Isn't empathy normal?
I live in California, so I hear a lot of random comments from random people. A woman today told me I was an "empath" and I should get guidance. Now, I just smiled and moved along. I remembered it as I was on the internet and google'd. Now, as I can relate to most (if not all) of the signs... can't everyone? Both of my parents are very empathetic and I thought getting anxiety in crowds and the like was normal as well.
I talked to my friend who is a self-proclaimed psychic and she told me she thought I knew I was empathic. Is there a course I forgot to take, because I had never heard of it before. I was always told I was just very anxious and "sweet" or "sensitive". She brought up the fact that I can always tell when my loved ones are in trouble. I remember on multiple occasions crying at random or feeling as if I could just cry at the time of my mom, grandma, and brother were in trouble a state away. Of course, this was before I knew that they were in pain or sick. I chalked it up to coincidence.
Random people on the street also feel the need to tell me their life story. It makes me very uncomfortable and my husband didn't believe me before we were married. Now it's a common topic of teasing.
I'm not one to deny anything. I'm factual, but open-minded. What is this "guidance" that this woman was talking about?
Comments
Empathy is a normal human characteristic and it is a necessary component for the development of compassion, polite behavior, and even normal social skills. Typically empathy begins to develop when a child becomes aware that other people experience the world differently than they do. This provides the basis for "perspective taking" which is necessary to develop empathy. This might be demonstrated by a child crying when a character in a book gets hurt. Essentially, a person recognizes a situation being experienced by another person, considers the experiences, takes the other person's perspective, and feels emotions as if the event is occuring to them. That's the psychological explanation for the term empathy.
You are talking about more than the ability to understand the world from another person's perspective and the ability to take a different perspective. Your description relates to a sensitivity to the emotions of other people that occurs even if you don't know anything about the other person or people. You also discuss feeling emotions when relatives are experiencing a crisis in a different location. These are not the same characteristics of empathy that are discussed in standard psychology. These characteristics cannot be explained by normal physical or emotional theories.
You ask if everybody has these sorts of feelings, and that's a difficult question to answer. It is possible that these sorts of experiences are available to many people, but only a few people recognize these feelings and acknowledge them. It's also possible that only certain people are able to interpret these feelings well enough to understand what they are. In any case, you are having experiences that many other people would not understand.
In terms of "guidance", I would recommend that you use common sense and your intuition as guidance. It can be helpful to speak with other people who have similar experiences, but you are the best person to understand what you are experiencing and how you should best act upon your feelings. Good luck, and I hope this information is helpful to you!
Picking up on people's feelings isn't a "gift" to me. I used to do it a lot. I could go into a place feeling happy and come out almost bent over. I posted a question on here about feeling like dancing in a certain house.. I think I was picking up on the feelings that were in that house the same as I picked up negative feelings at the other place. I have a friend who I don't like to go out with sometimes because I can feel some things she feels. I'm mostly around negative people now and you can tell it by the way I look . I look downtrodden and unhappy. Be careful about trying to be empathetic. BE YOURSELF.
Normal empathy is normal. Most human beings relate closely to how others are feeling, and most of us are quite perceptive in picking up non verbal clues like body language to determine a person's emotions.
However this New Age 'Empath' idea is just poppycock which originated on some fictional scifi show. You can't magically know how someone is feeling although plenty of people like to imagine that they do.
The 'guidance' was most likely some creative way for a psychic charlatan to lighten your purse.
Random people probably tell you stuff because you look friendly and make eye contact - next time scowl angrily at them and look away - that puts off all but the most rhinoceros hided folks.
everyone in the world has a subconcious trait that allows them to find characteristics to determine a person's feelings. It is common and simple and can be done by anyone. Here's the misconseption though. And empath has a greater sense of this trait, and can sense feeling without the guide of any characteristics. In other words, they can feel your feelings, along with the feelings of animals and spirits. The woman was probably telling you to learn to utilize your empath abilities, that is if you have them.
Random complete strangers are right to treat you differently, it's not normal to be able to relate to the emotions of others.
no not all people can do it
I can only do it with someone I have had a physical connection with at anytime..be it family friends or the lady at DMV
Some people are sociopaths and feel nothing about anyone at all.. ever
not everyone is empathetic. and that just means your more aware of your surroundins and understanding, i think