Sensitivity and Creativity

If you’re the kind of person who walks into a room and picks up the subtle vibes immediately, and that energy sometimes drains you, listen in on this episode of Awaken Your Wise Woman, as host Elizabeth Cush welcomes Lauren Sapala, an author, teacher and creative guide, on honoring your intuition.  

“The basic strategy I teach is that most writing methods are achievement oriented. They really hold a lot of masculine energy.” 
 — Lauren Sapala

If you’re highly sensitive, chances are you experience the world differently. You might see and feel things that others just don’t. You’ve probably always seen that as a detriment, but it doesn’t have to be. Your perceptions are actually a gift that can help you better understand yourself and others. In this episode of Awaken Your Wise Woman, host Elizabeth “Biz” Cush, LCPC, a licensed professional therapist, founder of Progression Counseling in Maryland and Delaware, and a mid-life women’s coach, welcomes Lauren Sapala, author of several non-fiction books for intuitive creatives, including The INFJ Writer, The INFJ Revolution and Writing on the Intuitive Side of the Brain. In their discussion on living a more creative, empowered life as a sensitive intuitive, they’ll talk about boundaries, overcoming overwhelm, and finding a community where your creative process can unfold safely and help move you toward healing. 

You can find the full show notes and resources mentioned here- https://www.elizabethcushcoaching.com/awaken-your-wise-woman-podcast

Transcript

Lauren Sapala interview

SPEAKERS

Elizabeth Cush, Lauren Sapala

Elizabeth Cush  00:02

Hi Lauren, and welcome to The Awaken Your wise woman podcast.

Lauren Sapala  00:06

Hello, hello. I'm so glad to be here.

Elizabeth Cush  00:09

Yeah, I'm excited to have you on the podcast for listeners who are not familiar with you, could you share a little bit about yourself and what you do?

Lauren Sapala  00:20

Well, I do a lot of different things, but mainly I'm an author and a teacher, and sometimes I call myself a creative guide, sometimes a mentor. I used to do coaching quite a bit. I don't coach anymore, but I teach quite a bit. I teach a new class probably every week. 

Elizabeth Cush  00:37

Wow, wow. And what? What are you teaching when you are teaching?

Lauren Sapala  00:43

Well, sometimes I teach on writing, sometimes creativity, sometimes intuition. I specialize in working with iNtuitive personality types, mainly introverts, but I don't exclude the extroverts either.

Elizabeth Cush  00:58

There you go, and I think you identify yourself as a highly sensitive person. Is that correct?

Lauren Sapala  01:04

Yes. Sometimes I just taught a class last night and I said, sometimes we say empaths, sometimes we say highly sensitive, sometimes we say intuitive. Sometimes there's an overlap between all of it. You know, whatever you want to roll with. But yeah, intuitive, sensitive,

Elizabeth Cush  01:19

yeah, yeah, yeah. Just being sensitive can make you empathetic and intuitive all if you're tuning into those sensitivities, I would imagine, yeah. And so for you, was there a time in your life that I, you know, we've, I've talked to a lot of highly sensitive women this season on the podcast, and some really found growing up difficult because, you know, we were told You're too sensitive or you're too much. You're, you know, you need not to feel so much. Was that ever your experience? Have you ever found the, you know, being a sensitive Empath a challenge.

Lauren Sapala  02:05

Oh, oh, yes. I mean, when I was young, when I was a teenager, when I was in my 20s, my 30s, now I'm in my 40s, it's still a challenge. Even knowing what I know today, what I teach in my classes, is that sensitive people were born with naturally thin boundaries, so we tend to grow up with problems, with boundaries, and when we try to address those problems, we're told, you need to get better boundaries. You need to stand up for yourself, speak up for yourself. It's really hard for us because boundaries, a lot of the time, it's not something we can control. We tend to absorb the energy around us, the emotions of other people. We notice the little things. We're very observant. We pick up on changes in tone of voice, facial expression, the mood in the room, the emotional temperature, and even though we tend to be the glue that holds together the office or the family or the social group. Our gifts are not often appreciated because we do have such quiet gifts, and we're very good at being gentle and unobtrusive, so it's a hard row to hoe. Honestly, if you are a highly sensitive person, it's it is. It's very challenging, and it's hard to explain what's going on with you to other people, much less yourself.

