YOUR RAINFOREST MIND

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Strategies for Living in a Troubled World When Your Empathy Meter is Overloaded and Your Synapses are Imploding

Many of you are likely reeling from the multiple crises facing humanity these days. Chances are, your empathy meter is way overloaded and your synapses are imploding from the inner and outer pressure to reconfigure or unleash your mind palace to save this troubled world.

I understand. I am also overloaded and imploding.

So, today, I am sharing YOUR WORDS from various insightful comments you have so generously written on the blog, plus some of my own thoughts on caring for your rainforest-minded self, particularly during highly stressful, even frightening, times.

(Toa Heftiba, Unsplash)

“…In a sense, I suppose this is a form of perfectionism: feeling like you’re constantly letting down the people around you, because you don’t excel in every area where you could with the right effort and unlimited time, energy and opportunity. It is not sustainable to live like this, so I make the effort to focus on what I do, rather than what I don’t. On most days, I do research in my field, with a focus addressing an important problem. I regularly help, mentor, orient younger graduate students, undergrads, or even create opportunities for them. I listen to friends and family and make them feel loved, seen, heard, and appreciated. I volunteer with children who need it. And when I look at things, I think I’m doing pretty okay actualizing my strengths. It will always be, however, a bit of a grieving process letting go and accepting I can’t help in every way I would like…”

  • Recognize the power of creating community and the impact of local actions. Join organizations that reflect your values. Tune into your knowingness about the interconnectedness of all life.

“… It is constantly reinforced to us that we must do great things. When you have high ability in one or more areas, the pressure is even greater. But I don’t think it’s a healthy mentality. Our strength comes from community, from putting all our efforts together. We are ONE person, with ONE set of strengths. So much of our most lasting achievements are those that directly impact the people around us, locally…”

  • Differentiate between healthy striving for achieving your goals and unhealthy self-sacrifice. Give yourself permission to set boundaries when needed and to have limits. Address any childhood trauma that might be impacting you today.

“I’ve spent a large part of my life chasing institutional prestige. Not because it’s something I intrinsically cared about, but because it was expected of me, and because (not unrelatedly) it reproduced a dynamic of toxic conditional acceptance I had with my father. There is nothing sustaining in that, of course, nothing to feed me; when you are only as good as your last perfect mark, the latest scholarship, your current h-index, you must feed it, and it is insatiable…”

“…I think striving for greatness comes from a very genuine, sincere place, from deep caring and social responsibility and love. But this is compounded by social pressure, and this cultural emphasis on extreme self-sacrifice and achievement is making many of us miserable…”

“…Actualizing one’s strength is not always a tangible thing; I’d argue raising our spirituality, our shared values is more important than pragmatic concerns much of the time….”

  • Embrace the idea that greater self-awareness and self-compassion, along with generosity, community, and loving kindness, combine to create a soothing, healing salve and an important path forward.

“…My happiest periods of life have been talking, collaborating and playing with (and just witnessing) artists and musicians who know and act on the fact that we are in this together, that our common humanity is what matters and what we have to strive to embrace and protect.”

_______________________________

To my bloggEEs: What tools, techniques, and beliefs sustain you during stressful, fightening times? Have you found a community where you can feel a sense of belonging and safety? I am thinking of all of you and sending so much love. And thank you to the folks who contributed the comments that I quoted above.

Much gratitude to those of you who have purchased my books and for the reviews on Amazon. Keep them coming!




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Author: Paula Prober

I’m a psychotherapist and consultant in private practice based in Eugene, Oregon. I specialize in international consulting with gifted adults and parents of gifted children. I’ve been a teacher and an adjunct instructor at the University of Oregon and a frequent guest presenter at Oregon State University and Pacific University. I’ve written articles on giftedness for the Eugene Register-Guard, the Psychotherapy Networker, Advanced Development Journal and online for psychotherapy dot net, Rebelle Society, Thrive, Introvert Dear, and Highly Sensitive Refuge. My first book, Your Rainforest Mind: A Guide to the Well-Being of Gifted Adults and Youth, is a collection of case studies of gifted clients along with many strategies and resources for gifted adults and teens. My second book, Journey Into Your Rainforest Mind: A Field Guide for Gifted Adults and Teens, Book Lovers, Overthinkers, Geeks, Sensitives, Brainiacs, Intuitives, Procrastinators, and Perfectionists is a collection of my most popular blog posts along with writing exercises for self-exploration and insight.

