While someone may be an empath, it does not limit them to just being an empath. They may also have or develop other psychic abilities, such as telepathy, channelling, clairvoyance, etc. Empathy is one branch of our psychic abilities.
There is no shame in being an empath. You should not have to hide this from others, or even yourself. Who you are is a blessing, and you have the potential to enrich other people's lives so much that they will flock to be around you. The empath can not only receive emotions, but they can also send, and where they feel pain in others, they can, instead of taking on the pain, choose to send joy and healing instead. You can literally bring someone out from their deepest despair just by doing this, and being you.
Unless you are an empath, you will find it hard to understand what it's like. Many non-empathic people will simply pooh pooh the concept. Some will feel uncomfortable if they believe that another can read their feelings.
Being an empath is more common than people might think. Women, by their nature, are more prone to being empathic. Males are less common, but possibly suffer more as they don't fully fit into being with 'real men'. That does not mean that an empathic male is gay, but just less interested in the earthier things. Many will have little interest in cars, sports, people blowing up each other, etc.
Being an empath does not make a person any better than another. It's simply another ability. Nor does it make a person chosen, special, spiritual or automatically good. Those things come through your intentions, your actions and your goals.
When I first found a spiritual community many years ago, I discovered three things: Having psychic abilities does not make one spiritual, good or knowledgeable. In fact, I was quite appalled to see how many just had egos that were running out of control. The three things are quite exclusive.
You can be spiritual without being good or knowledgeable.
You can be knowledgeable without being good or spiritual.
You can be good without being spiritual or knowledgeable.
Some of the most spiritual people I know have no apparent psychic ability.
So being empathic does not mean you are any of those three. That comes from who you are, what you do and what you have taken the time to experience and study.
I say this because there is a perception that if you're an empath, this makes you somehow better than another. It certainly makes you different, and that's nothing to be ashamed of. But be wary. Don't use it to big note oneself. Use it wisely. Tell others when it's appropriate. Don't just bring it up out of context. Far from being impressed, most people will find it annoying. Some may even resent you.
The reason I give this caution is that being an empath, you will pick up on these things. You will find that the rush of finding out that you are empathic can easily be countered by what you get from another.
I've met quite a few people who claimed to be empaths, but interestingly enough, they never seem to really pick up on what I'm feeling. I remember having someone proudly proclaim to me that he was an empath while being totally oblivious to the fact that I was one, too.
I would suggest that they would be medium level empaths. Those who do indeed have empathy, but it's limited and not very highly refined.
I believe a high level empath can tell who is an empath and who is not pretty easily. Distance isn't really a barrier as you can pick up a sensation, a type of feeling from others.
It's also not uncommon for an empath to be somewhat telepathic. They are able to pick up people's thoughts. I believe what happens is that the empathy attunes you to others vibrational levels and this in turn attunes you to the vibrational levels of thought. Normally, though, it's a very subtle thing and you don't tend to notice it unless the other person says something.
Leaning to deal with empathy can be tricky, especially if you're not in a good space.
Chakras
Chakras are energy centres in your body. By visualization techniques, you can open and close them. If they are wide open, they can leave you very vulnerable to energies and psychic influences. This is not a good thing for the empath. Many people open them while meditating, and while it certainly enhances the experience, they forget to close them down afterwards.
When someone has been overwhelmed and is feeling strange, I often suggest they shut their chakras a little and it always seems to help them.