Elizabeth Cush  03:25

Yeah, well, interesting. It's funny. I really hadn't thought about how, like that boundaries are hard for us because we just naturally are taking in like we can't stop that process of picking up on others emotions. I mean, I guess we can protect ourselves in certain ways, but, but we're going to be taking in the environmental stimulus without like, it's not just like, oh, today, I'm not going to do that well. 

Lauren Sapala  03:57

And our entire operating system is different when you have thin boundaries, one feeling glides into another. Sometimes you might have trouble differentiating between your thoughts and your feelings. People have thin boundaries. Their past might feel like it's very much part of their present. With people who are not so sensitive, things are much more straightforward. They're not absorbing all of these things, they have one feeling, I'm sad, and then it's over, and then they move on. Their past is the past. And so we live in a society and a culture that really encourages us, I don't want to say pushes us, but sometimes it does to do things in a linear way, in a straightforward way, with thick dividing lines around things, and highly sensitive people don't operate that way. Yeah, that doesn't work for us. We're not usually linear. Linear. We're not usually straightforward. We don't have a lot of thick barriers between things. We don't naturally operate that way. And then when we try to operate the way we operate, we're. Told, what are you doing? That's weird. You're wrong. You need to get stronger, toughen up. And we can't do those things. We cannot toughen up. It's not part of our makeup.

Elizabeth Cush  05:11

Yeah, yeah. I've definitely found that for myself, being more aware of my needs has helped me take better care of myself when I do get my feelings hurt, or I am absorbing things that feel overwhelming, or avoiding situations where I know I'm going to be overwhelmed, but yeah, it doesn't stop. It's just I've learned how to manage how much I'm feeling out in the world.

Lauren Sapala  05:41

Overwhelm is huge for sensitive overwhelm is maybe the biggest thing, because, again, we live in a society that says you should be fine working five days a week, eight or nine hours a day, and then you should want to socialize when you're done with the work day. And you should want to socialize on the weekends. You should want to be busy all the time and be surrounded by people, and if you don't, well, what's wrong? Are you depressed? Are you isolating? Are you antisocial? And for highly sensitive people, working five days a week, eight or nine hours a day is too much. We need rest breaks. We need longer rest breaks than others. We need a lot of downtime and socializing on top of it's just way, way too much,

Elizabeth Cush  06:25

yeah, well, it's interesting. I'm I'm a therapist and also a highly sensitive guide for women, but I find that in the Facebook groups for specifically for highly sensitive therapists. Often the challenge you're hearing or that you're seeing, reading, you know, as people are posting, is like, I can't work a 40 hour work week. You know, where some sort of larger corporate entities that provide mental health. Expect that, you know, seeing 40 clients a week, which I can't even imagine, like, can't even imagine, and just knowing how much empathy and caring and overwhelm can happen for us, it's, it's a, yeah, it's a quandary. You know, it's hard for for people that are out there doing this work that's so important, and yet so many of us are burning out.

Lauren Sapala  07:30

Yeah, that thin boundary thing, again, I think we tend to think we have lower energy levels than other people, and we shame ourselves for that. Why can't I have more energy. Why can't I do it all? Yeah, but what's happening is our energy is used up faster, yeah? Because any person we're talking with, any situation we're in, we are processing more deeply, we are taking in more stimulus, and so our energy is used up just more quickly. We have the same amount of energy, yeah, yeah, but it's used up more quickly, and then we feel low energy and exhausted, yeah,

Elizabeth Cush  08:08

and need to recharge, reset. Yeah, yeah. I find a lot of I spent a lot of time on my own, my husband works hard, and I have a dog, and my kids are all grown, and, you know, I'm perfectly happy in between sessions, just like hanging out with my dog and recharging that way. Yeah, so I wonder, I know you shared in the, you know, the little blurb I asked you to fill out before our interview that you found that writing was or being an author, was difficult as a highly sensitive person, and I'm curious like, what challenges specifically to writing? Does high sensitivity? How does that make it harder or harder for you?