25 responses to “Strategies for Living in a Troubled World When Your Empathy Meter is Overloaded and Your Synapses are Imploding”

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  1. Sheep's Wool Avatar
    Sheep’s Wool

    D.K., Leafy and the other contributors here, thank you for this deep and useful conversation. Honestly, it is very interesting and useful, in itself, and also to me.
    I am a history student. I have studied up to doctorate level and did not finish my doctorate (not by choice – I overstretched and didn’t manage to finish).

    Anyway, I had some thoughts. Like D.K., the way of this world, the way those who wield power and influence seem to drive it, and the people in their large numbers seem to ‘consume’ it, does disgust me too. I am sorry for saying this word.

    The drive towards capitalism, consumerism and the prevalence of technology is a historical occurrence. It happened at a historical moment and has kept flying since. It happened in tandem with the rise in liberalism and democracy (a good thing on the whole but it has its pitfalls). It has been fuelled in the Western world by the influence of rationality and science and the diminution of the influence of true spirituality. In my PhD, based on texts, I saw that there was a discussion about this at an inflection point around 1830.

    The Bible – I am not super religious – but I am curious about its ideas – also shows man’s stupidity in stories like the Golden Calf (worshipping gold as opposed to God) and like the persecution of Jesus (preferring popularity and popular rationality rather than deeper thought) and like ideas of justice (based on codes rather than ethereal things). We are completely demented. This world is driven by money. It is no accident that Jesus, for example, just to use him as one spiritual figure, celebrated simplicity.

    George Orwell also had interesting things to say about politics that are relevant.

    The world needs highly sensitive people, rainforest-minded people, poets, the feminine.

    Thank you to all who spread out their ideas here in these comments and to Paula for initiating the conversation. I think it has given me some ideas for what I can do with my talents and how they might be really useful in this world. I am at the stage of using intuition to find my way forward. This discussion has helped.

    I think nature is the stop valve to all the stupidity but this is not reassuring because once nature acts or reacts it will bring devastating consequences.

    We are all one – we humans and the natural world. But we have lost sight of this completely.

    Reply
    1. pprober Avatar
      pprober

      I so appreciate each of you in this discussion as you are presenting your views and thoughts as your own and speaking of how they relate to you as opposed to telling others how they ought to think and feel! This is such a rich conversation. And thank you, Sheep’s Wool for your historical perspective. The world absolutely needs more of this, and more of us!

      Reply
    2. Marina Avatar
      Marina

      How interesting! We also have philosophers today – Santiago Alba Rico (https://www.tabakalera.eus/en/santiago-alba-rico/) argues that we are living a period of transition between an ‘old’ societal system and something totally new and different in connection with AI. I find this fascinating, because there are so many things to learn about human society in its continuum.

      Reply
      1. pprober Avatar
        pprober

        I will check it, Marina. Thank you.

        Reply
  2. Leafy Avatar
    Leafy

    This post was just what I needed today. Thank you for all this warmth. I’ve also noticed some of my previous comment(s) in here, and interestingly enough, it was therapeutic for you to write them and in a sense reflecting them to me in this way. I’m a pretty verbal person when things are on my mind (such as everything that is going on lately), and it helped me process things. I suppose there is a lot of truth to the idea that effective listening is about reflecting what the other person has said and paraphrasing concisely, and this is what you have done here with us, the commenters. It was also nice to read the rest of the post and to see different people weigh in. Thank you.

    Reply
    1. pprober Avatar
      pprober

      Oh, Leafy, I so appreciate hearing from you and how my quoting you in the post has been for you. I’m glad it was what you needed. It was what I needed to write, too. Thank you.

      Reply
  3. Eline Avatar
    Eline

    Oh yes, I found a community of like-minded souls and each contact fills me with bliss & hope.
    EFT (emotional freedom techniques) helps me a lot. It is tapping with your fingers on meridians (no idea of the correct English term) on your head and upper body while acknowledging your feelings and their intensity. It helps calming them down, feeling them through instead of running away as fast as you can!

    Reply
    1. pprober Avatar
      pprober

      That’s the term, Eline! Thank you for sharing this tip.

      Reply
  4. D. K. Avatar
    D. K.

