Self-Care for Empaths

by Tanya Carroll Richardson

  A good self-care practice will sometimes ask you to explore your inconvenient or even painful emotions. Be very gentle and loving with yourself as you enter this vulnerable territory, and get any extra support you need. Know that positive change and healing can be the results.

  Practice Observer Mode and Witnessing Energy

  Empaths have a special place inside they can retreat to, even when they’re around many people. Entering observer mode and witnessing others allows you to enjoy or support the person you’re around without feeling that person’s energies or emotions intimately. Witnessing is one of the most useful techniques in an empath’s self-care kit.

  There will be times when someone else’s energies and emotions overtake you regardless of your best efforts. But your best efforts will help significantly, and get even better with time and practice. The more you mindfully work with observer mode, the more your own systems will automatically switch into observer mode when the situation calls for it.

  You’ll know you are in observer mode when you are:

  • Pulling back into your own energy. You might imagine that your energy body is a cape or cloak, which can be open and unfurled when you want to open up and feel. In observer mode, you will pull your energy back, like wrapping that same cape or cloak around you instead. Get a mental image of your energy cape or cloak—is it bold like a superhero’s, or is it simple and understated, or decorated with intricate, colorful embroidery?

  • Witnessing someone else’s energies and emotions with concern or pleasure but also with curiosity. Instead of wanting to relate to them, feel with them, or change their emotion, you are lovingly allowing them the space to feel and process their emotions, both the wonderful ones and the challenging ones.

  • Mimicking the energy of people you know who are adept at using witnessing energy. Doctors and counselors can be excellent at it because it allows them to use critical thinking and observation to better diagnose and help patients—instead of becoming overwhelmed by their patients’ emotions. Doctors and counselors may be tuning in to you emotionally, but they have real boundaries and conditions with that.

  • Experiencing a balanced emotional state or energy, even as those around you are experiencing big emotions, like joy, anxiety, grief, or eager anticipation. In observer mode, you are surfing on top of and around these emotional waves while balancing on your own sturdy, stable energy.

  • Imagining space between your energy body and someone else’s, or imagining your energy body shrinking back into your physical body as if your physical body is a shield. Witnessing energy is holding someone else’s energy at arm’s length, no matter how close they are to you physically, creating neutral, open energetic space between you.

  Sometime in the next few days, practice mindfully entering observer mode—perhaps when your partner comes home filled with intense energy and tells you about an amazing day at work, or when your child cries over a friend who’s hurt their feelings, or when you see something on the news that troubles you. You can take action to help others or simply offer comfort while in observer mode. In fact, you might find you have more stamina for supporting others when you are engaging witnessing energy.

  Using witnessing energy does not mean you stop caring, or become cold. Empaths can still have great compassion for others without feeling all their energies and emotions quite so intimately. Sometimes holding a calm space for someone who is very emotional is the most loving action.

  Open Up to Feel

  Sometimes as an empath, you will want to open up to feel more and mindfully encourage your amazing ability to sense the energies and emotions of others. This practice can allow you to experience bliss, like celebrating a dear friend who got a dream job, or a family member who got sober. There are even times when you might want to open up to feel the challenging, painful emotions and energies of others.

  Opening up to feel in to suffering on the other side of the world can inform your actions, like inspiring you to make a charitable donation, volunteer, change the way you vote, or change the way you shop. Other times, feeling the suffering of someone else might give you a clearer window into your own suffering or make you feel less alone in the struggles of human existence. Opening up to feel challenging things can also simply be a way to authentically honor who you are, an empath, as well as honor the person who is suffering by being with them energetically in an intimate way.

  Opening up to feel and mindfully using your empath ability feels like:

  • Your own energetic and emotional systems are active and tingly. You might feel the energy around you or in you change, like becoming thicker or lighter. Any change or palpable shift in the energy around you or inside yourself means you have opened up to feel more. Your emotions may change as well, like feeling sad or happy or anything else that the person you are tuning in to is feeling.

  • Your heart chakra and heart energy are awakened. This is what the phrase “My heart goes out to you” is describing. Your heart energy can make you feel very compassionate; tender; emotionally receptive; and moved to help, comfort, or connect with someone.

  • Having knowledge of what someone else is feeling because you are feeling it too through clairsentience, as opposed to having that knowledge come another way, like via the intellectual psychic pathway of claircognizance as a breakthrough thought, strong knowing, or mental download.

  • Experiencing physical changes related to what someone else is feeling, like tearing up if they are very sad or noticing your eyes widen and smile broaden if they are very happy.

  • Your emotions and energy body still buzzing or feeling more engaged, even if just briefly, after you have stopped tuning in or ended your interaction with this person.

