Make Peace with Doing Less

I think one of the harder things for highly sensitive people can be accepting that we may simply have less capacity for some things than other people do. It’s hard not to compare when someone else seems able to work all day, exercise, make dinner, see friends, and do it again the next day without needing much recovery time.

Many of the sensitive adults I work with are capable people who are used to expecting a lot from themselves. They also tend to get overwhelmed and depleted fairly easily. Knowing this doesn't necessarily make it easier to accept. It can still feel disappointing to need more downtime than your spouse or friends, or to realize that something you genuinely want to do is probably one thing too many.

I see this in myself too. There are times when I would like my capacity to be different than it is. Sometimes I just want to be able to do more.

Capacity changes depending on work, relationships, health, sleep, stress, age, and whatever else is going on. But I think we often plan for the capacity we wish we had rather than paying attention to the capacity that's actually available to us at the moment.

For me, making peace with doing less doesn't mean trying to convince myself that I shouldn't want to do more. It's more practical than that. How many things can I reasonably do in a day and still feel okay? How much time do I need between commitments? If I have a particularly busy week, what needs to come off the calendar somewhere else?

Sometimes this means leaving more space between plans, taking breaks before becoming completely depleted, or saying no to something that sounds perfectly enjoyable because there are already too many things on the calendar.

There are real tradeoffs to having limits. Doing less can mean missing things, disappointing people, or not accomplishing as much as we'd like. I don't think we have to pretend otherwise. But continually planning as though those limits don't exist doesn't make them go away. Mostly, it leaves us exhausted and annoyed with ourselves. Why not try taking them seriously enough to plan around them?