Lauren Sapala  09:01

Well, I will say, in the writing community, in the in the modern day, there is a certain way you're supposed to do things, and that involves a lot of sharing. That usually involves a lot of sharing when you're even in the first draft. So you write a chapter, and then you take it to your critique group, and they critique it. And then you decide, based on feedback, which way you're supposed to go, what direction you're supposed to go with the storyline, or your thesis, or whatever it is, that's sort of the way it's done. And then when you are finished with your manuscript, then you get an editor, and the editor critiques it, and then you query, you know? And so you're constantly seeking feedback, you're constantly taking in criticism. For highly sensitive people, this really doesn't work. Highly Sensitive writers tend to be intuitive, and so other people giving us feedback when we're in the middle of the process is actually very unhelpful, because we're still figuring out where we want to go. Intuitive people. Tend to need to be very private and very personal about any creative project, not just writing, but painting or building something, you know, coming up with conceptualizing any kind of project, we need to be on our own, and we need to be very private and protected so that we feel this freedom around our creativity. It can unfold in any way it needs to. And we can follow our intuitive nudges. If we are highly sensitive and we have thin boundaries, we can really easily lose our compass when other people are making suggestions, even if they're well intentioned. If someone says, Well, I think you should do it this way, or I think, you know, another person says, I think you should do it this way, that can be very confusing to us, and we can really lose the thread, and then it can interrupt our whole process. So I really urge intuitive people. Don't show anyone your work until you are very far along in the process. The first draft should be completely finished. Don't talk to anybody while you are in the middle of the first draft. Don't share pieces. Don't seek feedback. You stay in your own little bubble, and you protect that work, and then you have that first draft, and even, I would say, do a round or two of revisions without bringing anyone else in, and then you're probably ready to share. Once you've been able to emotionally detach from the work, we tend to be very emotional about our creative work. It means a lot to us. It's not just something we're writing for money or to achieve something. It's emotionally meaningful to us. It's a relationship. And so I always say, wait until you've been able to emotionally detach, and then you can bring in outside people.

Elizabeth Cush  11:39

 Yeah, that makes so much sense to me. I feel like even, well, it's probably true for anything, but from thinking about it, from my perspective, just like right in particular, writing fiction where you're really developing the characters, you're feeling, what you're they're feeling, and you're creating them in a way to truly represent all their feeling like I would imagine, it would be so hard to had to share that for one, initially, as you're developing those characters. But two, yeah, to have anybody tell you, Oh, no, you should do it this way would be disruptive.

Lauren Sapala  12:18

Also with memoir. You know, when people are writing memoir or personal essay, a lot of times, for intuitive people, we're using it as a healing tool. And so we're really excavating old layers, old events, and a lot of stuff can come up. And I say, for intuitive people, when you're writing memoir, you may experience physical symptoms. I if you've had a skin condition in the past, it might flare up, you know, if you've had stomach issues that might emerge, your body may react in different ways, because you're processing old trauma, old unconscious material from the past really emerging into the conscious now. And that's that's hard and to bring someone else in, who's not part of it, and who might start criticizing Well, I thought this chapter was confusing. I don't think you should write so much about the time you were five years old. That's not helpful. The healing journey has to come first.

Elizabeth Cush  13:14

That's really beautiful, actually, because, yeah, so much healing can come from writing, but if someone's telling you that's not the story you should be telling, I would imagine that could be very wounding, too. 