    Ok. This may be a question geared toward one specific part of the post but, what about those of us who are too disgusted with the way the world (and perhaps the universe) is to find any shred of spirituality to cling on? Connect with the so-called beauty and majesty of nature? Boy, I wish. There are times I get so close… until I remember how frail and weak it is against the collective childish greed of a few billion hairless apes, and how even before humanity was around to wreck the world the beautiful living things we see around us are and were forever senselessly, hideously mutilated by squirming parasites and predators that rip open their prey alive or the sadistic whims of Nature itself in the form of famines and natural disasters. At the same time, any hope of finding solace in the supernatural disappears the more I read science and the blinding truths it forced humanity to stare into. For example, do you know the case study of Phineas Gage? The one of the man whose personality did a drastic change for the worse after a railroad accident that drove an iron rod right through his brain? It was the study that demonstrated that the brain was the seat of the mind in the human body. It was also the study that called into serious question the existence of that supposedly immutable, immortal container of human emotion and reason we call the soul. I read and observe a mounting pile of evidence that screams out there is no rhyme or reason or higher purpose to anything that happens in this messed up universe, and as a result I believe in absolutely no higher intelligent principles or powers governing it. What do you have to say about those rainforest-minded people who have become not just cynical and disconnected from the enjoyment of humanity, but also of reality?

    Reply
    1. pprober Avatar
      pprober

      First, I would say, thank you for sharing your experiences, D.K. Then I would steer you to a couple resources that might help. (They are linked on the post.) One is the program On Being by Krista Tippett https://onbeing.org. Try listening to several of her interviews before passing judgment. I’d also suggest The Institute for the Noetic Sciences. It is science based and yet more. https://noetic.org. Maybe read Carl Sagan? Look for some inspiring TED talks? Do you have any friends you trust who see the beauty in nature, who experience a spirituality there or who are particularly intuitive? Perhaps having conversations with them and allowing yourself to consider there are other realities than the one you are experiencing even if many folks are writing about it and studying it via science. Perhaps think back to when you were a young child, what did you believe then? Maybe getting in touch with a younger, more imaginative, playful side of yourself?? I’m glad you wrote and I hope this helps.

      Reply
      1. Jennifer Avatar
        Jennifer

        Hi Paula,

        I think probably like a lot of people here I’ve always wanted to ‘save the world’ lol. Developing a chronic pain condition in the last few years and the journey I’m on, with hopefully finding a road to recovery has led me to start to learn a lot of what the commenters have said. For me it’s recently particularly around spirituality and recognising I don’t have unlimited physical, mental and spiritual resources, so having better boundaries and focusing my energy where it’s most impactful for others and myself.

        I guess the saying that we can’t save other people and can only really save ourselves ultimately has become clearer as I let go of old traumas and people pleasing behaviours. I realise you can’t fill an “empty well” but you will burn yourself out by keep trying!! My work in mental health and volunteering for a cat shelter fills me up (as long as I keep good boundaries) and feels like some of my unique contributions to the world.

        I also realise I have had to tune out of world news recently. Without being oblivious I think it helps me to get less angry about things I can’t change and focus on what I can. Pain is a pain but it’s teaching me alot!

        Reply
        1. pprober Avatar
          pprober

          Oh, Jennifer, so sorry about the chronic pain! Good to hear you are on the road to recovery. Thank you for sharing and for being here.

          Reply
    2. Marina Avatar
      Marina

      Dear D.K., thank you for sharing your thoughts with us. I do recognise your words so well. I, too, have become cynical about the world and about humanity (hairless apes, as you say, and in away, I agree). But you know, being cynical is ok, as long as we know how to use cynicism without harm to ourselves. Cynicism can bring alot of suffering when not used wisely, both to others and to ourselves. But perhaps cynicism could actually be used in a creative way? The answer to that is very personal, of course, but asking myself that question helps me to overcome the feelings of helplessness and hopelessness, which are really dragging me down ever so often. To me, humanity (and nature as well, as we are nature, too) has at least two sides, the creative side and the destructive one, and that is something I cannot change. I find this really hard to accept, especially the destructive part as I have long been struggling to create a perfect world (haha, not anymore, though)! I would like the world to be in harmony, absolutely perfect, immensely generous and full of loving kindness. Impossible, right? Humanity will always fight, kill, and cause suffering. But it will also create friendships, generosity, and solidarity. And I believe it is my task to seek those qualities out in order to contribute to a better world, instead of digging my head into feelings of powerlessness. Perhaps nature is not that frail and weak, after all? Perhaps its most important features are endurance and resilience? What is helping me to deal with my own cynical feelings and hopelessness for the world is to admit that we, humanity, are a bunch of hairless apes (well, some are very hairy indeed!), and admitting that I am actually one of them. Yes, this makes me really laugh! I realise that I am not that different from others, finally. What also helps me is to seek out people like me and especially news that are not terrifying, death-inspiring and hope-killing. Why not check out https://www.positive.news/ ? This is “Good journalism about good things”. That gives me alot of hope. I am not alone in this. And finally, as Paula keeps saying, try therapy with a therapist that knows about rainforest minds, and I agree with her.
      A big thanks to Paula for mentioning Krista Tippett’s TED talk. Everywhere, we are pushed into being productive, rational and succesful professional beings, and to me, that is not what we are, nor what society is. It is more a question of wholeness and questions without answers. We are not allowed to have questions without answers. We need to have answers to everything, otherwise we are seen as worthless professionals (=human-beings), right? But perhaps that is our task, to (re)discover what being whole in our modern world and new century means, and to (re)discover that there are not always answers to all our questions?
      Big hug to you, D.K.!

