Question:
If a person is very, very sensitive, and he is easily insulted when others slight his honor, even in the subtlest way – for example, if a close friend of his didn’t inform him that he had a new baby girl, or if he forgot to invite him to his simchah, or if he didn’t give him a full smile, or if he didn’t greet him when he saw him, etc. – and he is very pained at this, because he is a very sensitive kind of person, and in addition, he also values very much his relationships with his friends, and it is difficult for him to just take his mind off these kinds of disturbances – is this trait of “over-sensitivity” a trait that stems from honor, or not? Which of the four elements does this personality trait come from? And what is the way to fix this trait? Perhaps an overly sensitive kind of person needs to practice “nullifying the I” every day, and forget about himself? Or should he only make use of this power when he feels hurt?Answer:
Sensitivity, if it is not caused by some external factor but from one’s natural personality which he was born with, stems from refinement in the soul. This comes from the element of wind, the most refined of the elements. The element of fire is a more spiritual source, and it is from that source that he will demand his honor. But this is not refinement, it is just a demand for honor, which is a separate discussion.
The advice to overcome it is:
1) To rejoice in suffering – he should be happy that he has a sensitive and refined personality, because “Increase of knowledge is an increase of pain”.
2) The more that a person enters into himself, there will be a decrease in his negative bouts of sensitivity.
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