Lauren Sapala  13:26

Yeah, well, and a lot of times with memoir, you don't end up including everything, and that's okay, but you don't know that in the first draft, and you need to write to get it out of you, even if it doesn't go into the final draft, a lot of it needs to be written for you to speak your own truth on the page. That's a very important part of the process. I think sometimes editors forget that agents definitely do critique groups. Those aren't the people, and that's not the place to share that very raw material that's coming out of you when you're really doing that kind of healing work through memoir,

Elizabeth Cush  14:04

yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel that too, yeah. It would be Yeah. I can remember writing a piece for another website about my history of trauma and healing, and I can remember the editor being very free with their own words, like not mine, you know, when editing. And I can remember thinking like, Well, wait, is this even still my story? If they're using words that I wouldn't use in this context, you know, but yeah, I feel that deeply. Yeah. And so for you, when you're teaching intuitives in writing classes, what's helpful for them in terms of the process? Process. I mean, what I'm hearing you saying is just, you know, allow your thoughts and ideas to flow before you show them. But also, I'm curious, like, Are there tools they can use to help themselves if stuff is coming up? Are there things that you suggest or help them with? You know, if, if they are struggling, 

Lauren Sapala  15:22

well, there's so much. I mean, the basic strategy I teach is that most writing methods are achievement oriented. They really hold a lot of masculine energy. It's about word count. It's about goals. You see this all the time online, write your book in 90 days, you know, get your book done in six months, and you're supposed to be driving toward a result, and everything's very action oriented. And I say, Take Take your focus off the achievement oriented stuff, and pivot so that you are focusing on the relationship. You're focusing on your relationship with your writing, your relationship with the story, your relationship with the characters, your relationship with your own memories. Instead of word count, we focus on time spent. So maybe your goal is that I'm going to spend two hours a week on my writing. I'm going to spend an hour on Monday and an hour on Thursday, and I'm going to sit down and I'm going to be with the writing, and I'm not going to force it, and I'm not going to keep my eye on how many words I'm writing. If I write 50 words, great. If I write 500 words, great. But how did I feel? How did I feel during that hour? Did I feel safe? Did I feel curious? Did I feel engaged? Did I was I surprised by what came out of me? Did I feel in flow? How did the energy feel? Was the energy moving? Yeah, that's what we really focus on, instead of, well, how much did I get done? Or how much can I get expect to get done next week? And what is this all going to add up to? And is this? Is anyone going to like, this? Is this going to make money? Yeah, that kind of stuff. If you look at the energy, it's like, well, I feel very judged, and I feel maybe very exposed. I don't feel safe, I feel like I have to prove myself, or I have to have something to show for it. That energy doesn't feel good. I definitely don't feel in flow. So I really encourage writers using an intuitive process to always be looking at the energy. You're a thin boundary person. You're a sensitive person. You know how to feel into the energy. It can be hard, you might be uncertain, you might be confused, not knowing where you're going. That's okay, as long as you feel like things are moving, you feel like you're still engaged, you were curious, instead of feeling like you're scared or you're frozen or you're numb or you're stuck, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, and it's different for every person. Every person has a different situation, they're writing something different. But that's basically the gist of how I try to move people from driving towards achieving a result to being in relationship and tuning into how you feel,

Elizabeth Cush  18:04

gosh, sounds so much like therapy, like, if you can be open and curious and, yeah, be with yourself through the feelings, or whatever it is, like it can shift so much internally versus critical or, yeah, measuring progress, or Yeah, trying to I want to get there, to healing versus I need to process to unfold. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love the use of curiosity in in just our own stories too, or our own feelings versus like, judging ourselves for the feeling or judging ourselves for, are we making progress or not just to be like, That's interesting. Okay, I got 10 words done today, but, you know, I was in flow for those 10 words or whatever. Yeah,

