean I feel disproportionately dysregulated.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 5:35

I'm not just anxious, like I am trembling and you know, completely overwhelmed. Or I'm not just a little bit lonely, I feel completely abandoned, things like that.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Yes. It really drives, you know, when you think about, like you said, porn or any unwanted sexual behavior, it really drives the so-called kind of need or desire to try to regulate and medicate like the nervous system. And for highly sensitive people, this isn't just a short season of their life that they're going through, right? That's the thing. Like, you know, every morning you wake up, I look in the mirror, and guess what? Still highly sensitive. So I still need some way to regulate, right? You know, and so I think that's the thing about it sometimes. That's difficult. And why I think it lends itself so much to addiction because, well, every morning I wake up, and every morning my nervous system is going to be bombarded. Guess what? That means every day I need some way to do that. And it's kind of relenting in that way, if I could use that word. And so it can feel very overwhelming, like you said.

The DOES Traits Of Sensitivity

SPEAKER_02 6:50

Let's go into the acronym that describes what highly sensitive means.

SPEAKER_00 6:57

So Elaine Aaron has done a lot of this research. Her actually, and her husband, um, who's also a psychologist, I think he's a psychologist, but regardless, they've done this research and they've wrote written multiple books on this. And there have been some others who have written specifically about men in high sensitivity. And so the way she came at this is at in doing her research, she she realized kind of over and over that there was this pattern that existed, that there's these kind of type of people that seem to experience the world in a more sensitive way. And so the acronym that she came up with to try to help kind of understand and make sense of the particular traits of highly sensitive people is D-O-E-S. It's kind of does, right? And before I say that, I will say I think sometimes when people hear highly the words highly sensitive, it has a it has a negative connotation, right? And and I'll be just super honest, like very frank, as a man, it's it's even hard for me to say to you, I fall in the highly sensitive category, right? Because what what are you going to think about that? Like what's what's your internal script about that?

SPEAKER_02 8:00

Usually we associate sensitivity with weakness.

SPEAKER_00 8:03

Exactly. And so, you know, when I think when people hear high sensitivity, it's like, oh man, I don't, men or women, I don't know if I want to say this to the world because are they gonna think exactly that, Drew? Like, am I, does that are they gonna see me as a weaker person because I can't, you know, can't handle things, which is not at all what it means. But I think there's a stigma out there, which is part of the reason why I'm open to talking about this, because especially for men, but for men and women, I think we need to say, well, wait a minute though, actually being high sensing is has some incredible strengths, which I think will be more clear as we go through the acronym. And I'll jump jump into that. But I always like to give that disclaimer because I know even internally I feel that conflict and tension about saying this. Back to Doug. So essentially, if you're trying to think about, well, am I or do I know people that are, first of all, if you go to Elaine Aaron's website, she has a handy little objective assessment that you can take and you can see where on this spectrum you are. And it is a spectrum. I know I was talking to you about this the other day. It's not just a fixed, I'm here or I'm here. We, as with most things, we fall along along kind of the sensing spectrum. And so there are those who are higher on that and those who are lower, right? But D O E S. So as you're thinking about what are the qualities of being highly sensitive. The first is depth of processing. And what that means is highly sensitive people in general tend to take in a lot more of the information from their environment, right? Like they notice that little slight smile that you did, they they they saw like the head turn, and other people don't. And this was part of what's new, was new to me. I thought like everybody was seeing those things, and it turns out that that's not true. And so the depth of processing is that highly sensitive people, because they're taking in more cues from their environment, they have more information that they're processing. And it lends itself to a certain depth. It doesn't mean that highly people that aren't highly sensitive don't process in a deep way. It just being highly sensitive tends to like kind of create a certain depth in processing that sometimes more generally may not be there, right? Especially because of what you're taking in. So that's the D. Which again, like that's great, right? It's really, really good to be a deep processor until it's not, because the more information you're taking in, the more you're trying to process. Like to your point, ooh, that that by itself can create some overwhelm, right? If I don't know what to do with it, I have been fond of saying to myself and my highly sensitive clients, you don't have to turn over every rock. Like you just some rocks in the field you just need to let be there. You don't need to investigate what's underneath them, right? Which may sound stupid or crazy for a therapist to say, but for highly sensitive people, in order to navigate this world, you have to have a certain discretion or understanding of, you know what, that I see that rock is there. Other people may not, but I'm not gonna turn it over. I'm just gonna let that one be, you know, and right, because there has to be a certain way in a healthy way, I think, of limiting information. And we all need that these days. So depth of processing, that's the D. The O is over-stimulation. So this is the hard one, right? So people who are in the highly sensitive category, they they tend more so than others to be over more quickly overstimulated. And this can be things like noises, it can be things like textures. In my house, in my family, of course, you know, your family's always so kind to you, right? But they sometimes make fun of me because if there's like a loud noise, that startle reflex is usually like greater with me than other people. And I'm like, you know, like, did you have to drop that pan? Right. And they're like, What are you, what's going on?

