By Amanda Moreno
So…there’s a lot going on these days, in the world and in people’s personal lives. How many times have I made that statement? Yet, it always seems to hit a deeper layer, and as the complexity merges with themes of letting go, life feels more and more surreal.
Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day
I’ve been quite stuck in my own process, but recent events have kicked me out of that a little bit. As the personal crises amp up for the people around me, the more my inner strength seems to grow.
For the first time in a long time, the sense of urgency I feel doesn’t feed my inertia and paralysis, but instead seems to be motivating and grounding. I’m also increasingly aware of the need for communities to form, at the same time as I find resistance within myself.
I’ve also been thinking a lot about what it means to be empathic, and I’m recognizing so many other empathic folks around me, and the ways we often struggle with being so attuned to the emotional energy of others. Perhaps that’s our normal or natural state of being as humans? It is all connected, after all.
I learned what the term “empath” means a few years ago, and several thousand light bulbs went off in my head. Yet some of what I read makes me cringe, be it out of recognition or disagreement. Once a concept is labeled and categorized, it seems to be pathologized, too. Or leaned on as a crutch. Or exploited.
My current working definition of the term is something like: An individual with an (often poorly understood) intuitive ability that allows them to feel the emotions of others. This can lead to the empath channeling the emotions themselves and internalizing them as their own. The empathic person is different from the empathetic person in that the latter is imagining what it is like to be in the other person’s shoes, whereas the empathic person is actually feeling the energy of the other person’s emotions — which can get pretty sticky, especially seeing as so much of it is unconscious. Empathic traits are also known as clairsentience.
The first time I recognized and got a conscious sense of my own empathic abilities in action, a friend I’d been intimately involved with for several years came over while in the middle of a personal crisis. There it was — the felt sense of all of his anxiety and grief and sadness careening towards me and into me. I flashed back to nights where he would call me at 2 am, in the middle of anxious insomniac attacks. He’d fall asleep shortly after I arrived, while I stayed up all night. Talk about co-dependency.
As he sat in my living room that day, essentially dumping his words and emotions, I realized what was happening. I then made the conscious decision not to take the emotions in, and erected a kind of barrier. I could still sense what he was feeling, but kept it separate from my own emotions, which were being triggered due to the heartbreaking nature of his story. He was going through something intense that mirrored some of my own experience, and I felt my own sadness arising.
Whereas previously my exchanges with this person would end with him feeling much more calm and relieved and me feeling anxious and wrecked, my boundaries gave me space to think objectively. I was able to give him a few recommendations for what he might be able to do to take care of himself, along with some hugs. It was a pretty big moment for me.
Another example: the first time I witnessed a ‘play’ scene, in the kinky sense, a woman was being spanked for an extended period of time. As she writhed, and the intensity grew, I was aware that I could feel the pain she was feeling. I remember thinking to myself, “No way. This is so fucking weird — but of course!” It didn’t feel like my ass was being hit by a hand or cane or flogger exactly, but I could feel the energetic rippling: first of her anxiety, and then her pain through warmth that seemed to radiate out from my ass and thighs, and then her euphoria as the endorphins set in. The scene ended with both of us quite high, although for better or worse I didn’t have the bruises to show for it. It was a huge eye-opener for me.
Since then, as I have become more aware of energetic boundaries, I have gone through several different phases of coping with what is, at times, a seemingly involuntary ability to take on or channel other people’s emotions. Last fall, I began to go through the pissed-off phase, angry at what felt like unwanted invasions. I began to recognize just how much it felt like things were hurtling at me all the time. I amped up all of my protective boundaries out of a longing to keep my field as clear as possible, as some really difficult stuff had gotten in.
I write that, and I become aware of a particular framework or worldview, which is where I’ve been getting stuck when trying to process or write about the dynamics of energy and identifying as an empath. Do I really want to live as if I have to protect myself from negative energies? Is it naive to think I don’t have to? Is the very act of protecting myself from something out there the same act that invites it in, or creates it in my field?
