Inspiring Story: I’m an Empath and I Feel EVERYTHING

By Lauren Cecora from laurencecora.com

I’m an emotional person. No, really. From as young as I can remember, I remember hearing the words “why are you so emotional?”. It’s engraved in every fiber of my being. With every joyous or sad occasion, the words “emotional” are attached to those memories. When someone cries, I feel the hurt. I tense up, my eyes swell up with tears, and I feel my heart ache with pain. When someone has a joyous occasion, I feel the vibrations in my body. I feel my heart burst with excitement. I feel that joy.

That all seems amazing right? FEELING life with so much heart and soul? Wrong. You see, it got me into a lot of messy situations. Crying when I got my first speeding ticket and the officer thinking I was trying to weasel my way out of the fine, crying when I missed a college class to due a car accident and my adviser thinking I was lying and being “over dramatic”, sending my husband (then boyfriend) off on deployment and being unable to get out of bed, people thought I was overreacting. Its hard, when your emotions guide so much of your day to day.The thing I was missing – learning to harness and control those intense emotions.

It wasn’t until I was diagnosed with Postpartum Depression with a four week old baby at home, that someone saw my struggle. They believed me when I spoke. They listened as I cried. And they made me feel as though my reactions to things were normal. Someone saw my emotions not as a crutch but as a tool. A tool to help me become the best version of me, but I needed some lessons.

Those lessons included tuning into my emotional breaking points – aka when I had reached my max amount of brain and physical power. There is no “pushing through” when you’ve been feeling emotions with such highs and lows for weeks on end. People just like me, emotional people, just crash. Crashing can look like angry outbursts, fits of hysterical crying, falling asleep during focused tasks like driving, eating, or work. My body has been working through such a surge of energy that I just….snap and shut down. I need a release, and since I haven’t given myself the chance to reset- my bodies does it for me.

People with high emotions need resets. They need time away from people, noise, light, and tasks. They need to sit and reflect. They need sleep, and they need good wholesome food. Food that nourishes, not depletes. Food low in sugar so our bodies aren’t crashing after too much sweets or caffeine.

We need silence. Strict silence.

I know now after 3 years of personal development, therapy, meditation, research, and doctors that I’m what is called an Empath. Empaths are feelers. It’s why people can feel so easy to open up to certain people after only knowing them for such a short amount of time. They are the people who can empathize the most with your circumstances because if you are feeling something, they can feel it too.

After much research on empaths, In order for me to truly take care of myself, I’ve had to learn to rest and respect my time. I’m a planner, and so by nature, my calendar gets full quickly – in order for me to avoid those emotional breakdowns, I have to schedule in “non scheduled” time. That means saying no to work, social events, or even volunteering my energy or time. It means truly respecting my energy capacity, and allowing myself to refuel so I can function at my highest state. When I allow myself rest, there are no moments when I snap or freak out, or yell, or cry uncontrollably. Rest allows me to get back to my baseline and continue to do the things that give me joy, even if they take a lot out of me in an energy sense.

If you feel as though you’re an empath too or maybe you need some energy work, I encourage you to lessen your to-do list. Take some obligations off your plate. Allow yourself the opportunity to rest and reset. Both brain and physically. And if you’re already coming up with excuses in your head as to how you can’t do less, I want to ask you a very serious question:

If you aren’t around to do those things – then who would do them?

At the end of the day, we all want a happy healthy US, and the only way to ensure that is to take care of ourselves in the fullest capacity.

Lauren Cecora,
www.laurencecora.com

Lauren is a Postpartum Mentor who serves mothers who are struggling with Postpartum Depression & Anxiety. She focuses on three foundational blocks for healing: Self Care, Time Management, Holistic Healing Alternatives. Connect with her at www.laurencecora.com