SPEAKER_02 12:06

This is why I wear earplugs every night with my three young children.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

See, that is the perfect example. Well, young kids, especially, yes, because if they're doing childhood right, they're loud, right? And it can be light, so it can be sounds, it can be textures, it can be light. My wife is like, man, like you have you everything has to be so dark at night in order for me to sleep, because otherwise I'm like, I'm awake. You know, it's like the blackout curtains and that I wish I could just go to a cave just for for bedtime and then come out. So over-stimulation, which just all it means is like the tendency to be overstimulated by the environment that you're in. That's the critical piece. And so if you're, you know, if you're listening to this, you're like, okay, I'm going through this, I'm trying to think, does this fit apply to me? Look for those places in your life where you feel you are quickly over stimulated. Generally speaking, for those who aren't in the highly sensitive category, all of us can be overstimulated, but there aren't pattern, there aren't patterns to it like there are for highly sensitive. Like I know loud noises are just always gonna make me jump. That's just how that's gonna work. You know, hey, you know, earplugs are gonna have to be for this season because the noise, right? I'm assuming. And I know at night, as dark as I can make the room, I'm gonna sleep better. You know, just like you know, patterns, and that's what overstimulation means. That's oh. The E is emotional reactivity, and so it's kind of two E's, emotional reactivity and empathy. So emotional reactivity means I am acutely aware, at least of what I think are the is like the emotional landscape of those around me. Right. So I am aware that you're you seem to be feeling angry or you seem down or sad, or you seem happy. Like I'm a very aware of that. And sometimes I'm aware in a way that like other people are not registering. And you'll know this because you'll say, gosh, you know, you know, I was talking to Drew today, and maybe a friend was with me, and you know, we're talking like Drew seemed really sad today. And the friend, we're like, What? I I don't I don't know. I didn't seem sad to me, right? And it doesn't mean I'm right, it just means there's a certain sensitivity to the emotional landscape around. And I would do want to be quick to say, in all of these categories, and especially with that kind of emotional reading component, it does not mean that we're always reading the right thing, right? It does not mean that. So I just want to just want to point that out because there are definitely times I go back and I'm like, you know, well, it seemed like you were really angry at that. And whoever it is, like, what? I was, you know, I wasn't right. So I picked some something up, but not that. So that's the that's the emotional reactivity piece. But then there's empathy that's part of that, which highly sensitive people tend to be higher on the empathy scale. And we'll talk about this, I'm sure, but I'll just kind of say this real quickly right here. What's so great about highly sensitive people in recovery is that part. I mean, the other parts too, but that part in particular, especially when they're doing recovery with a spouse or partner, because they're already usually more wired. They tend towards kind of empathy, empathetic responses anyway. And so if you can work on the shame component and help kind of shame resilience, that that natural tendency towards empathy can really shine in the recovery process. And so you have just sometimes remarkable coupleship recovery with that.

SPEAKER_02 15:49

Amazing. Does empathy also sometimes include having like an emotional experience of what I think someone else is feeling?

SPEAKER_00 15:57

100%. It's it is that tendency to identify, like that's empathy, right? To identify with. And, you know, again, I might have an emotional experience of the emotion seems like you're experiencing. Whether that's right or not, maybe that's a different. But nonetheless, that tendency is there, along with kind of the the emotional reactivity as well. And the emotional reactivity part, by the way, is not only reading and understanding others, but it is also typically kind of bigger emotions for oneself, also. So sometimes highly sensitive people have learned to numb that or make that part small. But generally speaking, if not, highly sensitive people tend to experience their emotional world a little, let's see, a little more robustly than other people do. And sometimes those emotions can be pretty big. So I would add that to that part.