In an energy session the other day, my healer dude asked me to describe a feeling of tension I was having around my abdomen. I could see or sense what felt like clear space directly around my body, extending a bit outward, but then a darker or denser energy outside of that. It felt like it was encroaching. It didn’t feel evil or harmful, just different. He asked what it would be like to just let that energy flow through me.
I had some resistance at first; a feeling in my gut that was tight and clenched, unwilling to let go. But I trust this healer dude quite a bit, and decided to give it a try. Healer dude subscribes to a worldview in which even if there are ‘negative’ or ‘heavier’ energies hanging out in a person’s field, it is because they resonate with something within them. Therefore, working with the energies can reveal something about the person and what they are working on or through. Everything in its right place.
As I began to let the energy flow through, I noticed a relaxation. I noticed a flow. I noticed…presence. Not in the sense of an entity being there, but in that I felt…present.
The healer dude and I had a conversation after that about some various Buddhist techniques, all of them involving this kind of presence, particularly with more dense or ‘negative’ energies. He spoke of feeding them with love, transmuting them. It reminded me of the kind of work I do with spirit attachments or earth-bound spirits, in which getting them to the light is the ultimate goal, rather than exorcizing them or casting them out as fundamentally damned.
During the ‘anger’ phase of my empathic awakening, I struggled with feeling like some energies are parasitic. Like once they find the light within you, they feed and feed and feed. This experience is coming up against new worldviews I’m currently being exposed to, or old ones that are coming back to light. It should be interesting to see how it all shakes out.
There is also a masochistic dynamic I can recognize in the waltz of the empath. There is the potential for an ingrained belief that we become invaluable to people by merit of being able to take on all of their stuff, even if they’re not aware that’s what’s happening, and even if it hurts — by becoming the savior. That is a huge topic that I hope to cover in the very near future.
Bringing it back to the beginning, as I notice so many around me — myself included — embedded within some kind of crucible these days, I’m aware of two things. At the personal level, something is shifting in the way I meet other people’s crises, especially those I share physical intimacy with. I’m not hanging onto the emotions and locking them into my body, at least not as much as I used to. There is a difference between unconsciously taking it on, blocking it entirely, and allowing the energy in for a bit to alleviate some suffering.
At the collective level, I’m constantly compelled by an urgent sense that we need to be assisting and supporting the empathic among us. In light of the whole ‘it’s all connected’ thing, perhaps that’s just a call to help us all, and a more appropriate sentence would be: there’s a lot of feelings flying around out there — wouldn’t it be wonderful if we supported each other in developing those senses so they can be used for healing?
Take care, everyone. I’m very much looking forward to further explorations here.
Amanda,
A poignant set of thoughts, thank you. I will take the opportunity to describe my generic experience as an empath which is an extention of what you have so aptly described here. That is, I am a mirror. I don’t try to be, never asked to be, anyone’s “mirror”. But because I am so tuned in energetically to everyone around me, they necessarily project onto my energy, and project themselves onto me. No wonder “everyone likes me”! And no wonder those with whom I may not feel close feel close to me and are dismayed, angry or worse when they find I make my own choices–and not theirs.
My family of origin is exxtremely co-dependent, reading you here today got me thinking again about this empath subject and gave some deeper insight as to why my family can’t begin to embrace just how much I love them–they see themselves only in me, and it is not what they imagine they would see, yet it is there reflection.
Thanks for the thoughts.
aWord , I like that analogy about your family seeing you as a reflection they do not own. That really connects to my experience. When I was a reflection of the part my family all agreed to be – our collective judgment rested on other scape goats. When I began waking from the delusion they began rejecting (they felt suspicion) me – Its seems all about projection of unwanted or fearful feeling.
Hi aWord ~
I spend a lot of time thinking about projection (being a depth psychology, jungian-thought oriented human at heart), and can relate to your experience of being a mirror but also often remind myself that that’s what we *all* are essentially. Most relationships are built upon projection. And yet… I come across people all the time who seem to be human projection magnets in ways that are above and beyond the “normal” psychological understanding.