      Reply
      1. pprober Avatar
        pprober

        Thanks for sharing your experiences, Marina, and what has helped you. Hugs back to you!

        Reply
    3. Jennifer Avatar
      Jennifer

      I get this D.K.

      The more I listen to what my government is up to in the UK (and global politics), the more I despair (which is why I’ve now stopped listening on the whole). I do wonder when (or if) humanity can get to a place where there is wisdom leading the way rather than narcissistic grabbing and ego. But, I do think, particularly as I can feel myself healing my illness and the power I can feel with that, that there’s more to everything in this world than we can imagine. My penny’s worth but I also get yours. It’s a very weird time to be alive. 🤔

      Reply
    4. Leafy Avatar
      Leafy

      D. K., what you bring up is not unfamiliar to me as I have had many of these thoughts as well. Other commenters have brought interesting points, but I thought I could give my two cents. It can be summarized in three images/metaphors.

      The first is from the Aeneid. In it, as Aeneas looks at a mural that represents the Trojan war, he reflects on all the senseless destruction that has taken the lives of so many of his friends and loved ones. On this occasion, he mentions “the tears of things”. Well, to me, the tears of things are everywhere. There is so much aggressiveness in the world. So much selfishness. So much hurt, so much suffering and pain. And life has grown and evolved in those conditions. It is immensely sad, hence the tears of things. But in a sense, the fact that this metaphor resonates with so many people makes me feel less alone, as if many despair at all of it, then perhaps there are many people who wish for something better.

      The second comes from Rumi, the Persian poet. He says: “You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the ocean in a drop.” I think this fits particularly well the rainforest mind analogy. We may feel like a drop in a stormy ocean, but the fact is with our lush and complex, beautiful minds, we are also the ocean in a drop. The same is true of so many people. Perhaps their ocean is stormy, and surfaces all wrong. But there is beauty in there. Sometimes it’s buried deep, deep in the ocean’s abyss. But it is there. This helps me too when I feel discouraged. People sometimes hurt, are not at their best, and this may cause them to lash out or to be cruel, but the beauty is in them if you look closely enough for the subtleties.

      The final image is one I thought up, although I’m sure someone else has come up with it elsewhere. I call it “the bearer of light”. When I read history, look at people across times and places, it seems even in the worst of situations, there are some people who pop up and stand for essential human qualities that are universal. They represent love, courage, sensitivity, aesthetic appreciation, depth, compassion, sincerity and grace. There is something almost miraculous to me about this. It’s like, the drive for humans to tend toward what is good is so strong that even in the most desperate of places and the most cruel of times, you can find people who, apparently independently of context, appear and will stand for these values unconditionally. They are bearers of light: people who keep hope alive with their goodness.

      In practice, I believe most people are fairly egocentric, but have the potential not to be. Because the cultural context is too low, so is their attitude. They are not bearers of light unless someone teaches them to be; the people who are bearers of light spontaneously, against adverse conditions, are the exception. In some cases, organic causes (such as in the case of Phineas Cage, which I did look up before) distort who the person is and their essence is corrupted. In fact, my two greatest fears in the past were traumatic brain injury, or certain forms of dementia, precisely because of the antisocial behaviors/the aggression they often cause. Either way, these reasons, and likely a few others, explain why in business, in politics, in day-to-day life, it often seems like the loudest, most ruthless, most coldhearted person “wins” (I put this in quotes because to me, everyone loses when someone like this gets into power). It can get really rough staying positive when witnessing people like that dominate over and over and over again. But to me, by remembering the tears of things (i.e., letting oneself experience one’s sadness at the tragedy of it), seeing the beauty under people’s ocean (or in their mind, rainforest or otherwise!), and seeking to be a bearer of light (and recognizing others who are), things look a lot more hopeful.

      I hope this helps a bit. I know these questions are hard, and I’m not done working through them myself.