SPEAKER_02 16:57

This is resonating with me, like every single part of it.

SPEAKER_00 17:02

Good news. You're you're almost there. We'll we'll determine at the end whether you're in the highest sensor category. I have a feeling if this is resonating, you probably are. We don't even need to take the test. It would be interesting to take the test, though, and see where on that that spectrum you are. And I I had all my family members take it too. So now we all we have like, you know, this chart in my house of where everybody is and who is and who isn't, and all that good stuff. Most of us are, which you can imagine, right? That household. So I don't know if that's going to be true for you. But yeah, it's just a different kind of household when everybody in your house is. Okay, the last one. So we'll see if you if you hit this marker or not. The last is sensing the S is sensing the subtle. So I kind of led with this a little bit. And of course, the all these categories overlap, right, amongst themselves, but sensing the subtle means as I go about my daily life, I pick up on things that others don't. Whether it's, you know, a glance here, whether it's a quick flash of something on someone's face there, whether it's that person way off in the distance, you know, doing that thing over there. Like it could be an action. It doesn't always have to be kind of a registry on a person's body, can be a more kind of gross action somewhere. But I'm I am aware. Like things don't escape my attention as easily than sometimes they do for those who are not as sensitive. Which, you know, listen, as particularly as a therapist, I have found all of these to be super, super helpful. So in on one level, I think, man, this is it's been so great to be a therapist and have these qualities. On the personal side, though, honestly, I wish sometimes that I didn't see that glance, right? And have to make up a story about what that means, or didn't notice that person over there because they're not going to actually interact with me, you know, those types of things. So I want to be careful to frame all this, is in my opinion, Elaine Aaron says, listen, being highly sensitive is a trait. It

A Trait Not A Disorder

SPEAKER_00 19:09

is not a liability, it is not a disorder, it's just a trait. 30% of people are just born higher, like they have a higher trait towards being sensitive. And what I would add to that is I I absolutely believe it is a trait. I can go way back in my childhood and I can pick out for you, like I'll tell you a quick story. So I arrive at kindergarten, and you know, I'm I'm there at kindergarten and I'm going about my my days. And somewhere in the kindergarten process, there was a little boy, and he would at some point in the day, he would just wet his pants. And every day he would wet his pants. But I remember coming home and telling my mom, you know, this I forget his name now, but you know, this boy he would wet his pants. And I was so upset about that. Just because obviously, you know, even as a kindergartner, you know, something's not right about that. Right now, as an adult, I know probably something was really not right about that. And it's even more sad, but that's just an example of a six-year-old who has like that tendency to really not only notice and and maybe empathize, but just like be really aware of that type of thing. And then, you know, I really I genuinely I still remember all these years later just feeling bad for him every day. And so this is just a good example of where I think number one, it is a trait, it's probably part of our life early. I mean, we're we're born that way in so many ways. And I think can produce so many strengths for us. But as we have talked about, you know, we just have to be aware, like anything, of the liabilities, is the way I would say that, particularly as it relates to addiction, unwanted sexual. Not not just sexual things, but other ways of coping as well.

Turning Sensitivity Into Strength

SPEAKER_02 21:01

For me, screens have been that regulator or that way of getting out of overstimulation. Sensitivity is a strength. Yes. Especially as men, we often apologize for sensitivity, such as crying or feeling something strongly, or wondering if everything's okay. I'm sorry that I'm so sensitive. It's like, no, that is a superpower. Yes. And we have to learn how to use it and how to steward it, right?

