Ever been in the middle of a story, hands waving, voice rising with genuine excitement, only to have someone hit you with that look? The one that says you’re exhausting. Maybe they even said it out loud. "You're just a lot," or the classic "You are too much."
It stings. Honestly, it feels like a polite way of being told to disappear.
But here is the thing about that phrase. It is rarely a reflection of your volume, your ambition, or your personality. It is almost always a reflection of the other person’s capacity. Think about it. If you pour a gallon of water into a pint glass, the glass overflows. Is there something wrong with the water? No. The glass is just small.
The Psychology Behind the "Too Much" Label
Psychologists often point toward a concept called "emotional regulation" when discussing why people react negatively to big personalities. If someone grew up in a household where emotions were suppressed—where being "good" meant being quiet—seeing you live out loud triggers their internal alarm system. Dr. Elaine Aron, who pioneered research on High Sensitivity (HSP), notes that people who process more deeply are often labeled as "too sensitive" or "too intense" by those who don't.
It’s a projection.
When someone tells you that you are too much, they are usually saying, "I don't have the tools to engage with this level of honesty/energy/intensity right now." It’s a boundary of theirs, but they’ve phrased it as a flaw of yours.
We see this everywhere in history. Look at someone like Martha Stewart or even Steve Jobs. Throughout their early careers, they were consistently told their demands and their visions were "too much." They were difficult. They were "extra." But that "too muchness" was exactly what allowed them to build empires. They didn't fit into the standard pint glass, so they built their own reservoirs.
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The Double Standard of Intensity
Let’s be real for a second. This label isn't distributed equally. Women, specifically, are hit with the "too much" tag far more often than men. If a man is assertive, he’s a leader. If a woman is assertive, she’s "a bit much." It’s a subtle form of social policing designed to keep people—especially marginalized groups—in a state of self-shaming.
You start editing yourself. You stop laughing as loud. You hold back that "crazy" idea in the meeting because you don't want to see that look again.
Stop.
When you dim your light to make someone else comfortable, nobody wins. You end up resentful, and they end up with a filtered, watered-down version of a human being. It’s boring. It’s also a fast track to burnout. Masking your natural intensity is cognitively expensive. It drains your battery faster than any actual work ever could.
How to Tell if You're Overbearing or Just Misunderstood
There is a nuance here. We have to be honest. Sometimes, "too much" can mean a lack of social awareness.
How do you know the difference?
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If you are steamrolling over people, never letting them speak, or ignoring clear physical cues of discomfort (like someone literally stepping backward), you might be lacking some situational awareness. That isn't about your "essence" being too much; it’s about your social mechanics needing a tune-up.
However, if you are simply passionate, ambitious, or deeply emotional, and people find that "tiresome," that is a compatibility issue. You aren't "too much." You’re just in the wrong room.
Finding Your Tribe
I remember a friend telling me about her first job in a high-pressure law firm. She was "too loud" for the quiet, carpeted halls. She felt like a freak for three years. Then she moved into a startup environment where everyone was yelling ideas across the room and drinking four cups of coffee by 10:00 AM. Suddenly, she wasn't "too much." She was the MVP.
The environment dictates the value of the trait.
- In a stagnant pond, a wave is a disaster.
- In the ocean, a wave is just... the ocean.
Actionable Steps to Reclaim Your Intensity
If you’ve spent years trying to shrink yourself, you won't stop overnight. It’s a process of unlearning.
Audit your inner circle. Take a look at the five people you spend the most time with. Do you feel like you have to "perform" a quieter version of yourself around them? If you’re constantly checking your volume or editing your jokes, you are starving your soul. Seek out "high-capacity" people—those who have big lives, big dreams, and big personalities themselves. They won't find you exhausting because they operate at your frequency.
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Practice radical authenticity in small doses. Start by saying the thing you’d normally swallow. Share the big dream. Laugh the way you actually laugh. Notice who leans in and who pulls away. The people who pull away are doing you a favor; they’re showing you that they aren't your people.
Reframe the narrative. Next time someone tells you that you’re "a lot," try responding with, "I know, right? I have a lot of energy for things I care about." Own it. When you stop apologizing for your presence, the word "too much" loses its power to hurt you. It becomes a compliment. It means you are overflowing with life.
Develop "The Switch" for your own benefit. This isn't about shrinking; it's about strategy. Being an expert at life means knowing when to use your full power and when to conserve it. You don't use a blowtorch to light a candle. Learning to calibrate your intensity doesn't mean you’re "less than," it means you’re becoming more effective.
The world is full of people who are playing it safe, staying quiet, and coloring inside the lines. We don't need more of that. We need the "too much" people. We need the ones who care too much, work too hard, and feel too deeply. Those are the people who actually change things.
The next time you feel that familiar sting of being told you are too much, just remember: The world's most beautiful things—the Grand Canyon, the sun, a symphony—are all "too much" if you aren't ready for them. That’s not their problem. And it isn’t yours either.
Go find a bigger room.