HSP Struggles with Social Cliques: Inner Work for Highly Sensitive People

 By the end of this episode, you’ll discover how to use social click situations for deep inner work and possible inner freedom.

Welcome to Stress Management for Highly Sensitive People, a podcast helping HSPs avoid overwhelm, eliminate stress, and find true inner freedom. I’m your host, Todd Smith, a facilitator of the work of Byron Katie, A way to question and reduce stressful thoughts. And your guest it. I’m a highly sensitive person myself.

In this episode, you’ll discover why HSPs find social clicks, more emotionally challenging, how to use situations like this as a starting point for inner work. And how to find inner freedom by exploring different ways of looking at a social situation. This is an addition of guided Meditation Mondays, where I’ll be guiding you to do the work of Byron Katie.

As you listen, as highly sensitive people, we are aware of the social dynamics around us in any group situation and the situation of social cliques comes up in. A lot of situations, not always, but we are often tuned into them and we can also be affected by them more than other people. This can be for a number of different reasons.

We are more sensitive to this feeling of exclusion or rejection. We take it in more personally, we tend to process that and we tend to think about what that means. In other words, it’s easy for us to take it personally. We also are aware of unspoken social rules and we have sometimes difficulty with those things as well as hierarchies.

In addition, as highly sensitive people, we thrive with deep authentic kind of relationships. And this is often lacking in situations where there is a . A social hierarchy or some kind of a click like that. And even if we are included, sometimes we still feel like an outsider because we’re a little different.

We process differently. We think differently. We have a different pace and we have different needs. So all of this is good to know. And in many ways I look at my life how I’ve navigated around situations where there are cliques and in a lot of ways I just don’t make that a part of my life that much, but it is actually unavoidable at times.

And so I want to look at this as a situation that we can do some inner work on.

The way we’ll do it is look for a specific situation where you felt like there was some kind of click going on or some kind of place where you weren’t quite included. Some kind of social exclusion, something like that, some kind of hierarchy where you can’t get to that higher level. And let’s find something specific moment if you can, and then we’ll do.

The work together,

It can even happen in a very, quote unquote HSP friendly environment, for example, in a book club or in a, some kind of quieter type of environment. Human dynamics are human dynamics and this hierarchy. Aspect does come into play, so look for a time where you were feeling excluded from the in crowd in some way.

It could be recent, it could be from a long time ago.

I’m gonna go with a situation with my pickleball club. Where we have a group of men that play together every Tuesday night and there’s a group of about four or five of them, maybe six, that are, seem to be younger, better and more friendly with each other and I feel a little bit like an outsider.

I can’t quite keep up to their level. I don’t quite feel accepted. As friends don’t quite feel included and it makes me feel socially anxious. Find a situation where you have something like that going on

and it can help to get even more specific. Like I can remember one moment playing just, I guess it was last night actually, where one guy made a really good shot and the other guy was like, yeah, like it was a really, you could tell it was like an inside, they’ve talked about this before. They’re like, they understand how each other, you understand how they play.

There was a closeness there that I could pick up on. It wasn’t happening for me. Like I don’t, I’ve never had that, or very rarely had that kind of comment from the same people.

So pick your moment and let’s begin.

The thought we’re gonna question is, they didn’t include me or they don’t include me. Actually, I think I like the present tense better because it keeps us really focused. Being there. So be in your moment and then think, look at the thought. They don’t include me or he or she. So is that true? They don’t include you in that moment

and we’re looking for a yes or a no.

And we’re looking for your honest experience.

Don’t make it up. Don’t come up with the right answer. Let your insides speak,

but be honest. Be like, we’re challenging our insides, but we also wanna be honest at the same time so they don’t include you. Is it true in that situation, yes or no?

And for me, I’m going with a yes. I see that comment. It was directed directly at that person. I don’t feel included. So if your answer was yes, then let’s go to question two. If no, you can skip this question. The next question is, can you absolutely know it’s true? They don’t include you in that situation when they do what they do?

Are you sure?

I feel my, my, no, sorry, my Yes. Changing to a no. No, I’m not absolutely sure that they didn’t include me, and it has to be a shift, like on the inside, ask that question and see what comes up. We’re inviting a kind of stretch, but we’re waiting for the inside to actually stretch. Otherwise, what’s the point of faking?

