I’m acutely sensitive to vibrations which tells me it’s a survivalist thing; my system prioritises them like air or sustenance. Reason being good vibes = dopamine in my system and I’m either short of that or I need more of it than average because I basically run on it. Some people call that ADHD, I call it the gift of being neurodivergent which means I run on different ‘fuel’ or motivators than other people and, yes, that comes with risks and pitfalls in a world not set up my way but knowing it can be the first stage in opening the gift.

Because I’m not wrong or broken I’m just different to mainstream. It’s the world that’s so messed up that I can find my natural fuel so easily there and am often forced towards poor or inappropriate substitutes. I don’t ‘get’ other peoples motivations either but it doesn’t make them wrong. We all deserve our place in this world.

Like an electric car runs on electricity there’s no point offering my engine petrol (carbon motivations such as pay, promotion, position, power) I need vibes…and the right vibes at that. Vibes just happen to fuel me more than any make-do of the material kind.

But when right vibes (‘higher’ vibes) are in short stock my system will suck-up most any vibration that’s available (in order of stimulation, mistaking assertiveness with power as we all tend to do) in the hope there may be some of the right stuff in there…or a close substitute.

Manufactured ‘stims’ won’t do; facsimile though they may be on a neurological basis, plugging the dopamine gap for a while, that’s not enough for me long term or even very long at all. I sniff out fake stims like a hound dog these days and have no interest in chemical stopgaps.

When thirsty for stimulation, especially first thing in the morning when I’m still feeling-out the point of my day, or when my system is flagging and in desperate need of energy, it will suck in vibes even more than usual. EMFs, noise pollution, negative people with strong opinions, inappropriate music (since the most sticky music tends not to be of the highest vibe)…when you’re hungry for dopamine, your system will hook onto them all, and on to any passing source of excitement, obsessively and as first priority on the list of your day. In fact it dials in and hooks onto vibes of dubious origins even without you knowing it (and don’t forget, vibes are highly contagious) and they suck you like leaches, bleeding you dry because these aren’t the higher vibes your system craves but a very poor substitute for the real thing. The seemingly ‘glittering prize’ of a thrill becomes quickly tarnished and shows it’s true colours; so, what starts as thrillingly overstimulating turns into the toxic exposure as your innate preferences start to wake up. Over time, after way too many of these experiences, your system starts to fail like an engine corrupted by too many years of filling up with the wrong fuel.

In effect (if you are like me, you realise) you’ve spent your life like a hybrid car; trying to utilise a bit of both so your have a fallback position when good vibes aren’t available to you, in which case you default to dopamine fixes from material objects and temporary secular thrills, addictions and bad habits, a moment’s cheap excitement or convincing yourself this is all life has to offer which allows you to feel the brief frisson of a kind-of fake kinship with the rest of floundering humanity, all of us in it together; it is, after all, what everyone else makes do with for motivation and meaning. Deep down you’re not convinced and the constant self-lying bores into your system more effectively than the rust in that engine from decades of taking in the wrong sustenance. So you fall apart inch by inch from the inside out…lost, overstimulated, health floundering…until you catch a whiff of the real thing.

For me it was stopping everything for long enough that all my ingrained patterns broke or fell away that led to that. Only then did higher vibes, at first from nature (irony: it’s been here all the time!) insinuate their way into the door I had left ajar, at first, not because I planned it that way but because I’d taken my eye off the ball and let all my fixed ideas go. In time, I came to recognise the difference between vibes and, in my usual way, I began to categorise and sort them, I noticed patterns and trends, I made them a fixation, an interest, my passion. I listened to the information of them, much the same as (I remembered) they were such a priority to me when I was a child, before I unlearned how to read them as the very first way that I assessed every situation I was presented with; before I was taught to make more of logical assessment and to use only what I saw with my eyes. I did my darnedest to fill my life with more of the good stuff so my system wouldn’t have to default to the make-do any more.

On a daily basis this still takes work. But what I realise is, there are times when I’m more susceptible and those times are when I especially need to feed myself the good stuff…before the make-do stuff gets a chance. If I can get in there first with enough positive vibe of my own selecting, my thirsty system is quenched enough to avoid the bad habits and addictions, to step past the fixating distraction of dubious origins and make the better choices. I have come to understand what my system prefers to consume and I step in to curate that as far as is possible; no different to anyone else making their particular life choices only…big difference here to how I used to be…I don’t ever assume my choices will be the same, or even ballpark similar, to theirs and I stand by that and my divergent neurology. I prioritise what my best consumption looks like and that’s how I start my decision-making process, not as a mere afterthought.

If this seems a little control-freaky then maybe I have to be in a world run amok with very much vibration filling every space and yet not all of it the good stuff. And don’t get me wrong, there can be great vibes in some very dark places…and not all that glitters is gold. The gift is having the discernment and then not leaving it to chance. These come with maturity, possibly after years of living fairly brutal experiences as a highly sensitive person in a world not designed for the way we are wired. And the antidote isn’t that we need perpetual quiet or to withdraw or hide away from overstimulation (as is often suggested) but to go after the right kind of stims, the sort that work to fuel us with invigoration and enthusiasm and energy and inspiration and positive thrills enough to thrive in this life of ours, as equals (if different) to everyone else. When you get there by stepping up to the plate of choosing your own vibes and then realise you already have all you need to make these everyday choices, the effect is powerful and life altering…and profoundly health altering too.