The family bit is also interesting, and I’m not able to provide much commentary based on my own experience (I’ve chosen to leave my family dynamics out of my writing here, which leaves a pretty gaping hole, but…so it goes), but can definitely relate. The frustration that arises in those moments when I realize just how difficult it seems for family members to see ME outside of their own projections can be pretty intense. Thanks for sharing!
Being the mirror can be a bitch because many people do not like to look at what is reflected back at them. I’ve been on the receiving end. I, too came from a codependent family.
Remarkable piece — really hit home. Thank you so much for sharing.
You’re welcome 🙂
I’m familiar with blocking energies. I have just recently learned how to do it. It takes some energy, and focus. It’s worth it when I don’t want to take on someone else’s emotions. I’m just now learning that I’ve been absorbing people’s emotions like a sponge for years. My aunt Penny once told me I used to just sit around wide-eyed like a sponge, taking everything in. Putting up an energy barrier nowadays (when necessary) affords me the strength to be there for the other person as they’re “dumping” their emotions. There’s something satisfying about sitting still, listening and watching as someone dumps their emotions, then responding to them with unflappable calm.
Ah, yes. The unflappable calm. That quality came in particularly handy for me when I was working the front desk at a community based mental health agency. People would come in in all kinds of crisis (sometimes psychotic or high), and I’d quickly shield, becoming more and more calm as they amped up. I would always notice, however, that once they would leave I would often start shaking, and on a few occasions crying.
Another story comes to mind. On one of those occasions, someone came in while in crisis and their energy was particularly rough. I sent them into a session room with one of our counselors so that she could give them some crisis counseling, but not before shielding the heck out of the room with a kind of white light, fire and ice protective barrier I sometimes use. 20 minutes or so later, the client and counselor came out of the room, client full of peaceful smiles. After they left the counselor told me that five minutes in the client started remarking on all of the white light filling the room, and how loving and peaceful it felt to be sitting there in it. It was a lovely affirmation 🙂
Amanda, Thank you for all the ways you have been sharing in this column over the last year. It is very personal and deeply reveling on many levels.
As I read today I felt compelled to share a technique I learned to do when I know some one is going to be downloading difficult information with me. That is I imagine a window screen around myself. This screen allows me to listen, feel, and experience what they are sharing , and then the energy continues to move on the wind through my field. I am able to be fully present knowing it is continuing on and does not have to become my energy.
I feel the screen is simplistic as I write this. I also know it has worked for me.
Perhaps this will add one more tool to your tool kit.
Blessing, Jeanne
Thanks, Jeanne. I love simple tools And there is something about imagining the movement of energy that seems particularly helpful, especially for those of us who tend to have patterns of “getting stuck.”
I love the screen idea. In my work, I sit and listen to people all day. I’m trying it out tomorrow.
Like others writing here, I’m having to learn techniques to deal with the impact others’ energy can have on me. (I’ve also come to some realizations about how much of my own energy I can throw off onto others without realizing it.)
Amanda’s description of her healer-dude’s idea about letting the energy pass through sounds a lot like one of the techniques my healer-lady had me try in my last session. And it’s the one I keep forgetting, so I appreciate the reminder!
She had described it as being like letting yourself get so expanded that you’re like a cloud: all spacious…like there’s all this room between your molecules to let the energy just pass right through those spaces. And then you can bring yourself back into the usual embodied form.
It’s kind of a cool technique, but a little intimidating for me since I’m not always confident that I can let it pass through without accidentally letting it stick in some way. Then there’s the inner “tai chi pivot,” which is just kind of letting your core shift/pivot internally so the energy slides right on by.
Of course, part of my challenge is recognizing that someone’s energy is coming at me before it gets in, so I can try one of these (or else the “warrior deflection,” which just sends up that wall and bounces it back).