Your way through this inner work. So for me it switched to, no, it’s not true. They didn’t, I can’t absolutely know. It’s true. That didn’t include me. How about you? What’s your answer? Yes or a no? And if you need more time, you can pause.

So regardless of your answer, yes or no, let’s go to question three, which is how do you react? What happens when you think in your situation that they didn’t include you?

I feel small. I feel like an outsider.

My heart shrinks my shoulders kind of crunch.

I kind of slump.

About you? How does the reaction hit you when you think they don’t include you?

I push them away emotionally. For me, I’m in the middle of playing this point. I’m looking at the two of them sharing this moment together. I can see that they’ve had past interactions about this, and I just feel, I feel jealous

sometimes. I feel like I’m just doing my pickleball all alone, and here these people are teaming up and getting the benefit of. And coaching each other in a way, so I feel sad.

How about you? What happens to you when you think they don’t include you?

I also see images from the past when I was more the young part of the club, I was quote unquote the cool one. I first started playing pickleball, it was only old people that played. And now it’s younger people more so I feel a certain nostalgia for being like having an advantage at that time.

And now I’m on the outside. I.

I also just feel a certain kind of yeah, like I’m missing out on something that they have more than I even had back at that time.

So what happens in your situation when you’re feeling not included and you think they don’t?

How do you treat yourself?

I treat myself like I’m less than.

I don’t have any confidence and I into the background.

So the next question is, who would you be if you imagine yourself in the same situation without the thought? So they’re doing what they’re doing, the click is there. But if you don’t have the thought that they don’t include you, who would you be? Experiencing the same moment

I see one person making a great shot. I see the other person congratulating him and giving him that little I don’t know what, it was like a sparkle in the eye.

I think it’s sweet. It’s cool.

It’s like a special moment. I see their friendship. That actually touches me.

I see them.

Being close.

How about you? Who would you be without the thought that these people don’t include you?

I would also see that I’m playing with them. , I am included to a large degree, maybe not on the intimate friendship level that they may have, but I’m, there’s a lot of overlap.

In fact, if I’m not thinking, they’re not including me, my focus goes to other things like the next point of the game or just walking back and getting ready to serve the ball

becomes simpler, comes quieter.

There’s no comparison.

So by looking at these questions, who you are with the thought and who you are without the thought, you get to see the effect of the thought. And the thought is they don’t include me. When it’s there, when it’s active in your mind, it’s stressful, feels, makes you feel small, and if it’s not there, in your mind, even if the situation is the same, the experience is different.

Experience is more open, more appreciative, more connected, easier. So this is the effect that the thought has on your experience. So the next part of the work is what we call turnarounds, which are opposites. We’re going to look at some opposites of the statement. They don’t include me, and we’re going to do that as a way of exploring a kind of, another question is.

Could the opposite be true? Could it be as true? We just saw that the thought causes stress. So is it possible that we’re missing something? Maybe there’s something that is not a hundred percent true about that thought and one interesting idea about truth. There are different kinds of truth, but we’re doing inner work and truths.

In this context is about what resonates for me, what feels right to me, what feels clear and truthful and the biggest picture possible. And so these turnarounds give a chance to explore that by looking at these opposites and seeing if there may be more to the picture than what we just were imagining.

So one turnaround is from the statement they don’t include me, is they do include me. Now, we’re gonna look for honest answers here. We’re not gonna be us just gonna look for, are there any ways that they may be including me more that I’m paying attention to, or they may be including me in addition to sometimes not including me.

We’re looking for balance. We’re looking for a bigger truth. If possible. So what do you see in your situation? They do include me. Can you find any grains of truth for that turnaround for you?

And you can start with the most superficial and obvious for me. I’m still included in playing with them. I’m still playing with them. So that counts for something. It may not be everything I was wanting, but it doesn’t. It’s not nothing either. So they include me, has some truth. It does. How about you? Can you find where they include you, even if it’s not all the way that you may have wanted?

This turnaround is important because it brings balance. If I focus only on their not including me, I will find more and more reasons why that’s true and feel worse and worse about myself. But if I also look at the other side, which is also true that they are including me, I. I start to feel, I start to find more and more reasons why that is true and I start to feel better about myself.

So we want a perspective that includes the broadest point of view if possible.

So they do include me. Any other examples for you?

