Empathy

We have decided to start this thread because of the number of Empaths,both old and new we are getting in the coven.

This thread is not for Empaths alone.Anyone that wishs to comment is more than welcome to.

Some of you may have known your ability for some time.
Others of you may just now be discovering your gift.
What ever the case there are a few things we all share,both good and bad.

Empathy is the 'capacity' to share and understand another's 'state of mind' or emotion. It is often characterized as the ability to "put oneself into another's shoes", or in some way experience the outlook or emotions of another being within oneself. Empathy does not necessarily imply compassion, or empathic concern because this capacity can be present in context of compassionate or cruel behavior(wikipedia)

There are baically 2 types of empaths.
#1 Those people with other Physhic abilities that are taught to recognize Empathic senses.
These people may be able to descern feelings to a certain degree,but will always have limits on what they can successfully recognize
#2 The Natural Empath is someone that is born with the ability or gift to read the emotions and feelings of others .
This is something that the user doesnt have to work at having but they can have to work very hard at controling.

As it starts to reveal itself it can be very frightening,and the user may have no idea whats going on
When you start to feel the flood of emotions that come with empathy,you may experience a wide range of emotions in a very short time.

This is because you are receptive to the emotions of those around you,but you have no control over what they are feeling..For instance,your around a happy person-you feel their happiness.Your around an angry person-you feel their anger.
In groups of people it can be down right confusing and very upseting at times,many different emotions may seem to flood in all at once.

With time and certain techniques you can learn to control what you experience.

There are different ways this gift can be used.
It can be used to help people better understand whats going on within themselves,and sort out emotions that may be all mixed up.Empathy often goes hand in hand with Healing and may be used to isolate injuries,or other medical issues.Be warned that most people may say they want you to read them and their feelings...But when you start to reveal their innermost secret feelings to them,they feel violated and may react in an angry manner.
Its for that reason I always ask the permission of anyone that wishs to be read(I literally ask them is it ok for me to go in their head,lol)wether for serious reasons or just for fun.

Some Empaths use their gift in a totally different way and prey on people by useing their emotions against them.
You can often predict what a person wants or needs if you can see what they are feeling at certain times.Then use that to your advantage in any number of ways.

I would like for those of you ....New or old empaths...wether youve known for a while...just found out you are an Empath...or maybe your not sure ,you just think you may be.

Post here what is the biggest problem you face or have faced,or think you may face with being an empath.

Once this is done we will be addressing these issues.
Some of the things will be:
*How to practice and strenghten your ability
*Shielding and Grounding yourself against the flood of emotions
*Isolating the feelings of just one person,,and one feeling
*How to tell if what you are feeling is real or imaginary *How to deal with people when you read them
*Finally how to turn off the flood of emotions from others ,without turning off your OWN emotions completly.

The biggest issue I face now with my Empathy is controling MY OWN emotions in certain situations.
If I have no emotional attachment to a person Im able to objectively read their emotions and give an unbiased reading.
If on the other hand I am emotionally attached to the person,I may feel all thier emotions and my own ,The more I feel for somone the harder it is to seperate the two,My emotions become unstable and I become irational and totally unpredictible.

very intresting... i would say all of this is true, and even though im a natural empath and have been for a few years im still not in control fully. I look forward to this thread.

a couple things i have a real problem with is controlling it at the times where i want it controlled. Also to trust my instinct (or intuition) because its normally right.

But i look forward on finding out how you can isolate other emotions so its as if your searching for one in them.

Kry had mentioned in another thread that an empath might be on an emotional roller coaster around him..this was my reply there


That would actually be good practice for an empath Kry.
Its part of the growth process to learn to isolate feelings.
Its often when we (empaths) cant do this we get the feeling of dread,negativity or even suicidle thoughts.
Once you learn to do this,you can deal with emotions one at a time,one person at a time.
For the empath there is always the chance,if they let their guard down,Or get emotionally involved,the flood will come raging in.
The other extreme for empaths is they shut their feelings down to the point of feeling nothing at all.
Not only for others ,but their own emotions.Its like a black hole,where somthing used to be.
Its a great gift to have as far as helping others at time,it sucks when you have to deal with it or control it.
The key is learning to control it.

As JK said..it is actually like your searching for one emotion at a time
It starts by trainig your self around people where you dont have to guesss the emotion.
People that are sad or crying,home in on what that feels like
to be around.
People that are angry
People that are happy
home in on every emotion you can individually,remember the distinct feel each will have,it will feel as unique to the empath as if you were seeing them in different colors.
Once you have isolated these and remember their individual feelings,It becomes easier to unravel them when your in groups.
Practice giving the individual emotions distinct markings


next we will talk about control,or the lack of control

hey my lovely buddy,

you may be amazed to know my gf is a Empaths,

and she is scared of it,

how she stop being a Empaths is there any solution???

There is really only one way to stop being an empath.
You have to totally shut off all emotions,and unfortunatly that means your own as well.
Its much better to learn to control them,just recently I was at a point where I was so tired of being led arounnd by emotions,I started shutting them all down.
Fortunatly somone reminded me that what would be lost was much more than the little I would gain.Even if youve been doing this for years,there will still be times when they get out of hand.
The best advice I can give your girlfriend is to get some help controling them,and learn to use them.....I dont think she wants to pay the price for shutting them down.

Grounding and sheilding yourself as an empath should become a daily(at very most weekly) event.
The strains that go along with being an empath cannot completly be understood by those that dont experience them.
Emotions can cause a huge drain on your energy ,but its not as well known that dealing with them may in fact cause you to GATHER an excess of energy.
Yes you can be so focused on dealing with the emotions that you become somwhat of an unwilling Psi vampire,not literally a vampire,but you start taking energy from anything and anyone around you,to continue fighting them.
In doing this you may end up with excess at the end of the day,causing Headaches,stress,anxiety, or several other things.
Thats one of the reasons Empaths tend to be so high strung,,they have never learned to release the excess energy.
Or they become depressed because they have never been taught the need to daily replenish.
For this reason it is important to get into a habbit of grounding yourself and releasing all the excess energy you have drawn,or gathering MORE energy to replace the energy you have used.
Any grounding method will work,just see the energy Flowing from you and taking all the stress,the tension with it.
If your replenishing then see the reverse,see the energy coming in from the earth,the sun,the moon.trees ,any natural object is a source of energy,it doesnt matter the grounding technique you use as long as the end result is a relaxed refreshed you.
If you practice looking at people and concentrating on what emotions they are feeling...dont look directly into faces as they can be misleading,just feel what their feeling.
If you practice Isolating the feelings and giving them colors or special tags,any thing to help you recognize that ONE feeling easier.
If you develope a habit of Grounding yourself and either releasing or regaining your strength.
Then you will be well on your start to mastering the gift ...and not it mastering you.

Next we will look at how to be with many people and block others out so you feel One feeling from one person.

I believe I am an empath, and it's starting to freak people out how I know how they're feeling, although I don't always get it right. People sometimes know that I know how they're feeling without me even saying or doing anything! Why is this?

People dont like to feel exposed in any way,and when their around an empath they can feel kinda naked,so to speak.
Its not somthing that they like so they may react in a bad way.
We just have to learn to try to make them comfortable with it,thats about all we can do.

Unless you're me. I asked Nodrk why he's feeling a certian way about every 10 minutes lol.

Good point baby,lol
What she isnt saying is she is an empath also to a degree.so I have no hope of telling a lie and getting by with it,lol
When a relationship exsists between an empath and another empath....lets just say there are no emotional secrets,lol