And then, when that fails, I practice different ways of discharging it — then asking “god”/source for help and offering it up to the light if I just can’t quite shake it myself.
But I can’t say I’m “proficient” at any of these yet…in fact, might be a life-long practice. 🙂
I also had a “lightbulb” moment last month when I realized that I can often put myself into an energetically leaky/un-centered space when I simply *recount* a stressful or energetically un-balancing event to someone else — even when I came out of that event feeling pretty neutral and grounded. I associated it with my talents and tendencies as an actor: that to act, you have to re-create true emotion, you have to “live” the story in all its emotional and energetic fullness. I’m not sure which cam first: did I have that tendency, and so I was drawn to acting? Or is it that in becoming more open and skilled as an actor, I’ve brought this tendency to re-live or act out the stressful event I am describing to someone?
Michael — you’re also an actor: have you noticed yourself doing this, too?
Anyway, I realized that one of my next lessons may be figuring out how to tell someone about stressful events with difficult people *without* re-creating the stress and energetic leakage; without bringing that “stuff” into my core and then blasting it out to the person I’m talking to.
You’re so great. Thanks for sharing so many really valid points and techniques.
In particular – thanks for reminding me that the energy absorption/leakage thing goes two ways. That’s pretty important to remember 🙂
As the “spaciousness” ideas come forward, I totally relate to that little fear that the energy might just get stuck anyway. I have a hard time trusting. But what comes to mind as I type that is that I suppose for me it’s another opportunity to learn (or, as some would say, another FGO – Fucking Growth Opportunity) — if something “gets stuck,” perhaps it has something to teach. Energy Healer Dude has helped me to explore the edges of those spots, rather than forcing myself through them, instead getting a feel for them and any associated memories or thoughts or sensations that arise. Helps to keep the fear at a minimum.
As for the recounting bit, I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately. Where you associate it with your tendencies as an actor (and I suppose my Leo-Rising, formerly-wanting-to-be-a-Broadway-Star self can relate to that), I associate it with the power of words to convey all kinds of energies. I’ve started noticing there are times when I start telling a charged story and become aware of little signals that perhaps I shouldn’t be sharing – I lost my train of thought consistently, or the phone connection keeps dropping all combined with an intuition that I should stop talking. It’s hard to stop sometimes because I do love the drama of storytelling, but those words have a mind all their own sometimes. Or most of the time. Maybe ( work in progress).
Ah — interesting; I’ll be curious to see/hear what insights come from your explorations in tracking the words you use. I can’t say I’ve noticed an association there, but then, I have not been focused on the words so much as the people and types of situations/energies that seem to be most prone to this “reliving” above and beyond a “retelling.”
Sometimes in the direct, initial interaction, I’ve actually felt like I had stayed fairly neutral. But then in retelling it to someone, I allow myself to go to that more leaky/unbalanced/infused-by-another’s-energy place. And then all of a sudden, I realize I’m in that icky energy, and I’m giving it off left and right (and right at the person listening to me). Curious dynamic, that. Not sure if it means I was not as solidly/clearly neutral in the original interaction to begin with, or if some part of me gets off on the other energy, or gets off on expressing it to someone else?
I’ll keep observing and noting…
*(edited note: I just realized I’ve repeated myself a bunch here, but I’m going to leave it. Apparently my consciousness really needs to chew on this issue/set of questions…) 🙂
I started out being really aware of the words I use in ritual specifically – but now am noticing it in most areas. I have lotsa Gemini/Mercury karma going on 🙂
Amanda thanks for another deep thinking article. I think I am empathic but I do seem to naturally shed the emotional content of others while fully focusing on how they feel. I usually am pretty good at working with them to raise their vibration after they have vented and I walk away feeling energized. But I just never recall having to worry about other peoples honest drama.
For me it is the unspoken denied energy of a relationship that saturates me and leaves me feeling drained and frustrated. And If I call attention to the energy I have usually fallen victim to the plot; now its all mine and the other walks away lighter and refreshed.
