On Empaths : Recognising our Gift

I have been thinking a lot of the ‘gift’ of being empathic and sensitive lately.  Judith Orloff’s book The Empaths Survival Guide arrived yesterday and it is helping me to understand intuitive feelings I had about being an empath before.  Empaths are often led to believe in our externally focused materialistic culture with its deep feminine feeling wound that there is ‘something wrong with us.  We get told we are ‘too sensitive’ have a ‘too thin skin’, ‘need to toughen up’ or are cry babies.   We MOST DEFINATELY DO NOT NEED TO TOUGHEN UP BUT WE DO NEED TO WISE UP and become stronger in our sense of self and self value.    

There is nothing wrong with us in fact, as Judith points out, we are here to raise awareness on this planet.  We are needed, our gift is needed in an ailing world and when we get scapegoated by a narcissistic, numbing or shut down culture we lose ourselves.  Empaths are probably more likely to be bullied, if we are different or stand out in some way.  We should see being bullied or shamed or judged unfairly as being ALL ABOUT THE OTHER PERSON.  Most caring people don’t need to judge others.  They do not tell them there is something wrong with being themselves.   If you have had this done to you as an empath give the pain and ignorance back to where it belongs, or if you like you can imagine a shield with the painful words bouncing off and falling to the ground.  Or see the arrows of nasty words turn to flowers and hit the ground before they reach you.

The thing we do need to develop most as empaths are healthy boundaries.  We must also learn to develop a good awareness of where our deepest childhood wounds and injuries lie as these are what make us vulnerable in later relationships with others.  We can have compassion for others but often others wounds will trigger our own too and this is where we need healthy boundaries.  We need to know we can offer love to others but there are limits.  WE ARE NOT GODLIKE AS EMPATHS and we cannot fix or heal others, but we can offer compassion up to a point.   In fact we often end up carrying more sadness when others fail to step up because our caring nature makes us keep pressing on!  And often as children we saw a lot and could talk to no one without being misunderstood.

Because we are sensitive and so many of us have gone through harsh experiences and much trauma in life we have a lot of knowledge and awareness to give but we may also end up projecting our wounds too, and many of us can then attract narcissists who project their dismissed negated self onto us.  Then they can disparage us for our sensitivity because long ago they got wounded or injured by being vulnerable and began to see sensitivity and vulnerability as weaknesses rather than strengths.  This kind of a relationship comes as a lesson for us to develop our own healthy narcissism.

My last partner had a violent alcoholic father and he saw his pregnant mother being kicked at one point, but he still judged his mother for leaving his father and projected the abandonment trauma onto me and other women in his life.     He could only get angry but never cry about it.  I was the one who ended up doing all the crying in the relationship.   And then I got it trouble when I got angry as that frightened his repressed terrorised inner child. 

And that is the other point about being a sensitive physical or emotional empath. We can pick up and feel the feelings of others when we are with them and some of us even end up getting sick.  Its making me think about how I came down with breast cancer just a few months after my sister was sick with breast cancer and I had been supporting her through her surgery and operation.  

Awareness of who we are, what we have to give, where our boundaries get blurred or over run is very important for empaths. And WE MUST VALUE OURSELVES.   WE MUST NOT JUDGE OURSELVES FOR FEELING DEEPLY OR BEING MISUNDERSTOOD OR REJECTED.   That way lies depression and suicide for many an empath who has not yet awakened to the reality of their soul quest and purpose.

Taking care of our inner child is also essential for empaths as is developing a wise and loving inner parent.  Our wounds and vulnerabilities may make us turn to those who reject or dismiss us and it takes some time to realise we cannot expect everyone to understand or value our sensitivity, to many people (especially those who are numbed out or defended against feeling)  it will continue to be seen as a sign of weakness .