A woman who is easily hurt by others wants to learn to toughen up. Mariella Frostrup says she should get busy and read fiction instead of psychology.
If you have a dilemma, send a brief email to mariella.frostrup@observer.co.uk
The dilemma I always get told I am "too sensitive" and need to stop taking everything so seriously. On good days I'm fun and gregarious and on bad days I'm nervous and anxious, getting easily hurt by what others say and sometimes what I think they're thinking. It affects friendships and relationships (all three of my past boyfriends have cited it as a problem). It can be a good trait – I am loyal and compassionate – but the bad side is it drives me and others crazy. I can't handle criticism and take things too seriously, getting overly upset, overthinking things and cutting people out of my life. I want to be able to roll with the punches and take life lightly! I meditate and read psychology books, but I just haven't been able to shake it.
Mariella Replies Oh dear, you definitely won't be speaking to me by the end of this column! I've been accused of riding roughshod over others' emotions and I admit when I feel a friend is being over-indulgent my patience is in short supply. That's all very well when the person in question is drowning in a well of self-pity, but in cases of real depression it's taken me a long time to understand that tough love is neither constructive or kind.
What's interesting about you, and quite unusual, is that you're not claiming depression, or even mitigating circumstances for your sensitivity. It's a very good start. Normally the thin-skinned have an endless array of excuses for why their workaday interactions are so much harder to bear for them than for the rest of us. In the eyes of the self-suffering they are being victimised, used and always abused when they're actually experiencing exactly the same body blows as the rest of us.
You're already on the mend because you have a perspective on the irrationality of your responses. Often those who bruise easily spend too much time thinking about themselves. I'd go so far as to say that oversensitivity is a privilege of the underoccupied. The majority of people don't have the time to lavish care on emotional wounds – they're too busy getting on with living.
It's an issue highlighted by therapy culture, as all too often patients end up not cured but justifying their qualifications as fascinating cases. There are more than enough people with serious mental issues who really do need professional help without all the other Toms, Dicks and Harriets rushing to the therapist's couch. Happily, the craze for mass self-examination has been all but obliterated by new technology's facilitation of the 24/7 working week. Fewer and fewer people have an hour to squander gazing at their navel when their smartphone is blinking like a hazard light in their hand.
So back to you and how to toughen up your emotional epidermis. Activity is top of my list of useful distractions. The more time you spend doing and the less thinking the easier it is to shrug off perceived put-downs and imagined insults. You say you've read psychology books in your pursuit of emotional equilibrium, can I suggest you turn to fiction instead?
Understanding what makes other people behave the way they do can help minimise the impact their actions have on you. I've learned as much about the world from made-up stories about it as I have by living in it. Through great novels you can better understand everything from a stranger's suicidal impulse to the far-reaching effect of the Holocaust on the descendants of survivors.
I'd recommend The Grass is Singing, by the late great Doris Lessing, anything at all by Alice Munro, the heart-wrenching Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels and perhaps Dirt Musicby Tim Winton. The best fiction strikes at our heart, reminding us that we are flawed and fabulous, unique and much the same as everyone else, and that ultimately our duty is to live well and leave a residue of goodness with those we love, not squander time fretting about the perceptions and slights of others.
Putting irrational issues in proportion by increasing your empathy and broadening your horizons is the best way possible to reduce their power to diminish you and stop you living bravely. You won't look back.
Email Mariella at mariella.frostrup@observer.co.uk. Follow Mariella on Twitter @mariellaf1