One example for me is I asked them if I could join in their drilling session, which they dO. and they wrote back. Absolutely. So that’s something, I wasn’t really counting that, but that’s something. Maybe I’m not so much of an outsider as I think,

and I think about between games. We just hang out and joke around and they’re very friendly to me,

so they do include me.

We may not be best friends. That’s a whole other thing, but we are, they’re open and it’s up to kind of them and me to see if we become closer or just stay at a certain level of closeness. But it’s not that they’re actually not including me.

Another way of looking at it is they’re just waiting to see how things develop. Maybe they’re waiting to see if I wanna be included. Maybe they’re, the invitation is open, but they’re not gonna go push me in. There’s all kinds of possibilities here, and we don’t know what’s really the truth. But just seeing these possibilities begins to soften this idea that they don’t include me.

It just may not be as true as I was thinking.

So every situation’s different and you have to find your honest examples and sometimes you can’t find it, it’s fine too, but we’re looking at least inviting that possibility. In the name of balance.

Balance. So another turnaround could be, I don’t include them now. I don’t know. This is different. Could there be any way that this applies in your situation?

I don’t include them.

It could be just how I see them as other not close. It’s an energetic thing where I’m saying they don’t belong to me. They’re other they’re separate, so I’m not including them. I also mentioned that they’re younger. I also mentioned that they’re a little bit better at pickleball, so I am ranking them, seeing them as better.

And in that regard, I’m not including, I’m separating, that’s me. I don’t ever hear them talking about them being better than me or I don’t hear them. Talk about, oh yeah, we’re so much younger. We’re in the young club, and they never have said anything or given any indication of that. Who knows how long they’ve been friends.

But I’ve got this idea like, oh yeah, they’re better, they’re younger, they’re all of that. So I’m not including them quite literally.

I’m inviting them into my world, either staying guarded,

so one more turnaround instead of they don’t include me. I don’t include me.

And this could have several different meanings. So think about it. In your situation, can you make any sense of this? You don’t include you in some way or another.

For me, it’s not letting me be a part of a group that doesn’t have. Firm boundaries to it. It’s a very open group, and I am standing back saying, I don’t really belong. So that’s me, not including me more than them, not including me. I think that’s true, or in my particular case. And

another meaning for me is that. I don’t include me like, like that. I don’t count that I’m not, I’m needing to somehow be a part of them for me to be okay instead of just being a part of me and letting that be okay. I don’t include me in the equation at all. I’m focused on them. What I’m unable to seemingly be a part of.

So it leads to a kind of living turnaround for me to include myself more. Maybe that means sharing more of who I am. Maybe it means just seeing myself as in my own world and there. Here with me, seeing myself as a part of us, a larger group. These are all possible things that I can look for and build on as I continue to interact with these people.

In this episode, we looked at why HSPs find social cliques more emotionally challenging maybe than others. We found that there are a number of reasons, just our sensitivity to exclusion and rejection. The difficulty we sometimes have with unspoken social rules and hierarchies. The need for deep and authentic connections in instead of hierarchical ones.

And sometimes even feeling like an outsider even when we actually are included. These all can be factors that make it more challenging as an HSP, but I would say in general, human beings, we all have, we all find social cliques to be challenging. And so that was one area where we started out with, and another place where we looked at is how to use situations like this as a starting point for inner work.

And this is exciting for me as an HSP and I think for others. They’d like to go deeper, want to find freedom, and we can use situations like this as the location to begin inner work, which can actually open up the perspective. And the way we do that is by identifying a specific moment, specific time and place where you were experiencing this type of situation.

Then noticing what thought was there. In this case, I chose the thought for us. They don’t include me, but you can find your own thoughts when you’re working your own types of situations. And then of course, going through and questioning those thoughts. And that was the last part that we looked at is how to find inner freedom by exploring different ways of looking at a social situation.

And so we went through the questioning process. To experience what it’s like when we’re believing a thought, like they don’t include me, and who would be without that thought? And then we finally looked at these turnarounds or opposites and explored the idea that maybe the opposite of what we’re thinking could be as true.

And maybe by looking there, we can see the situation from a more balanced point of view, it may be less stressful. So thanks for participating and doing this work and listening along. It’s always a pleasure to work with you, and I look forward to next time. In the meantime, I hope you have a great rest of your day,