Are you a highly sensitive empath?

I was too.

This is a common label, identity or concept that is very popular in the spiritual community today.

When you start becoming more in tune with your own energy and listening to your intuition, you can start to feel everything around you. You feel more connected to nature, animals, other humans, maybe even too much at first. It can even become overwhelming.

The reason it might become overwhelming is because we are not used to feeling so much. We've built layers of protection around ourselves in order to not feel the pain inside. We also have so much within us that we've attached to and keep ourselves so busy so as to not have to deal with it or feel what is longing to be purged. But society sells us on do, do, do, more, more, more, only then will you be happy and be enough. So we never seem to get around to working through all the junk and walls inside of us.

The moment you actively start participating in your own evolution, is the moment you start breaking down those walls of protection and feeling what's underneath. The more you clear and let go, the more you feel.

Everyone has this power. To feel. To tune in. To act from our intuition. This is a gift of feeling that we all have that sometimes goes against our conditioned mind and makes you feel uncomfortable. It's a wonderful sensitivity that we all can access and train ourselves to trust and act on.

To be honest, everyone is sensitive when in their true nature.

But highly sensitive? This is a term to label the mind. It is the mind that is sensitive, not your body and the body is simply responding to your mind. It becomes programmed to do so.

Empathy is a lovely gesture. But at what cost? It can be a great tool to use wisely to tap into an experience and try to resonate with what one might be going through, but tap in and tap out. Don't stay there. You will get taken down with the ship. What use is it trying to save someone from drowning when you are drowning in empathy right next to them. Not so wise right? Not to mention the burnout you will feel. Drained and exhausted all the time.

A much better quality to cultivate is compassion.

Compassion involves wisdom. It is resonating with the suffering in another as we are all interconnected, but it is maintaining strong boundaries to serve and support, without compromising ones own health & stability.

Another disadvantage about using the label highly sensitive empath is you become extremely disempowered. You start to believe that you take on energies and other energies are intentionally draining you. For the most part, this is just an illusion and exaggeration of the mind.

Not to say that we don't need to protect our minds and bodies from energetic or physical danger, this is there too, but, we do need to stay grounded and logical as well.

You are creating your reality with your own unique perception. You are transmitting a signal out into the quantum field with your frequency. This frequency can be distorted, when we are full of illusions in our mind. In order to get back to seeing things more as they truly are, we need to bring in logic & reasoning.

Some questions to ask yourself next time you feel you are absorbing too much energy, think someone is stealing your energy or draining you or trying to energetically attack you:

1. Is this actually real or is my mind exaggerating things?

2. Can someone else really drain me? If so, why would I give them that power?

3. Are people really trying to steal my energy? Are they really that intentional and aware of what they're doing? or are they maybe lonely, vulnerable, suffering and looking for support without being aware of it?

4. Do I want to feel stuck at home in order to protect myself?

5. Do I want to continue living in fear and separation because I have this belief that I absorb all the bad and negative energies from people or people are draining me?

If you don't want to live with this narrative debilitating you, making you sick and feeling disempowered, then it's time to CHANGE THE NARRATIVE.

Listen, if you're an introvert like me and need alone time to reconnect with yourself and keep filling yourself up, this will always be a priority.

Self-care first in order to serve.

But you can live your life with a stronger narrative for yourself with wisdom, compassion and boundaries.

I just stopped using this term altogether.

It no longer served me.

It did in the beginning of my journey when I was first opening to my true nature, but then it became a crutch & a disability. Who wants to end up in bed for a week from doing a job they love and helping to benefit others? I didn't anymore. I was fed up.

Now, with every situation, I bring a combination of logic & intuition. An integration of the masculine and the feminine or compassion & wisdom.

I question my mind.

Does this narrative help me serve others?

Does this narrative empower me or disempower me?

Is this narrative actually real or has my mind exaggerated shit again? LOL.

Your labels, identities and narratives are helpful... until they're not.

We must keep evolving.

If you're getting sick, living in fear, feeling debilitated, exhausted, disempowered, lonely, isolated, frustrated, etc.

Start to question yourself.

Sit in meditation or with a journal and contemplate things.

Is this really serving me or do I need to change things up?

You create your reality with your unique perception.

So change it to something that serves you better and helps you to serve others in a way that fills you up, not sinks you.

The choice is yours.

It all comes down to your mind.

Is it ruling you or are you ready to take the steering wheel?