I realized today that I think I’m addicted to stress.
Why? I recently solved one major problem in my life, and then I realized that I have another. I was thinking, maybe I am looking for problems in my life.
Now as a Highly Sensitive Person I am acutely attuned to everything. I read a book this weekend called DBT skills for highly sensitive people and I thought it was helpful. It brought some new concepts in my life that lead me to this new insight.
What it mentioned is that Highly Sensitive people also are correlated with drug use. It got me to thinking. I think that we as HSPs because of the constant stimulation try to manage that with dopamine hits in our brain. That can happen with drug or many addictive behaviors, and I think one way that I have expressed this is with stress addiction. That also brings dopamine hit as well.
Isn’t that crazy? Feeling stressed in some ways also feels good. It can feel that we have a sense of control, and by being active we can both try to avoid thinking about what stresses us, and have a easy and ready excuse for sympathy from others. We are seen in a positive way by taking more responsibility that is healthy or helpful for others and ourself, and the only downside to stress addiction is that we are killing our bodies slowly.
I think this explains why I was over consuming social media. I wanted to feel stressed so that I would get a dopamine hit when I found content that was funny or interesting. I felt bad so that when I felt good, it would feel better. We know that social media and games hijack this dopamine hit reaction, we just need to accept that we don’t need short term feelings we need longer term feelings of peace and happiness more.
I’m not going to choose stress anymore. Anyone with me?