Have you be labeled as “too emotional” or overly sensitive?
If your friend is distraught, do you feel distraught, too?
Are your feelings easily hurt?
Do you get emotionally drained by crowds and require alone time to revive?
Do you over-compensate (eat, drink, sleep, shop, etc.) to cope with emotional stress?
Are you often identified or suspected of having ADD or ADHD (but you find you can focus when you want)?
Are you a talented daydreamer and visionary?
Do you feel you are part of something vastly larger and bigger out “there” but do not quite fit in “here”?
Are you attracted to all that is contained in the Universe?

I define spirituality as a search for love, beauty, happiness and wisdom. Spirituality is a journey that we never finish.
~Akiane Kramarik,

As far back as I can remember, I was told I was over-sensitive, especially by my father. My mother told me from the moment I was born I was a crier. If I witnessed an argument, I would drown in emotions. If anger was directed at me, I cried. If I saw someone hurt, or an animal, I wanted to soothe them. All of them.., the hungry, abused, and lonely, I felt a sadness in my heart. I needed to soothe those emotions in them, to heal them, because in doing so, I would soothe myself. As a child, I saw this a defect as I apparently wasn’t “like everyone else.” Especially when family members were telling me that my feelings were hurt too easily.  I was scolded for expressing such sadness..  Yet, I always felt that I was part of something much more than here. When looking into space, into the Universe, the longing, is surreal (neither happy or sad).

However, in the past 10 years or so, I randomly would meet people and they would tell me, “Michelle, you have an empathetic soul.’.  I started studying what “empath” meant. That is when I truly knew I had a purpose on this Earth and that my existence as it was, an empath, was not a defect, but a wonderfulness. I embrace the soul within, or should I say my soul embraces my human-ness. My soul is far more powerful than my mortal mind can comprehend, but my heart feels every day. There is so much we cannot possibly understand about the Universe we live in, but I believe when others come out and openly share their thoughts, words, and actions (sum total of life experiences), we find that no one is ever alone.

Below is an insightful article by a esteemed doctor of psychiatry, Judith Orloff, Ph.D., who also has an empathetic soul and has made it her mission to spread the news that being an empath is not a defect. If you accept it, understand it, and find your balance, your center, it is a wonderful life indeed..

“Hold on to your divine blush, your innate rosy magic, or end up brown. Once you’re brown, you’ll find out you’re blue. As blue as indigo. And you know what that means. Indigo. Indigoing. Indigone.” –Tom Robbins,  Jitterbug Perfume

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Empaths are highly sensitive, finely tuned instruments when it comes to emotions. They feel everything, sometimes to an extreme, and are less apt to intellectualize feelings. Intuition is the filter through which they experience the world. Empaths are naturally giving, spiritually attuned, and good listeners. If you want heart, empaths have got it. Through thick and thin, they’re there for you, world-class nurturers.

The trademark of empaths is that they know where you’re coming from. Some can do this without taking on people’s feelings. However, for better or worse, others, like myself and many of my patients, can become angst-sucking sponges. This often overrides the sublime capacity to absorb positive emotions and all that is beautiful. If empaths are around peace and love, their bodies assimilate these and flourish. Negativity, though, often feels assaultive, exhausting. Thus, they’re particularly easy marks for emotional vampires, whose fear or rage can ravage empaths. As a subconscious defense, they may gain weight as a buffer. When thin, they’re more vulnerable to negativity, a missing cause of overeating. Plus, an empath’s sensitivity can be overwhelming in romantic relationships; many stay single since they haven’t learned to negotiate their special cohabitation needs with a partner.

When empaths absorb the impact of stressful emotions, it can trigger panic attacks, depression, food, sex and drug binges, and a plethora of physical symptoms that defy traditional medical diagnosis from fatigue to agorophobia. 

Empathy doesn’t have to make you feel too much all the time. Now that I can center myself and refrain from shouldering civilization’s discontents, empathy continues to make me freer, igniting my compassion, vitality, and sense of the miraculous. Recognizing that you’re an empath is the first step in taking charge of your emotions instead of constantly drowning in them. Staying on top of empathy will improve your self-care and relationships.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Adapted from Dr. Judith Orloff’sNew York Times Bestseller, “Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself From Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life” (Three Rivers Press, 2011)

Transforming the face of psychiatry, Judith Orloff, Ph.D., asserts that we are keepers of an innate intuitive intelligence so perceptive that it can tell us how to heal — and prevent — illness. Yet intuition and spirituality are the very aspects of our wisdom usually disenfranchised from traditional health care.

Dr. Orloff advocates “a democracy of healing,” wherein every aspect of our being is granted a vote in the search for total health. It is our birthright, both as health-care givers and health-care recipients, to reclaim our intuition to build energy and well-being. In response to her work, The Los Angeles Times calls Dr. Orloff “a prominent energy-based healer.”

Dr. Orloff is accomplishing for psychiatry what physicians like Dean Ornish and Mehmet Oz have done for mainstream medicine — she is proving that the links between physical, emotional, and spiritual health can’t be ignored. Dr. Orloff has spoken at medical schools, hospitals, the American Psychiatric Association, Fortune Magazine’s Most Powerful Women Summit, and alternative and traditional health forums — venues where she presents practical intuitive tools to doctors, patients, and everyday people.

As a board-certified psychiatrist and assistant professor of psychiatry at UCLA, Dr. Orloff draws upon her own intuitive abilities to help her patients and workshop participants. Dr. Orloff’s latest book “The Ecstasy of Surrender: 12 Surprising Ways Letting Go Can Empower Your Life” (Harmony Books, 2014) describes the power of letting go in everyday life, health, and wellness–an enlivening and sane alternative to pushing, forcing, and over controlling people and situations. In addition, her struggles acknowledging and then finally embracing her gift of intuition are chronicled in “Second Sight” (Warner Books). Her second book, “Dr. Orloff’s: Guide to Intuitive Healing” (Three Rivers Press) shows how breakthroughs in healing our body, emotions, and sexuality can be accomplished by listening to intuition. “Positive Energy” which has been translated into 23 languages, takes a probing look at the American epidemic of exhaustion and how we can reverse it using specific strategies to build energy and combat draining people. Her New York Times Bestseller, “Emotional Freedom” describes how to transform negative emotions into positive ones with specific techniques.

Dr. Orloff begins talks by creating a bond of warmth, trust and intimacy with participants, within which they can hear and explore her ideas. Her sincerity, humor, and joy bring everyone in the audience with her — leaving everyone certain of their own intuitive abilities, as well as Dr. Orloff’s contributions to a radically new kind of medicine.

Dr. Orloff is also a Huffington Post, Psychology Today, LifeScript.com and PBS Next Avenue (boomer site), blogger.

Dr. Orloff was voted “Most Inspirational Person” for the Readers Choice 2012 awards on About.com (a New York Times site.)

The Sunday Times Style in London calls Dr. Orloff “the positive energy guru.”