Navigating Life as an Empath

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The Healthy Empath
One of the many reasons I love talking to people so deeply and honestly is that conversations often unearth or provoke interesting concepts for me to explore. When a friend recently mentioned that they would love to read anything I might have to say about how to navigate life as an empath, a list instantly formed in my head. That was interesting because lists aren’t my typical style of writing. I’m more of a stream of consciousness person, with a heavy bent toward thorough organization of whatever came out in the stream. That’s because it’s really important to me to make sense to all of you. I love to philosophize, it’s kind of my thing, but what really lights me up is to be understood well enough to have you say, “that really resonates with me” or even “that’s not my experience at all.” I like to create connection through mutual understanding or through open curiosity about diverse views. Both are equally creative and joy producing for me. If connecting in that way also creates joy for you, please share your thoughts with me in the comments.

A couple of things before I get to the list. Synchronicity (love the magic) put a beautiful short video on my screen this morning about how some of us become empathic. It was from the Jungian perspective, and it reminded me that many of us come to our empathic abilities as a critical skill developed in childhood when our situation requires hypervigilance to enhance safety, and sometimes even to ensure survival. Two other points the video made that I find central to this discussion are that: 1) because we were denied the “sacred selfishness” stage of normal development and individuation in childhood we are likely very uncomfortable with the idea of being considered selfish -ever, and 2) those of us who came to empathy this way are very susceptible to burnout. Both of these tendencies are strong indicators that we are likely still in a chronic state of hypervigilance and that our nervous system never truly gets to rest.

I personally believe some of us come to our empathic self through a highly sensitive nature and the fact that we never shut down our childhood connection to all that is, and the wonder it fed in us. However, this does not mean that we don’t have the same misconceptions about ourselves and the need to repattern the same behaviors as the hypervigilant empath. Whether you came to be empathic in the former or the later fashion, let your opinion that you are selfish (very unlikely), and your awareness that you’re burned out (very likely) be messengers that you are an empath who needs help harnessing your skills and learning to eliminate self-harm from the practice.

Don’t let any of this dishearten you, many important life skills come out of necessity and should not be underrated because they come from traumatic, overwhelming or isolating life experiences. I believe empathy is an amazing superpower. Even if, up to now we have used it in a way that is self-denying. At a certain point we just have to reclaim and finetune it so that it doesn’t drain us or continue to be a way in which others deplete and abuse us. I hope the following list of practices helps you to live a freer life, more attuned to your own needs and less so to those of others.

Helpful Hints for Empaths:

• Don’t do anything for others that they haven’t directly requested of you. I know you can feel what they want from you; that’s not the point. Most have probably learned that they can sneak their requests and desires into your psyche without having to actually acknowledge they are asking something of you. This will help them repattern as much as it will help you repattern.  
• Practice saying “no” anytime any part of your being isn’t 100% on board with what is being proposed or asked of you (verbally, nonverbally or in any other way).
• You can soften or explain your “no” initially, but it will become important to eventually say “no” without explanation.
• Do one thing every day that is solely for you. It doesn’t have to be big; it just needs to be prioritizing yourself. And when the voice in your head yells “you’re being a selfish asshole,” tell it to shut up.
• Ask clarifying questions. If you can feel that something is up with someone and you don’t clearly understand their intentions and actions, ask. If they don’t want to be clear and forthright about what is going on for them, they don’t get to benefit from your empathy. This is not selfish or unkind. It is setting healthy psychic and emotional boundaries.
• When you feel shifts in your mood or wellbeing that don’t seem to fit your current situation, it is likely that you are carrying someone else’s stuff. Let it go. I use a simple statement such as: “You are not mine and you don’t have permission to be in my energy field. You must go.”
• Simply put, we are allowing ourselves to read the room (i.e. be empathic), we just aren’t responding to any of the unspoken demands that the people present are making on us.
• Finally, the more fully we allow ourselves (the true, sovereign, healthfully selfish, authentic us) to inhabit our life and our energy bodies, the easier it is to not absorb other people’s stuff. This will initially feel incredible counterintuitive. It will feel like we are being unkind and giving up our ability to read life, and that will feel scary. I promise you that if we are practicing healthy empathy, our empathic superpower is fully intact and will activate if ever needed. And even more importantly, it will be tuned toward enhancing our own life instead of burning us out chasing the illusion that we can ever satisfy the desires of others.

We truly are the main character in our own life, and it’s critical to know that we count. We are important. When we give ourselves what we need in life we create sovereignty, wholeness and a deep understanding of our worth. This is healthy engagement with sacred selfishness. This is how we reclaim our lives. I’m still and will probably always be finetuning my understanding and my practice of healthy empathy and sacred selfishness. That’s why it’s such a relief to know that it’s only by practicing these skills with self-kindness that I find my truth and my wholeness. No perfection needed or desired. Those who would harm us by way of this tender skill will likely push back hard, criticize and maybe even end their relationship with us when we start to set these boundaries and act from a place of self-appreciation. It’s okay, we just keep doing what is right for us. Their reaction is none of our business. We are only responsible for finding our wholeness. They are responsible for finding theirs.  

If you are interested in empathy, boundaries and the afterlife, check out this video. 

​Tawa Ranes is a writer, healer and astrologer. She is in awe of the communicative and connective potential inherent in words and language and loves to use them as an entryway into deeper understanding and communion with others. She writes in a candid voice with deeply philosophical undertones. Tawa is a leap before you look extraordinaire and the creative founding spirit behind Solar Moon Press.