Lauren Sapala  18:59

oh, I always do meditations during my silent writing program. I have a silent program. We meet three weeks, three times a week over zoom, we write silently together for an hour, and I open it with a meditation. And one of the meditations I use that people say is, I'm willing to be surprised. I'm willing to be surprised during this hour. And every time I say, I can feel it from the group. I'm like, Oh, I feel a little anxiety ripple, because it's scary to say I'm willing to be surprised, especially if you have trauma, yeah, especially if you have a past history. You know, if you've had abuse in your past, sometimes being surprised you got hurt, and you got hurt very badly. So it is very healing to work with your own creativity, and to experiment with willing to be surprised by the words that come out of you or the painting that you make, and to see that this can be something safe, this can be actually something stable and secure my surprise in my own creative process.

Elizabeth Cush  19:59

Yeah. Yeah, that's really nice. I like that.

Elizabeth Cush  20:07

And so share a little bit about so I find that so intriguing. Having a silent writing group just because, yeah, it's like, well, we're in this together, but I don't have to be sharing. I don't have to be saying anything, but the energy is here. That's creative. Yeah, that's cool.

Lauren Sapala  20:27

The silent writing sessions I started because I used to do a silent writing program years ago in San Francisco, like 2020, years ago, and it was in person, and I couldn't write at that time. I was paralyzed with fear, but I would go once a week and sit with this group, and we would write together for one hour, and I realized later I had so much trauma, and I was so frozen. I Trauma around self expression, which a lot of intuitive writers do, and so it was frozen sharing on the page, and I couldn't ground myself on my own, I could not ground myself. I didn't have the tools, I didn't have the resilience to do that, but with a group of people who were grounding, I could just sort of connect to their energy and people who are very sensitive and have thin boundaries. This is one of the advantages if you're in a good group. If you're in a group where people are safe and wonderful and lovely, you can really connect to that energy easily. And that's what we do in the silent writing sessions over zoom I hold now is that there's a space, there's a circle, and so people who feel very afraid, very unsure, very ungrounded can come in just kind of plug into the group, ground themselves, and start to do their writing work from there. And I get new people all the time who are like, This is the weirdest thing. I didn't think it was going to work. I'm just sitting there with my camera off even, you know, because I tell people you don't have your camera on if you don't want there's no participation. They said, I can feel it. I feel different in the sessions. And I say, yeah, that's, that's the power of a group. And it's, it's all really sensitive, intuitive, lovely people who are open and being vulnerable and making it a safe space. And you can feel it. And if you have thin boundaries, you can really feel it.

Elizabeth Cush  22:13

Oh yeah. Oh my gosh. I'm in a mentorship coaching program with, yeah, really intuitive healer and and it's just the energy they bring, attracts the energy of the people who come. And it just I was I personally, I often can feel in in group, like, Is this really my space, right? Like, if it's just a mixed group of random people, but, you know, these groups have been so great because it does just feel like, all right, I get this. This whole energy is really flowing because the person holding the space knows how to do that and is grounded enough to do that. Yeah, yeah. I bet it's really great. So if you were to describe like, one piece of your high sensitivity, intuitiveness, creativity, like, what's what do you love most about it? I know we've talked a lot about challenges, so I always like to come back to what I love most about it, 

23:21

And I understand there's a whole lot of highly sensitive people who are not here yet, but I believe any highly sensitive person can get here is once you understand what it is, you don't even have to know how to work with it. If you just really can understand what it is, the world can open up and you realize you can see so many different layers of reality that other people cannot see. You can see so many energy patterns and so many dynamics at play that other people cannot see. And it is really that piece of oh, I have thin boundaries. I'm not crazy, I am not codependent, I am not dysfunctional. I am not too fragile and not too weak. I have thin boundaries. So I can feel the energy in a room, in a group, in a relationship. Once you understand that, you can go into a workplace and you can see, oh, there's some weird dysfunction going on here between the manager and their team, he's sort of like the critical dad, and they're seeking His approval, and that's not working. And some of them are getting frustrated and isolating, and other ones are trying to be play the teacher's pet role. You can see all of these different test pieces moving around, and you can realize that other people don't see that. Other people will come in and say, Well, I don't know why this office isn't working. I don't know why no one is getting any work done. You can kind of come in and be the Oracle or the seer and say, Oh, it's so obvious. Can't you see there's self sabotage going on here. There's a whole other, you know, dynamic going on here. And it can really. Help you very quickly, avoid those, those situations like you can come into a group and, and I know a lot of highly sensitive women, they still don't understand. They're like, I go to work every day and I just feel bad. I come home and I'm tired and I'm grumpy. I feel

