A place for empaths to share

Originally Posted by Sunshine111

Bonjour Legrand

Le plaisir est le mien

What is your own definition of empathy and being an empath, in your own words, irrelevant to any definitions given by any association or person?.

How do you perceive and understand this?.

Hello Sunshine,

To me Empath is just a word. I took the general definition on the first post of this thread simply to start from someplace to discuss on what some may have experienced in relation to this word. The important being what one experiences.

To me it comes as the ability to feel others from the inside.

On the positive side of the experience I already wrote this:

Originally Posted by Legrand

Hello,

They are a lot of positive aspects to being an empath that we don’t often talk about.

Just to give a few exemples. In my spiritual development I simply need to meditate with or just sit near, and now just simply focus on/with a master of a given discipline to actually feel his or her state of being. It really accelerated my ability to be in this world in different ways that would of taken me years of practice alone to discover otherwise.

And what not to say about those simple pleasures I sometimes give myself to enjoy, like just taking the time to take a few hours and sit in front of a new flower in the garden and watch it open to the sun. Actually becoming the flower for those few hours.

Enjoy!

Hope it helps?

[Molearner]

This probably will make no one happy but empathy, as commonly defined, can be a trap....leaving one in limbo and stunting development. Empathy, by itself, can be a good thing but unless it leads to compassion can be seen as a yoke. Just my personal opinion.....:)

[ThatMan]

I am an empath and I have always been this way... This is one of the things that I love about myself, I care for everyone and I feel their suffering even the suffering of people that are completely strangers to me, and because of this, I also feel a great deal of inner suffering.I feel like a magnet for the suffering of people and not just only people... To me the greatest suffering to an empath is to not be able to relieve the pain of other people.. The very nature of your being says that you are born to help here and yet you can't and this is horrible.When I see a dead animal I always say something like: "Goodbye my little one"; in fact I do the very same thing with the deceased people, it does not matter if I know them or not.I can't do many things for myself because I feel that I do a "bad" thing, it's like why I am doing something for myself when the core of my being screams to do something for other people, for this very reason I make sure I don't do too much for myself.When I eat good food I think about the people who have almost nothing and nothing to eat, it hurts... When I have a good time with my family I feel that I should not be happy because there are people suffering in the world.I can go on and on, I love this thing at myself but it's causing me a "ton" of pain and yet I would not give it up for nothing in this world.

I simply can't understand why all people are not like me, I can't understand how can they think so much of themselves and how they can do so many things for themselves, I just can't, my mind can't comprehend this idea.. This is also making me sad and angry at those people who are so obsessed with their well being and sometimes I hate them but then I do what I do the best, I put myself in their shoes and I understand... I will do the very same thing if I would be just like them.

This ability, "to put myself in the shoes of other people" is how I feel the suffering of other people...

I also feel mercy and have a great deal of understanding for the people who were/are bad with me, I see them as being blind and that they are living in darkness, they can't see that they are hurting me.I remember all the moments I hurt someone in this world, I kept these memories as a way to remind myself that I have to grow to not make the same mistakes again.

[davidsun]

Originally Posted by ThatMan

I can't do many things for myself because I feel that I do a "bad" thing, it's like why I am doing something for myself when the core of my being screams to do something for other people, for this very reason I make sure I don't do too much for myself.When I eat good food I think about the people who have almost nothing and nothing to eat, it hurts... When I have a good time with my family I feel that I should not be happy because there are people suffering in the world.I can go on and on, ...

The Q which poses itself (in me) in response to what you say here is: Does your having a 'good' time (necessarily) hurt/harm someone else? Likewise does your having a 'bad' time (necessarily) benefit someone else?

This vignette also comes to mind in this regard: "And being in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at meat, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment of spikenard very precious; and she brake the box, and poured it on his head. And there were some that had indignation within themselves, and said, Why was this waste of the ointment made? For it might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, and have been given to the poor. And they murmured against her. And Jesus said, Let her alone; why trouble ye her? she hath wrought a good work on me. For ye have the poor with you always, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good: but me ye have not always. She hath done what she could: she is come aforehand to anoint my body to the burying."

Originally Posted by ThatMan

I love this thing [about] myself but it's causing me a "ton" of pain and yet I would not give it up for nothing in this world.

That's you choice of course.

Originally Posted by ThatMan

I simply can't understand why all people are not like me, ...

Your capacity for 'empathy' is not deployed in their 'direction', maybe - only being responsive to 'suffering' and not 'joy', perhaps.

Originally Posted by ThatMan

This ability, "to put myself in the shoes of other people" is how I feel the suffering of other people...

But not their 'joy'?

It strikes me that you fail to appreciate the fact that the sharing of 'joy' (not just of 'suffering') can also be a relationally positive motivator - in those who feel related, that is.

[Sunshine111]

Originally Posted by Legrand

Hello Sunshine,

To me Empath is just a word. I took the general definition on the first post of this thread simply to start from someplace to discuss on what some may have experienced in relation to this word. The important being what one experiences.

To me it comes as the ability to feel others from the inside.

On the positive side of the experience I already wrote this:



Hope it helps?

Yes, it did help to remember a monk that I called "father". The specific monk/father came into a very hard time then, in my life. He was introduced to me by a very religious friend who had already invited him to come to "the real world" from the mountain and forests where he absolutely dedicated himself to God in a monastery, prior to this hard time begun.

As I said to him among others, "I am like a flower that you water with all this love in your heart, each time you see me, and a flower that opens its pedals in the sun, each time I see you".

The good news is that, he has a mobile phone number.