      Reply
      1. pprober Avatar
        pprober

        Oh, Leafy, I’m crying. This is so beautiful. Thank you for shining your light on all of us. Much gratitude to you and everyone here. I’m sure many of us needed to read this today. <3

        Reply
        1. Jennifer Avatar
          Jennifer

          Beautiful Leafy. Thank you for writing this. ❤️

          Reply
      2. pprober Avatar
        pprober

        And Leafy, do you have a place where you share your thoughts and writing? Where you shine your light other than here? Once again, I might share some of your comment later on the blog. It deserves a wider audience.

        Reply
        1. Leafy Avatar
          Leafy

          Thank you Jennifer and Paula. I used to write for the student paper, but now that those years have been over for a while, I mostly just share my thoughts and writings with my loved ones and colleagues, acquaintances, etc. I did contact the paper a couple of times without success. However, I’m currently working on a different project I’ve just picked up: learning Esperanto. Esperanto literally means hope, in the sense that L. L. Zamenhof, its founder, would see how language often divides people, and he had hope his language would even things a little bit, therefore providing hope. Well, it happens that the Esperantist community is big enough that what you write can have impact, but not so big that it gets drowned in the noise. As I’m working on this though, I’m happy commenting here: this blog has been very therapeutic for me. I’m glad I was able to help a little today by writing out my thoughts: that process benefits me just as much.

          Reply
    5. D. K. Avatar
      D. K.

      I just want to follow up on this post to say thank you to everybody who decided to step up with perspectives and experiences of their own on this subject. It means so much to me and says out loud that I am not the only person in the room who has felt what I felt, and it showed me ways I can come to peace with what I see and think. Beautiful, beautiful answers. I sincerely, truly thank you all.

      Reply
      1. Jennifer Avatar
        Jennifer

        I’m really enjoying being part of the discussions here too. Thanks Paula and d.k. for kicking off this inr.

        I have about 5 or 6 blogs I read on a variety of topics and it’s nice to find like minded folk in those different spacrs. Hope it’s ok to take a tangent here but I wondered if anyone has any blog recommendations on grounded spirituality type topics? I’ve been having some interesting but unusual healing experiences that it would be good to talk with others about.

        Reply
        1. pprober Avatar
          pprober

          It’s fine to ask the question, Jennifer! I hope you get some suggestions.

          Reply
    6. Alia Avatar
      Alia

      Hi D.K. I’ll say first that I’m allergic to woo and find the concept of god-as-clockmaker, though long out of fashion, the least uncomfortable conception of a “higher power” if someone’s going to insist. And, honestly, how is that any different than just saying natural laws like gravity exist? Natural laws, or what we humans have been able to discover of them so far, are incredible. There’s a lot to keep a brain happy, learning about the immutable way things work on this planet or out in the universe. If you “zoom out,” everything simultaneously happens for no reason and for a quantifiable set of very firm reasons. And there’s no sadistic anything. Those wild animals are just trying to get lunch, same as the rest of us. The natural world is gory but rarely cruel. Humans are the outlier, with our multi-tiered motives and general bad behavior.

      I’ve read about Phineas Gage and other accidental experiments in damage to one region of the brain or another. For a salty, 3-pound blob of electric jell-o, there’s so much we still need to learn. But, I’d argue, even the religious-minded don’t think whatever ineffable intangible quality of “humanity” they may be clinging to is physically lodged in there or any other specific body part. (Sorry, Ancient Egyptians.) If Mr. Gage had some magic-something, it was as true after his injury as before, just as those who lose a limb or suffer from dementia aren’t written off as soul-less. If it’s there, it’s not tied to the meat.

      I’m on the fence if there is more to us than some electricity and goo, or if the whole is simply far more than the sum of the parts. When I was about 12, I met the cadaver my mother was dissecting for a class. Well-pickled and missing most of his skin and about 1/3rd of his musculature at the time, it was still obviously a human…and very obviously not a person. I was struck with certainty that whoever-he-was, that bit was gone. A soul or a lot of Duracell batteries, something wasn’t there. At the same time, the mechanics of him — tug this tendon and watch the finger crook — were as beautiful and intricate as any machine I’d taken apart.

      So, that’s my take. No invisible someone has to be in charge for things to be marvelously intricate and worthy of both time and wonder, just as no fairytale threat of punishment in some invisible realm is necessary to choose to be kind. “Purposeful” or not, things happen and we’re here. Why? I haven’t read enough philosophy to field a guess. But if it’s just to take good care of my cat and read a lot of books, would that be so bad? If we’re all just electric jell-o that occasionally gets its collective head out of its arse to look up at the wonders of the universe, that’s amazing.

      Reply
      1. pprober Avatar
        pprober

        Whoa, Alia! What an inspiring way to start my week! Thank you for this.

        Reply
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