Elizabeth Cush  25:14

Nobody understands me, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 

25:16

It's, it's not you, it's the energy of the group. The group feels bad. Yeah, you are on. You're just seeing it and feeling it, but that it's not you, it's the group and what once you can see that, you can quickly say, Oh, I don't need to be in this situation, in this environment. And you can very quickly get out of it and into better things. And then you can build this life where you're like, I feel good all the time. I'm very unconventional, and I'm a little bit hermit like but I feel good all the time, and it's amazing. That's me.

Elizabeth Cush  25:53

Yeah, well, it's funny, because although I don't work in a corporate environment, if my husband loves music, I do too, but we often will go to musical events lots of people, and I kind of prepare my energy for that to be in all the excitement. But what I end up doing is watching the people in the audience and kind of figuring out always, are they are they having a fight? Are they having a good time? Like, Oh, I see that dynamic, dynamic with their kids or whatever. And I can build a whole story in my head about what's going on, because I'm picking up on their energy and watching their movements, and it's funny, 

26:32

yeah, so we really will be at a cafe, you know, working on something, and two people are having a date across from me, and so much of that, I want to stop them and say you two are not compatible at all. She's not really listening. He's not really interested. Let's just call it off right now. It's been 10 minutes, and I can tell this is not going to go anywhere.

Elizabeth Cush  26:52

Really, don't keep fighting it. Yeah, that's funny.

Elizabeth Cush  26:56

I love that. Love

Elizabeth Cush  26:58

that. Well, if there are listeners out there who have been wanting to write either a memoir or whatever it is that want more support in that area, how do people find you and the work that you do?

27:13

 Go to my website. Laurensappala.com, and sign up for my newsletter. I send out frequent newsletters. Right now, I'm doing a series where my readers have sent me questions. So almost every day, I answer a sort of dear, Abby type question in my newsletter for sensitive people, which has been going really well. People are saying, Oh, this is incredibly helpful. I thought I was the only one that struggled with this. You're not. You can always send me a question I'll answer at my newsletter. I do new classes, really just about every week. I'm doing a class right now called getting past feeling not good enough. I'm going to be teaching an intuitive memoir class. Later this month, I'll be teaching more classes on energy, intuition, intuitive people, all sorts of things. So there's always something going on. And then the silent writing program that runs every month, and that's Sunday, Monday, Thursday, there's no attendance taken. You can come any of the days. You can make it. All the sessions are open to you if you sign up at the beginning of the month. And that happens every month. And then I have a lot of books out as well. My books are on Amazon. They're on my website, so there's lots of stuff to choose from. I've got my fingers in a lot of different pies.

Elizabeth Cush  28:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it sounds like it really lights you up just watching your face. Talk about it that it sounds like it's really something that you love.

Lauren Sapala  28:33

Yeah, I do. It's I want, I don't want to say a labor of love, because most of the time it just feels like fun. It's hard work, but it's just fun,

Elizabeth Cush  28:41

nice. I love that. Well, Lauren, I really, really appreciate you coming on the podcast. I know I found you through an article you wrote for the highly sensitive refuge. Maybe I think about writing, journaling, I think, but, yeah, so but super fun to actually connect in you know, here face to face with you, and I appreciate your being a guest on the podcast.

Lauren Sapala  29:07

Yeah, thank you so much for having me. This was great. You.