SPEAKER_00 21:37

Yeah, exactly. I love the way you say that. The first step which I had to do, and I'm still doing, is we have to embrace it. Like you have to de stigmatize it, you have to let it not be a shameful thing. Right? Another quick story. For I've had two kids that are graduated high school so far, and in the Vaughn household, what We do is we have a graduation party, and then my wife and I give a speech about that kid, right? And in both cases, my wife has m almost made it through her speech without crying. But in zero cases, did I make it more than like about five sentences without crying when I'm kind of talking about my child and you know their who they are and all that kind of stuff? And I don't, I don't know about you, Drew, but after both of those times, you know, look, we have this whole group of people here. And I'm I'm thinking, I mean, they're like, why did I come to this Vaughn, another Vaughn graduation party, right? And this this this guy's up here now, he's crying. In both cases, I had this emotional hangover because I was like, man, why did I I tried not to cry this time? I didn't want to cry, right? I just wanted to deliver my message. But it is like me to be to sometimes cry at things because they just catch me that way, and that's what it is. I used to really kind of be very self-critical about that myself for many years. Like, gosh, it doesn't seem like other people in these situations are crying about this stuff. Why like what's wrong with me? And you know, as a therapist, I would think, well, what's gotta be more, I gotta do more trauma work. I need to go back to therapy. Like, there must be something to fix here, clearly. I had a, I still have a really, really good friend, and we were talking about this one day, and he's of course sensitive like me. And he said, Mike, what if nothing is wrong with you? What if what you're describing is just you? Because certainly, I mean, I think we could make the case that crying's not in and of itself a bad a bad thing, you know? Like, what if nothing is wrong with you? And I'm telling you, Drew, I don't know how that hits you and anyone listening to this, but it was like it was like a light bulb moment. And I was like, wait a minute. Is it possible, just possible, that this trade and others is not a I'm not defective in some way, that maybe this is just how I am. And I maybe don't need, I mean, we can always do more trauma work, but maybe I don't need to do more trauma therapy to get rid of this. Maybe I just need to think about this differently. And that's actually what started coming to understand about high sensitivity, which I had heard about for years, and just I think very probably consciously and subconsciously just kind of pushed aside, right? We do that for things. And so all that's just to say, just to underscore what you said, which is absolutely it can be a true superpower, but we have to embrace the components of what it means, and we have to let go of the criticalness of ourself. And sometimes if we see it in others, because while I think we can work with it, marshal it, you know, do be a good steward like God tells us to do with everything with it, we first have to let it be something that's positive, which may sound you know crazy to some, but I know I had to it had to be, it had to turn into something that was positive because I had experienced it as negative for a long time.

Regulate Your Body Before Your Mind

SPEAKER_02 25:14

As you work with highly sensitive people, what are some of the most important tips beyond simply embracing it and letting go of shame in terms of handling overstimulation and heightened awareness and processing things so deeply? What can help?

SPEAKER_00 25:36

Yeah, that's a great question. And I'll I'll answer it generally, but let's also apply it to the recovery process. Perfect. Generally, number one, body first. You said this, right? You said it at the beginning, but I'm gonna like draw a thick line underneath it. You have to have a process of regulating your physiology, your nervous system. Simple things, right? Box breathing, like all the things we know. Box breathing, taking walks, all the things that help us regulate our nervous system. I think for highly sensitive people, that's not just, you know, a fun thing that we should kind of all be doing. It is, you have to do it. Otherwise, that void that you leave there is going to be filled with something because your body is going to be screaming for regulation. All of ours are, but for highly sensitive people, even more so. And you talked about this, like screens, right? Like in this day and age, we can easily find something that temporarily regulates us. So if you don't put something, if you don't kind of do body first almost, then something is going to fill that spot. It might be pornography, it might just be screens, it might be social media, like whatever it might be, could be food, all the things. So first thing is body first. Just like you have to think about your physiology before anything else, because story follows state. I love that polyvagal insight. I did that just for you, Drew. I did that just for you. I knew you'd like that, right? It's polyvagal. The the truth is, like we we as Christians, maybe people everywhere, we we want to do our mind first. Like, well, let me think my way through this, right? But that's actually in so many ways. God created your nervous system to help you then kind of think it, but you have to do the body first. So for sensitivity, that's the first thing. You have to find ways that work for you in terms of regulation. For me, definitely breathing, but walking, walking, I have come to understand is just so, so helpful for me, just to be outside, first of all. And then that footfall, that rhythm, right? Really kind of it helps regulate both sides of the body. So that's the first thing. Um, in fact, I hurt my ankle last week and I haven't been able to walk as much. And I'm actually really noticing it. So if anything I'm saying doesn't make sense today, it's because I'm dysregulated. I haven't been able to walk. So hopefully I'll get back to that. So the second thing is know like know your tendencies, know what the patterns are of the things that cause the most over stimulation that cause like those things that we went through. You know, we've talked about sounds and things and things like that. But if there are parts of your day, if there are any patterns to your life that consistently are in any of these categories, it doesn't mean that you can get rid of them, but you can plan and prepare to experience them differently. Right? You're a perfect example, Drew. You know, in the evenings, probably the noise level is gonna rise. So you've taken alternative measures, right?

