Are Empaths Even Real?
If you have brave enough to identify yourself as an Empath, you have probably been asked a question or heard a reality denying statement like this:
Are Empaths even real?
Or
Empath is just a label.
Or
Aren’t people using the term Empath to disguise your trauma as a superpower?
Let’s address them.
Are Empaths even real?
Yes.
An Empath is someone who has a heightened ability to feel/take on the emotions of others. Psychology says that there are varying degrees of empathy, those that have so much empathy that they take on the emotions, energy, and burdens of others, we call Empaths.
Psychologist and author of The Fear Factor, Abigail Marsh, found neurological differences in the brains of people that have an abnormally high level of empathy. She found that these people had an easier time recognizing fear in others and had an amygdala that was 8% larger than those in her control group.
Think of it as a bell curve, on one end we have narcissists that lack the ability to feel empathy at all. In the middle is everyone that feels varying degrees of empathy, and on the far end there are people that feel a lot of empathy. We call them Empaths.
Empath is just a label.
Yes, Empath is a label.
You know what are “just” labels? Gender, race, sexual orientation.
We use labels to help share our experiences in a convenient way. Think of it as the communal hashtag in the imagination of the public.
Labels don’t encompass the entire history of a person.
Labels are a social construct..
We make social constructs, or social agreements so we can understand one another better.
Have an understanding to communicate from.
If a label lets us connect around shared experiences and find tools for growth, then it is helpful.
If a label makes us feel like a victim and makes us feel disempowered, then it isn’t helpful.
If someone identifies as something, like the term Empath, and that label brings value to them and lets them start to solve problems, why would you deny it?
If someone tells you, when I am around sad people, I feel completly drained, and you respond, “you’re imagining it.” Is that helpful? Is it kind?
What right do you have to decide on someone else’s reality?
How can you know better than the person having the experience what experience they are having?
Questioning someone about their personal experience in order to deny that they have it, is not supportive or helpful.
Arguing over a term of common understanding, is a game of semantics that misses the point.
Personally, when I learned that there was a term for my experience that let me connect with others with similar experiences, I was thrilled.
Aren’t people using the term Empath to disguise your trauma as a superpower?
Look. We all have trauma. No person makes it through life without hard things happening to them.
Not everyone takes on the energy and emotions of others. In fact, most people do not.
Not everyone is an Empath.
There is a lot to be gained when we address our trauma and the dark sides of our personality, we gain clarity, we gain insight, and we can start to find peace and acceptance.
And in this way, we can lean into something that many look at as a curse and turn it into our greatest asset.
Deep connection, deep understanding, and the ability to navigate through our own challenges to learn.
Are you an Empath?
My name is Emily Grass and I have a free Facebook Group for you! Alignment for Empaths, this is a place that we come to support one another, learn to trust our intuition, manage our energy, and learn to lean in to our SUPERPOWER.