I am learning more about how to filter my environment and focus my energy where it feels good. The ideas mentioned in these pages sound like wonderful strategies to practice. Thanks all.
Thanks for sharing!
I’ve definitely noticed that when I’m in a “proper” container for sharing, I tend to walk away feeling energized. The most obvious example of this is when I’m in sessions with clients.
“For me it is the unspoken denied energy of a relationship that saturates me and leaves me feeling drained and frustrated. And If I call attention to the energy I have usually fallen victim to the plot; now its all mine and the other walks away lighter and refreshed.”
Oh, lord. I can so, so, so, so relate and have so much to do with the hurt I have surrounding this pattern. I might write out that last sentence and post it somewhere just as a reminder to me of how easy it can be to fall victim to the plot and then experience the pain of watching them walk away lighter and refreshed. Oofda. Thanks for that.
Thank you for your pertinent topic, Amanda. I have recently experienced many empaths coming to the realization that they need to discern what is theirs and what is not theirs. My experience is there is a growing awareness in the collective as our ’empaths’ of the world raise their frequency and become conscious about their specific relationship to emotional streams of consciousness.
For me, I have discovered that what I am really ‘tapping into’ is a stream of consciousness. If I open to it fully, I notice I may actually experience its’ formation and expansion throughout the evolution of that consciousness. As an empath, it can feel very overwhelming to ‘process’ that through – which is what I did most of my life as well. It started with individuals and then eventually became a collective emotional stream that was being processed and released. It took me years to learn the discernment of what was mine, what was another’s, and what was collective consciousness. And, ultimately, aren’t they all the One in its many expressions? Anyway, I digress….
I do want to acknowledge two pieces – one is that the key to me was much as others’ have so beautifully expressed, I had to learn to be an open window and not a screen on which any energy stuck.
Over the years, I have also been told to ‘protect’ myself, but I would always feel as if I was blocking the flow of ‘life’ or ‘Divine’ energy if I created a barrier of some sort. It did not feel like the highest answer for me though I did not always know what the answer was. I practiced acknowledging that all energy was transmuted to love as it came toward me and the only thing that passed through me was love. Then, later, I actually realized that it did not need to be transmuted as all things are love at their core – I just invited my Being to recognize the core of all existence no matter what emotional stream it was using as a vehicle.
In recent years, I learned to attune myself to BE the light and radiate Source energy. From this ‘center point’ of existence, I am not at the effect of anyone’s energy as I am always vibrating light and love outward from the One I AM rather than ‘receiving’ anyone’s energy. As I have realized Oneness within mySelf, all is the One energy moving in various forms. I may be aware of someone’s ‘concept’ about the energy or identification with a particular energy stream, but it does not change my awareness of Self as consciousness or existence in an ever-flowing wave of light and love.
Another way to say this is I experience the wave but without attachment to it, I just let it ride through – like an ocean wave – I am the ocean not the waves in it – I may experience the movement – whether it is gentle or thrashing, but I am the whole ocean so I cannot be at the effect of the wave.
And, what is so beautiful is that everyone is allowed to experience what is theirs to experience right where they are in this moment.
Thanks to everyone for sharing their insights so beautifully here.
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Thanks! The best piece you’ve written and I so appreciate the play scene. I’ve identified as empath, for several years. I became involved in the BDSM scene 5 yrs ago and it’s actually been incredibly healing, allowing me to play with the energies and get more in touch in a safe environment. Pretty ironic to call a Dungeon safe!
Also know about the anger phase of feeling violated and invaded. And have struggled with the whole protection thing. One thing that has helped is realizing that the energy of love is the greatest protection of all. The Buddhist practices actually shower the negative in love and compassion, killing the demons with loving-kindness, and turning them into an ally. So much to discuss here.
Entering the BDSM scene has definitely been a catalyst for accelerated understanding about energy. There IS definitely a lot to discuss here — I’ll try to incorporate those themes more in the future.