SPEAKER_02 28:57

Yes. And it's scary to me what happens when I don't. Yeah. It's really, really difficult for me to be present and not react very strongly when the kids are allowed. And I've also noticed that there's an emotional piece of it too. If we're screaming and having fun, or it's a dance party, that's actually a lot easier for me to handle than if someone is hurt or someone is mad. Like those sounds become intolerable. So I have invested in earplugs, like I've got multiple pairs in multiple places around the house. And it's a form of comfort, it's a form of self-soothing that I'm really thankful for. Yes. Sometimes we think of soothing as a bad thing, of like, oh, I'm right not going to self-soothe anymore. Well, actually, maybe I just need a better way to self-soothe.

SPEAKER_00 30:07

Yeah. I I love that point because I think with everything, but with those in the highly sensitive category, honestly, soothe healthy soothing is a critical piece of how you get through your world. And I agree with you. I mean, what's more healthy than knowing what I need and doing it? And you can call it soothing, you can call it copy. Whatever word you want to put on it, you can call it a tomato. But like the thing is, if I know my sensitivities and I plan for those, my world's much better. And I I love you using you as an example because you've noticed the pattern. Like you're not continuing to like pull myself up by my bootstraps. I'm just tonight's gonna be the night I can make it without you know having a big reaction, right? That's but that's what you shake your head, but that's what we do. So often we're like, well, well, I'm gonna do it tonight. Like I can, I can do it, right? Like, let me reach down and I got my boots on and I'm and I'm gonna do it. And it and I think that's not being very honoring of the way that God created us. It's it's really kind of a deeply, we won't go so deep with this, but it's a deeply theological issue. Not trusting the creator who created me to be who I am and to use the mind that he's given me to figure out ways that I can circumvent those tendencies, which is the beautiful thing that you've done there. But I think so often, especially men, are like, I'm just gonna cowboy up this thing. I can I can do it tonight, right? And then what happens? I don't do it tonight. I yell at the kids because I'm overstimulated. And then what happens? Well, now I feel more shame, right? And by the way, highly sensitive people, remember they experience those emotional components in a usually in a in a more amplified way. And so shame is more amplified, right? And so now we're in this cycle. Forget the sexual compulsivity addiction cycle. This is just a shame cycle. Oh, I thought I was gonna do it tonight and I didn't, and I still yelled. And so, but what do we do that's usually so crazy making? I'll just say for me, what would I do? Well, tomorrow night's gonna be the night. Like I know I'll do it tomorrow night, right? You know, no evidence will suggest that I'm going to be able to do it, and yet, because I'm not willing to own how I've been created and the strengths and the weaknesses therein, then therefore not willing to take alternative measures, which is all I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_02 32:34

Yeah. When we get into that survival mindset of I'm going to overcome this and I'm going to win the battle, it still puts us into fight or flight.

SPEAKER_00 32:51

Right? It's exactly what it does.

SPEAKER_02 32:54

Even if we win, that's not getting all the way back to connection.

SPEAKER_00 33:00

A hundred percent. Because when we're in that mode, or maybe we're in freeze, I mean, what's what's going on there is we're not going to be able to be as relationally present with those we love as if we weren't, because God didn't design it that way. You're not supposed to be like, let's sit around and connect, you know, in the middle of this threat is coming, you know, the spar is running at me. Let's not do that actually, because we'll be dead.

SPEAKER_01 33:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:25

But relational, like those relational triggers, which to our nervous system feel every bit as threatening a lot of times as actual like physical threats, you're right. Like we can't be present like we want to be when we're in that place. But guess what? If you have earplugs in and you're going about your night, you certainly have a much better chance there because you're not as stimulated or overstimulated, and then therefore you're not going to be as reactive. So prepare body first, look for the patterns, prepare, which preparation makes so much difference when it comes to this stuff. And then probably the last thing I would say would be true for anyone, but you have to be specific about these qualities with your support community. Right? So that group of people, husbands and wives, really close friends, hopefully you're inner circle people, you have to share this stuff with them. That same friend I was telling you about, every day we we we do Marco Polo. So we go back and forth. We'll record a message and send it to each other. We know this about ourselves. So every day there's some component, whether we state it explicitly or not, but there's just some component about kind of being sensitive that is part of what we're checking in. Because I think you have to be specific about these things. Number one, it helps like reduce any shame that you might be carrying. Number two, it helps that ownership piece of like this is how I am. And I'm not gonna apologize for it, but I want to be wise about including it in any kind of support I might need because while others may not be activated by loud noises, I mean, today this this is really getting me. And it's not only that, I mean, I think the things that are more lasting even than noises are when we're processing something, right? Sometimes I know I need to speak something out loud because the longer it stays inside me, the more insidious it becomes. So, all that's just to say, if you're in the highly sensitive category, or if you know a loved one that is, they, you or they need to be specific about some of those qualities when they're reaching out for support. And

