How do you learn to trust your creative instincts when you’ve spent years second-guessing the way you’re wired?

(After all, there’s no shortage of experts eager to tell you — or sell you — The One "Right" Way to be creative!)

But as Highly Sensitive Persons, we notice details, connections, emotions, and possibilities that others may miss. As we learn to trust our perceptions, they can powerfully guide our creative work.

Today, fiction author Laura Joy Lloyd joins me as guest co-host. Laura Joy shares how her sensitivity shapes the stories she reads, the characters she writes, and the unconventional writing process she created to honor her gifts, personality, and capacity.

Together, we explore

What if the creative process that fits you best begins with trusting who God created you to be as an HSP?

How can you manage your home without draining the limited capacity you have as an Highly Sensitive Person?

In Part 2 of my conversation with Kathi Lipp, we discuss practical ways HSPs can reduce home-management overwhelm, including:

We also explore what may really be happening when an HSP is labeled “controlling” for needing more calm at home—and how to communicate our sensory needs with clarity and compassion.

This episode will help you approach home management with greater self-awareness, more realistic expectations, and less shame about what your uniquely-wired nervous system needs.

When clutter piles up in our homes, it’s not just “stuff” for many of us who are Highly Sensitive Persons. We can experience it as visual noise, decision fatigue, emotional stories, sensory input, and shame. So much shame.

In this episode, my dear friend and co-author Kathi Lipp and I explore why everyday home management can feel uniquely overwhelming for HSPs … and how we can learn to respond with practical compassion instead of all-or-nothing thinking.

You’ll learn

Kathi also shares three small re-entry steps for those moments when home feels overwhelming.

This episode is a gentle invitation to stop asking, “Why can’t I keep up?” and start asking, “What might help my HSP nervous system take the next small step?”

So many of us have spent years trying to fix our relationship with food by focusing on what we do — or don’t — eat.

But what if being “fully nourished” has less to do with getting food exactly right, and more to do with learning what your whole self actually needs?

In this conversation with guest co-host Brandice Lardner, we talk about nourishment that goes far beyond calories, macros, and meal plans.

We explore what it means to care for all aspects of your Highly Sensitive self — body, mind, soul, and spirit — with grace … especially as an HSP who is easily depleted by pressure, shame, and repeated attempts to fix everything all at once.

If you’re curious what it might look like to nourish the parts of yourself that food was never meant to care for, you’ll find this episode full of freedom and hope.

So many of us have tried to white-knuckle our way through one food plan after another.

But what if health isn’t about eating perfectly—but rather about building habits that actually bear good fruit in our lives?

In this episode, guest co-host Brandice Lardner and I unpack why “perfect eating plans” so often fail, especially for Highly Sensitive Christian women. Brandice introduces the idea of fruitful habits: flexible, grace-filled practices you can evaluate by their outcomes, not whether you followed every rigid rule.

We explore

If you’re longing for a calmer, more sustainable approach to food—one rooted in grace, discernment, and real-life rhythms—this conversation offers a hopeful way forward.

Links mentioned:

Have you found that diets promise you control, clarity, and confidence—but all-too-often they deliver the exact opposite?

For many Highly Sensitive Christian women, diets come with hidden costs:

In today’s episode, guest co-host Brandice Lardner and I have an honest, grace-filled conversation about how food became a primary coping tool for so many of us at such a young age, why dieting typically backfires, and what it looks like to pursue health without pressure, fear, or shame.

If you’re ready to reframe your relationship with food through the lens of grace instead of rules, this conversation is a great place to start!

Links Mentioned:

January can feel like everyone else hit the “GO” button while I'm still standing in my living room wondering if a bomb went off over the holidays.

If you’re still putting decorations away, finding glitter in places glitter shouldn't be, and feeling like you’re already behind on a year you just started, I want to invite you to take a breath — you’re not doing anything wrong.

Today I want to talk about the gift of a gentle start—especially for Highly Sensitive People.

I want to invite us to take a calmer, kinder approach to the new year.


Links:

Some adventures do more than stretch us — they transform us.

And today, Pam Watts is back in the guest co-host seat to share with us what God revealed during and after the experience she was still preparing for the last time we talked.

What began as doing something fun for something good became something sacred — reshaping her understanding of excellence, identity, rest, and God’s power at work through human weakness.

In our conversation, we explore:

If you’re in a season of saying your own faith-based YOUR — or in the reflective time that comes after—this conversation is rich with clarity, insight, and wisdom.

When someone we love is grieving, most of us fear saying the wrong thing. So we stay quiet, hoping our silence is better than a misstep. But for the bereaved, silence can feel like abandonment. In this episode, guest co-host, Cheri Fletcher and I discuss why connection matters so much more than perfect words. You'll hear how simple acts like prayers, texts, and thoughtful questions can bring lasting comfort. And you'll discover the power of initiating conversation with empathy and intentionality.

Links Referenced:

• Grit 'n' Grace Episode #279: Surviving the Holidays — Help for When Your Heart Feels Heavy with Cheri Fletcher
  • https://cherigregory.com/episode279/
• Order Cheri Fletcher's "Beyond 'I Don't Know What to Say' Grief Communication Cards"
  • https://cherifletcher.com/product/grief-cards/
• Sign-Up for Cheri Fletcher's "Comfort in the Silence — A 5-Day Reflection on Walking With Grief"
  • https://cherifletcher.com/joincheri/
• Learn more about The Write Beside You Unlimited Coaching Program
  • https://sensitiveandstrongbook.com/wby-unlimited-coaching-program/

Have you ever found yourself thinking, "If I'd known how to honor my sensitivity sooner, maybe life wouldn't have felt like such a fight to survive"?

If so, you're not alone. And today's episode explores what it looks like—in real life—to thrive as a Highly Sensitive Person.

My guest co-host is best-selling author Dr. Judith Orloff, and we're talking about her new children's book, The Highly Sensitive Rabbit. It's a sweet story that helps HSP kids (and tender-hearted grown-ups!) build everyday tools for boundary-setting, emotional balance, and self-trust.

We discuss how to turn "crybaby" moments into connection, how to reframe empathy as courage, and how to nurture that inner child who still needs to be seen and soothed.

This conversation offers fresh insight and gentle practices to help every sensitive soul—young or grown—thrive with confidence and self-compassion.

Links mentioned:

• Dr. Judith Orloff's Website https://DrJudithOrloff.com
• Take the "Am I a Highly Sensitive Person?" Self-Quiz https://CheriGregory.com/hspquiz/
• Learn more about the Sensitive & Strong Community Cafe https://sensitiveandstrongbook.com/gng-cafe/