[Sunshine111]

Originally Posted by Molearner

This probably will make no one happy but empathy, as commonly defined, can be a trap....leaving one in limbo and stunting development. Empathy, by itself, can be a good thing but unless it leads to compassion can be seen as a yoke. Just my personal opinion.....:)

I am happy in general and with what you say as, I find it very interesting. Do you mind developing on what you said further and explaining in what way "can be a trap, empathy as commonly defined(how it is defined commonly)..."leaving one in limbo stunting development".

And, how can empathy lead to compassion?.

Thanks.

[Sunshine111]

Originally Posted by ThatMan

I am an empath and I have always been this way... This is one of the things that I love about myself, I care for everyone and I feel their suffering even the suffering of people that are completely strangers to me, and because of this, I also feel a great deal of inner suffering.I feel like a magnet for the suffering of people and not just only people... To me the greatest suffering to an empath is to not be able to relieve the pain of other people.. The very nature of your being says that you are born to help here and yet you can't and this is horrible.When I see a dead animal I always say something like: "Goodbye my little one"; in fact I do the very same thing with the deceased people, it does not matter if I know them or not.I can't do many things for myself because I feel that I do a "bad" thing, it's like why I am doing something for myself when the core of my being screams to do something for other people, for this very reason I make sure I don't do too much for myself.When I eat good food I think about the people who have almost nothing and nothing to eat, it hurts... When I have a good time with my family I feel that I should not be happy because there are people suffering in the world.I can go on and on, I love this thing at myself but it's causing me a "ton" of pain and yet I would not give it up for nothing in this world.

I simply can't understand why all people are not like me, I can't understand how can they think so much of themselves and how they can do so many things for themselves, I just can't, my mind can't comprehend this idea.. This is also making me sad and angry at those people who are so obsessed with their well being and sometimes I hate them but then I do what I do the best, I put myself in their shoes and I understand... I will do the very same thing if I would be just like them.

This ability, "to put myself in the shoes of other people" is how I feel the suffering of other people...

I also feel mercy and have a great deal of understanding for the people who were/are bad with me, I see them as being blind and that they are living in darkness, they can't see that they are hurting me.I remember all the moments I hurt someone in this world, I kept these memories as a way to remind myself that I have to grow to not make the same mistakes again.

What a great man you are! This is one of the most beautiful posts for me, ever! Thank you for sharing your experiences and feelings, that is very brave!.

I am not so great as you are to care about everyone especially those who could not care less about anything else other than themselves, hurting and harming others deliberately, creating a whole havoc, devastation and problems to others.

[JustBe]

Originally Posted by Sunshine111

Just Be and Let "others" Be.

I am very well aware that, you are not God and not right in everything that you say or even impose or want to impose on "others" who can "sense", "feel" of what the truth is and is not for each one of them and for each and every single thing in this life but, most of all, HAVE their OWN mind and can make their own mind freely and indepedently.

I trust in others that they do have the ability to form their own judgement of matters and reach their own conclusion.

My own judgement is a fact and the fact that, THIS IS A PLACE FOR EMPATHS TO SHARE, if you want to share as "an empath" in the way you view and perceive this any further from your own experiences, based on the questions of this thread then, I will address and welcome this.

Anything else other than this is completely unwelcome and unwanted, will receive no acknowledgement and will be completely ignored by me.

Not just be but, let others be and stop imposing on me and/or "others" or forcing me or "others" to adopt your viewpoints as, the only viewpoints that are right and your person as the only person who is right and is right in everything you say while another or other who do not follow, obey, adopt your own views as you perceive them, wrong.

There is no imposing.

It was offered and you avoided even contemplating what was offered.

I see now by your responses why.

Legrand did say in the op -anything you want to share.

I’ll leave you to control the space in how things are shared. I’ve overcome control so it’s no place for me interacting with those who do.

All the best.

[Molearner]

Originally Posted by Sunshine111

I am happy in general and with what you say as, I find it very interesting. Do you mind developing on what you said further and explaining in what way "can be a trap, empathy as commonly defined(how it is defined commonly)..."leaving one in limbo stunting development".

And, how can empathy lead to compassion?.

Thanks.

Sunshine111,

Oddly enough I googled empathy trap and there is an article from Psychology Today entitled The Empathy Trap.........better for you to read that rather than accepting my summary......in specific regards to compassion by definition it implies action from the stimuli of empathy. This action can assuage our conscience among other benefits.....e.g. actually helping the one you feel empathy for.

[Sunshine111]

Originally Posted by Molearner

Sunshine111,

Oddly enough I googled empathy trap and there is an article from Psychology Today entitled The Empathy Trap.........better for you to read that rather than accepting my summary......in specific regards to compassion by definition it implies action from the stimuli of empathy. This action can assuage our conscience among other benefits.....e.g. actually helping the one you feel empathy for.

Hello Molearner,

Could you please share/post/send the URL of the article you mentioned?.

Thank you for the enlightenment that you offered me in regards to myself and that what takes place with my feelings of empathy=taking action, acting on them is compassion.

I found that , there was absolutely nothing to be achieved by just feeling miserable or to be suffering from the suffering of any person.

Action on my feelings of empathy was just a salvation from these absolutely overwhelming feelings, they were no longer overwhelming and lessened. I also felt fully in charge of my feelings and that, I was in control and charge of them, not them of my own person.

Unfortunately, there were some past stories that there was never any suffering in the one presented the suffering to me, knowing the specific person that, I will take the specific action expected or wanted to be taken by me and reason why of the "caution" post that certain "others", dark, negative forces can play on the feelings of empathy of another.