Recovery Check-Ins Using DOES

SPEAKER_00 35:41

that maybe is kind of a nice segue to the recovery piece. For those who are in recovery as highly sensitive people, but you know, pornography addiction recovery, other unwanted sexual behavior recovery, the check-ins also have to be specifically, they have to include all the things that we're talking about. Because if you don't, you're probably running the risk of flying too high over your real world experience, which that doesn't help as much. So I always tell my highly sensitive clients who are in recovery, listen, be aware of the acronym. And then when you're checking in, make sure you hit anything on that acronym that is relevant that day. Because if you don't, you're you're not being all the way honest. And it doesn't mean you're trying to be purposely dishonest, but you're you're probably not as aware as you need to be about those triggers.

SPEAKER_02 36:35

Right. If high sensitivity is part of my everyday experience, then I need to be able to not only realize it for myself, but also communicate it to the people who I love, the people who love me. And I love the sensitivity to sensitivity that you're describing that that we need in things like therapy. Can you say

Bethesda Workshops And What They Offer

SPEAKER_02 36:58

more about Bethesda and the work you're doing?

SPEAKER_00 37:00

Yeah. So Bethesda, we do mostly four-day workshops. They're clinical workshops led by trained clinicians, almost all of whom are either CSATs or they have the CPTT designation for partners. So Bethesda workshops has been around for just about 30 years at this point. We've had we have 7,000 alumni. So, you know, we've been in the field and doing the work for a long time. And we're in Nashville. So we have a facility in Nashville, and people come for those four days, they stay with us and they work either. If it's a you can we have our healing for men, which is for male addicts, we have healing for women, which is for female addicts, which there unfortunately aren't that many programs that help female addicts these days out there. But we do that and have done that from the very beginning. In fact, our founder was in recovery for addiction, and so she's a female, of course. And then we work with couples, we work with partners around betrayal trauma. And since I've added in the last year, I guess, we've added teens working with teens. We've had that program going back to 2019. We have an in-person workshop for teens, but what we have added recently is an online group, support group for teens, because unfortunately, there's not a lot of resources out there for our adolescents. And so we're really kind of passionate actually about that. So that's what that's what we do. Spend four days really trying to understand roots, addressing trauma, like all the things.

SPEAKER_02 38:32

I remember visiting Bethesda workshops in Nashville during my PSAP training, and it was transformative. We did some experiential exercises, you know, used our bodies. And so body first truly is the way to go for healing.

The Best Parts Of Being Sensitive

SPEAKER_02 38:51

Mike, what is your favorite thing about being sensitive?

SPEAKER_00 38:56

I have come to really appreciate all the categories, but I think I love the two of them more than the other two. And that is the depth of processing. I just I just kind of love to think deeply about things and then to have those spirited conversations with people. Also, the sensing the subtle, I think I really appreciate about myself because I like that I can that I do pick up subtlety in my relationships and and then like one more step, I then can I can use that in the relationship, right? Like it creates more depth. And I'm listening I can be wrong a lot. Like, oh, it seemed like you were whatever, right? And you're like, well, I wasn't, but but that's still we're uh like I want you to know that I see you. And I noticed that, and I might be wrong, but we can still have a conversation.

SPEAKER_02 39:52

Mike, thank you so much for sharing with us and for opening up my world to this whole dimension of who I am that I never saw before.

SPEAKER_00 40:00

And you'll have to take the test and text me what what your score is so that I'll have a sense of where you fall on the on the spectrum.

SPEAKER_02 40:08

We'll do. We will put the links to that test, to Mike's counseling and therapy, as well as Bethesda workshops in the description so you can connect with him and learn more. Always remember you are God's beloved son, and you, he is well pleased.