People of the Heart – Part One – from a 50+ yr. old empath

“I am an Empath – Which basically means I feel everything! If I choose, and more than most people believe I should.”

“Since I was a small child I could feel life at such a deep level of my being that it would cause me to weep; oft times, uncontrollably. I would cry for the gratitude I felt at the beauty of a flower and the sunset, of seeing my Maker’s hand who caused the winds to blow through the trees, or the Son that would give His great Life Giving Bounty. I felt such an oneness to Our Mother, The Earth and felt it a duty to give myself to tasks that would honor her. I would weep for everything. I would weep for the sorrow that I felt from the world. I would weep for someone’s anger, for someone’s pain and for things that were amiss.

“It was not only an emotionally deep feeling, it was very often physically painful as well. If I was too invested in what came, it would hurt my ‘core’ physically, which pain runs deep and I found, could only be relieved by crying out for the help of that Being much greater than myself. When I became a teenager and became more awakened to life’s physical journey, I was blossoming into a young lady and noticed that I was the only one crying! At that point, I asked the Lord if He would please take some of these tears away, which He did; for a time.

“An Empath belongs to a group of people who are highly sensitive and by definition can be quite opposite in extremes. These is no ‘one shoe fits all’ and they are often misjudged and prone to being given certain labels. Some individuals are as bold as the lightning and thunder storm, while others may be as gentle as a light summer rain that you hardly notice as they may need to know that it is safe to share. They can be either male or female, but are generally female as the feminine principles are more active in an Empath. Nurturing, compassionate, intuitive wisdom flows through their beings rather than the stark opposite principles; decisive, independent, dominating aggression that are so common in the world. The feminine principles exist in males and females, controlled by the right side of the brain which is the visionary, creative, feeling side in all humanity. Children are usually empathic but as they grow and embrace the world they live in, they often lose their sensitivities as they adopt other focuses. Some Empaths often appear to be preoccupied, very serious minded or even sad. They can appear to be overly burdened and feeling as though they are carrying the ‘weight of the world’ upon their shoulders and seriously, maybe that is what they have come to do in your life and with your family. An Empath has tremendous capacity to love with a great desire to serve their fellowman and would be willing to lay down their all for the betterment of humanity. The truest Empath is innocent, tender, without guile and pure of heart. I will call them the People of the Heart.

“All people are empathic to a certain degree and can develop a greater ability to open their Hearts to the feelings of others. What most people do not do is draw these emotions into themselves and absorb them. Most people may not even be aware that the possibility of such a thing exists. An Empath can actually take the energy of an emotion from you, thus making your feel better, lighter, and free from the burden of your thoughts and actions, all the way up to and including the taking of your physical maladies. An Empath may do it on a non-voluntary level. They do it automatically; like it has a magnetic pulling force. It feels natural to them as breathing in and out. And much of the time they can be quite ignorant of the fact that this is what is happening and may think that these thoughts and emotions are their own. They may be experiencing your highest highs and your lowest lows and not quite understand what in the world they are feeling and why.

“An Empath has the ability to walk into a room and immediately ‘feel’ what emotions exist. If there is sadness, anger, pain, fear, sorrow, guilt, etc. they can take on these emotions, pull them into themselves as if these were their own and begin to ‘work’ on them.

“I have had to keep myself very sheltered and clean to be at my best. City vibrations, actions that do not uplift, hard music or sometimes, even music at all. Negative words and ideas, the violence in movies, wifi that intrudes into our sacred spaces of life, etc., affect me very much. They effect all living things whether it is realized or not.

“Needless to say, it can sometimes be very difficult to be in large crowds. If the group is not of a more positive nature, it can be almost overwhelming. The room can begin talking to my soul. I will start to have all of these ‘things’ flying at me. I can start to feel sick to my stomach. My heart can begin hurting, I can get headaches or feel pain in a specific place on my body. I can feel extreme anguish to my soul. I can also feel the awfulness of unrepentant sin and feel so dark and weighed down that it sickens me and all I can think of is to just find solitude. Therein, I can pray in sincerity of my whole heart, asking for whatever help the Lord would offer upon the matter. I now see this as a way to help lift those burdens from mankind for at least a short time, so that greater things can be restored. But only with His permission.”

We will continue this next time.