Living With a Dangerous Amount of Sensitivity
What to do when there's cotton candy where your heart should be
Welcome back, friends!
I originally started this newsletter back in January 2023, high on new resolutions and the endless possibilities of a fresh start. It quickly fell off, as most resolutions do, and while I was still writing poetry and fiction, I let this little blog start collecting some cobwebs.
When I started thinking about reviving this newsletter, obviously the big question was “what do I write about?” I had just started re-reading Little Weirds by Jenny Slate for the billionth time. Slate’s new comedy special Seasoned Professional was out on streaming and I had already watched it. Twice. I found an old, unfinished newsletter draft in my Google Docs folder called “On the Genius of Jenny Slate.” The idea seemed pretty clear. But as I started writing, things began to take a turn.
Instead of rambling about how the line “I want to be brave for love” during Slate’s comedy special made me sob and how seamlessly she weaves vulnerability into her comedy, I felt inclined to share my own vulnerability. Which is so! scary! I’m no stranger to sharing my thoughts and feelings with the internet. I was a Tumblr girl, after all. But being vulnerable on the internet and attaching my name to it? Quite different from writing a moody poem and posting it anonymously to a blog where my profile picture was probably an over-saturated picture of Blair Waldorf from Gossip Girl. But here we are. And I trust you, dear readers, so let’s get vulnerable together.
Anyone who has discussed books with me for even five minutes knows that my absolute favorite book of all time is Little Weirds by Jenny Slate. And anyone who knows me at all knows that I notoriously struggle to pick a favorite anything. But I will without hesitation declare Little Weirds my favorite book to anyone who asks. I mean, I have a line from it tattooed on my arm. If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.
I first discovered Little Weirds in 2021 in the midst of a huge transitional period of my life. I had just gotten out of an abusive relationship. The pandemic was still raging. I was packing up the last five years of my life and moving from Philadelphia to Denver. To say I was going through it would be a massive, enormous understatement.
This book was like my lifeboat. I remember sitting in the bedroom of my old apartment voraciously underlining word after word, mouth agape, overwhelmed by how much everything Slate was saying felt like it was being directed right at me. Like she had reached deep inside my rib cage, swirled things around a bit, and went splat! right onto the page, and then forced me to look directly at it. Slate’s vulnerability felt like a mirror held up to my own.
There is one section in particular where Slate describes what it feels like to live with what she calls “a dangerous amount of sensitivity.” I still have a bruise from the gut punch of reading these lines for the first time.
“Well, I am so sensitive and I am very fragile but so is everything else, and living with a dangerous amount of sensitivity is sort of what I have to do sometimes, and it is so very much better than living with no gusto at all. And I’d rather live with a tender heart, because that is the key to feeling the beat of all the other hearts.” (Little Weirds, 162)
I was born with blue eyes and the word “sensitive” branded right across my little forehead. I feel everything so deeply it is almost painful. I am convinced if you took an MRI of my chest you’d find a big, pink, fluffy ball of cotton candy where my heart is supposed to be. Crying is my go-to emotional response for everything. Sad? Cry. Happy? Cry. Stressed? Cry. See a family of geese slowly crossing the road on a sunny day? Tears, literally everywhere. In fact as I sit here in this coffee shop and write this, I can feel tears prickling behind my eyelids. That’s the thing about softness. Sometimes it just pours out of you.
For the longest time I viewed my sensitivity as my biggest weakness, mostly because I was told by others that it was. “Sensitive” was an insult. I took things too personally, felt things too deeply. “Don’t be so sensitive!” My sensitivity was a burden to others, something weaponized and used against me, something that left me with a constant stream of apologies dripping from my lips like honey.
If I could just harden my heart, just a tiny bit, maybe things would be easier for me. And I tried, I really did. I spent so many years trying to be less, feel less. But it only ever made it worse. I made myself smaller and smaller, compressing my pink little cotton candy heart until it was nothing but a sticky, crumpled mess.
It wasn’t until I began to see my sensitivity as a strength that I began to truly embrace it. Yes, it has been the cause of enormous heartbreak and pain. It has led me to excuse people and behavior that I didn’t deserve. But I’ve learned that being sensitive isn’t synonymous with being helpless. It doesn’t mean I’m some defenseless, weak-willed thing. My sensitivity has allowed me to connect with people on a level that would otherwise be impossible. I hate the word “empath” (for reasons we can get into at a later time) but being able to empathize with people on such a deep level really is a beautiful thing, if you think about it. To be able to look at someone and truly say “I see you” — to be able to meet them in their vulnerability and not look away — is a gift. And if you’re lucky, one day, someone will see you, too. They’ll see that tenderness blooming in your ribcage and handle it with a gentleness that will, of course, make you cry.
To be sensitive is to be soft, and as poet Rupi Kaur said, “to be soft is to be powerful.” (Another tattoo of mine — are you sensing a theme, here?) I’d so much rather feel all the other heartbeats than feel nothing at all.
So here’s to the sensitive girls. The soft girls. The ones who cry for every emotion, who feel things so deeply it aches in our bones like a bruise that never quite heals. I see your pink little cotton candy hearts, and I love you for it. Welcome to To Be Tender. I hope you find a home here.
Such beautiful writing, I'm in awe of you!
girls with pink cotton candy hearts unite!!! love this <3