There are men in this world who carry a heavy weight through life, one that most people never really notice. Not because something dramatic keeps happening over and over, but because something quiet happens over time, day on day, month on month, and decade over decade. It's this feeling of needing to adjust yourself before you even speak to others. It's of scanning the room or your workplace to see if you'll be received or accepted before you fully show up as yourself. It's of becoming the version of yourself that will be the least misunderstood, the least likely to be seen as too much, the least likely to feel rejected. And after enough years of this, you stop maybe noticing that you're doing it, and it just feels like who you are. Dear soul, you're not alone in this. In the Light Bearer's library, I talk to highly sensitive men because my husband, who I've lived with for 11 years, is like you, is a highly sensitive man. He's an INFJ, he's an empath, he's gifted. He's all the things that this world it just doesn't quite, just doesn't quite fit. And I know he feels a lot of what I'm talking about today, and and he it's this feeling of rejection, but it's kind of like deeper than that, because it's about not really being able to show up as yourself because you know that that won't be appreciated or seen, you won't be seen for who you truly are. And I think I've been thinking about where this comes from because and why it's so painful, because it can be such small things. You know, we went to the grocery store and we were talking to this grocery clerk, and you know, he said hello to her, and she just kind of just wanted to talk to me. And she kind of it was so subtle, it was so subtle, but he afterwards could just feel that that feeling of of rejection of the no, like I don't want to talk to you, like and and it's like he's like, I didn't want even feel like I didn't need to put myself out there to just say hello and feel that feeling, and so it's just tiny things that build up over a lifetime. And I I've been thinking that it starts in childhood, it starts when we're even long before we had language to know what was happening, before we understood ourselves to be perhaps highly sensitive, and before we had words to say, you know, we're different than most people. And I think that I know for me, I'm also a highly sensitive person, and um, and I know that my mom got pregnant with me and didn't that that was unplanned. So it was quite traumatic for her. And she, you know, there was this sense, like I believe there's there's and I think there's studies that show that in the womb, even the emotions and feelings of our mother are are seeping into us. So even just me knowing that like there's a sense of this not being welcomed or wanted. Um, and anyway, I just know for me that's where that deep wound first started. And it can be piled on over a lifetime of our parents maybe just you know, not wanting a highly sensitive child, not wanting us to see the things that we do as maybe intuitives or empaths saying things to them and them rejecting those things, and then into childhood and our siblings maybe making fun of us or going to school and having you know schoolmates or teachers. So it's just this compounding of this wound, and for whatever that looks like for you, it can look different for each of us. But I think that sensitivity that we have to people's, they don't even have to say anything, right? They don't have to speak the words of rejection. We can just we we we know we know that it's it's we can feel their thoughts or feel their emotions, and we just know that there's like this pushing away of us, or this, you know, um the the the tension or the we just we can feel it. So they can be faking it and we can know and feel rejected, like and and when that happens it's it's it's so painful, and it can be painful for us when you know lots of you have spoken about being rejected in relationships and moving on from those rejections or those breakups is so so painful, and especially if it's kind of over and over again, it can get to the point where it's it's just it's it's a physical feeling in our body. It's um you know, our our heart feels broken, and it takes takes longer and longer sometimes to to feel like we can heal ourselves or reset our systems, you know, to equilibrium again. And then it starts to feel like I don't want to put myself out there again, you know, and my husband with his with his writing and putting putting it out there and just feeling like no one cares and the sense of rejection that it's like it gets to the point where you feel like you can't even go to the grocery store. I'm just but you know, it's it becomes where it's just small, the smallest things that sometimes, you know, and and when we try to if we I think part of the hardest part is that these are things that are unspeakable to most people, these are things that are unshareable to most most of us as highly sensitive people, and to speak the words to other people about this topic that I'm just talking about, all this stuff to our you know, our family members or friends. Because we know we've we've probably tried to say something to this effect and they just they look at you funny or they change the topic, or they kind of give you like oh it's not that bad, or like, oh you're overreacting, or whatever, fill in the blank, you've got all the all the all the evidence you need, like you know, of like just and that just like stabbing us in the heart even more. Like like, okay, it's best just to not speak it, to not talk about it, but it sits in there and it's it sits in there and it's painful. And I think what I found so freeing here on the library's library is is being able to just speak about my own sensitivity and my husband's high sensitivity and just just just vocalize it, just say it to others like you who can empathize, who can recognize it, who can, who've felt it, who know what it's like, and to know, oh I'm not alone. Like there are other people out there who who know what this is like. And and I've started to feel because it before I started to feel so like claustrophobic inside, like the the words, like I was choking on all the stuff that I couldn't say to people in my life. And and now I can I can say it and I can hear back from you in the comments about, you know, this, this, this is me. This, I recognize this. I've been doing this for years, you know, all of the all of the things, and it's like this weight has lifted from my shoulders and from my husband's shoulders. It doesn't mean that that that pain isn't all still there. It just means that you know, we can speak it aloud and know that we're not alone. And so it's it's this this pain is something that we we just we're learning, we call rejection, and we just are anticipating it every time we talk with someone about anything really that's meaningful to us, anything that's not small talk, but even then, right? Grocery store, and you're just trying to be kind or or whatever, and it just kind of gets rejected. So we start to be someone else than we are. So if you would like to come and express these things out loud and hear other men express these things out loud and know you're not alone and laugh about small things like grocery stores or, you know, all the things that sometimes we just if we shared it with anyone, they would look at us like we had three heads. And um I would I would offer that I have a a men's conversation group and we come together and we just we just share what's on our heart and our mind. And um there are eight spots. There's two left in um today's group, which is Tuesday, June 23rd from 6 to 7:30 mountain time. And there will be there will be more, so just stay tuned. But it's a beautiful exhaling moment of just like, oh, I can be me. I can be me. And there's older, older men in their 70s, young men in their 20s, and it's wonderful to share the experiences of a lifetime. And um, so I would I would welcome you to join that and know you're not alone. And please let me know in the comments about your experience with with this. I I read everyone and I wish I could respond to everyone, and I try my best. But know that I I am I see you and I hear you. So I'm wishing you so many blessings. Signing off for today, XOXO Kate.