A beautiful quality of humans is empathy, the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Humans need empathy in order to relate and learn from each other. Empathy develops as we age and experience life.
But there are some people that FEEL life a bit more deeply and absorb the energy of people and places easily. This can affect how they relate to others, how they feel emotionally and physically, how they behave, and, in some cases, can even be debilitating. These people are called empaths.
The 10 major traits of an empath are:
- You feel other people's emotions before you even talk to them.
- You feel the energy of a place like it's got "good or bad energy".
- You find yourself happy, angry, sad, etc. for no reason.
- You get overwhelmed emotionally in crowded settings.
- You dread parties because it feels like it's too much and too draining.
- You feel like you absorb other people's feelings easily and then have a hard time distinguishing them from your own.
- You are highly intuitive, especially when it comes to receiving information through your body (like headaches, goosebumps, feeling physical symptoms that someone else is feeling).
- Your energy gets depleted when you're around certain people, especially narcissists.
- You feel energized when you are out in nature, especially around water or lost of greenery.
- You get frazzled by lots of noise, smells, etc. Too much input to your senses!
If you answered yes to more than 5 of these questions, then you're probably an empath!
Being an empath is a beautiful thing as long as you take care of yourself energetically. Knowing what energy and emotions are yours is key to being happy, healthy, and having great relationships. Empaths are highly sensitive people, but not highly sensitive people are empaths. Empaths are natural healers and are drawn to helping others because they can deeply empathize with them.