  Sometime in the next week, practice mindfully opening up to feel. You can practice letting your heart go out to a loved one or coworker, or to an issue in the larger world. Notice if you feel any of the sensations noted here.

  Opening up to feel is a dynamic way to connect with others, but it is also a dynamic way to connect with yourself and your empath ability. In that sense, opening up to feel more is an act of self-care and self-love.

  Process Your Emotions Before Using Witnessing Energy

  Observer mode and witnessing energy are not meant to be used as an emotional bypass that helps you avoid your own feelings. In fact, if you try to use observer mode to protect yourself before you process your strong emotions, it won’t work well. This protocol does work well for situations when you know in advance that you’ll face a triggering person or situation and you want to meet them/it in observer mode to minimize drama, protect your sensitive empath system, or support someone who is going through an emotional time.

  You might encounter a situation when you should process your own emotions before you use observer mode if, for example, a close friend is ill and you want to be strong and supportive for them; a triggering family member will be at an upcoming event and you want to keep the peace; you’re very jealous of someone but want to celebrate their win with them in a loving way; or you know your win will be difficult for someone you love and you want to share your good news with them in a more subdued or neutral way (imagine you win an Oscar but your bestie isn’t even nominated). Here’s how.

  1. Acknowledge your emotions. It can help to name these emotions—“I’m sad” or “I’m excited,” for instance—but don’t judge them as right or wrong, good or bad.

  2. Find a healthy way to process these emotions. Refer back to the Develop a Personalized Method to Process Your Emotions exercise in Chapter 2.

  3. Pay special attention to the processing technique of sharing your emotions with someone. Pick someone safe, loving, and discreet who isn’t too close to the situation.

  4. If possible, wait to enter observer mode until your emotions have cooled. For example, wait until the situation doesn’t seem so bad or even so intensely good, or until you can see fresh perspectives, you start to soften toward a person or situation that upset you, or you can thin
k less emotionally and more objectively or practically. If it’s not possible to wait to enter observer mode until your emotions have cooled, see the Enter Observer Mode Quickly exercise in this chapter.

  Connecting with and processing your own emotions first clears space for you to fully embrace observer mode with an open mind and heart.

  Switch Back and Forth Between Observing and Feeling

  Most of life exists in the gray areas or between extremes. Many times, especially with practice and understanding, you will be holding space with others by engaging both witnessing energy and your empath ability to open up and feel more, switching back and forth automatically between the two. You’re looking for a balance.

  If the balance feels too far to one extreme, lean back the other way. For example, if you’re opening up to feel (whether you’ve made the mindful decision to do this or your own energetic and emotional systems have engaged on their own), but you start to become emotionally overwhelmed and drained, mindfully switch into observer mode. Sometimes when an empath is feeling generally run-down, it’s a great time to practice leaning more toward witnessing energy to rebalance. On the other hand, if you’re feeling isolated or disconnected, or you simply want to feel more intimately connected with someone, switch out of observer mode and open up to feel with heart energy.

  Switching back and forth between witnessing energy and opening up to feel is something I do naturally in sessions with clients. You’re no doubt doing the same in your own life. For this exercise, you’ll simply be doing it more mindfully to help you get clear on what both approaches are like, as well as why and when you might switch back and forth.

  Try to let this exercise occur organically. You don’t have to plan for it ahead of time. Maybe after you read this section of the book, life will present you with the perfect opportunity to practice this exercise! Look for a situation where someone wants to share and confide in you about something that is upsetting them or something they’re really excited about. A situation like this should not be hard to come by, as many empaths naturally attract this sort of deep sharing. Then follow these steps.

  1. As the person begins telling you what they’re upset or excited about, check in with yourself. Are you tired or anxious? If so, you might want to lead with witnessing energy, which can be less draining. Are you feeling bored or lonely, or has this other person already engaged your heart energy automatically? Perhaps opening up to feel more with your clairsentience will be nourishing or appropriate.

  2. As the person keeps sharing and you engage with words of comfort or advice, or mirror back to them their own joy, check in with yourself about what you feel that person needs most. Would a grounded, calm witnessing energy help them ground or express and process emotions, or do you sense that letting your heart go out to them and feeling with them would make them feel more seen and less alone or strengthen/deepen your bond?

  3. Once you decide mentally, or your energy and emotions decide naturally, which energy to lead with—witnessing or opening up to feel—notice how it becomes a dance, where at times you feel a tug on your own heart, and then at other times you pull back and snuggle into your own energy.

  4. After the encounter ends, notice how witnessing in observer mode and opening up to feel are different. You may think of witnessing energy as intellectual and opening up to feel as emotional.

  You will receive intuitive insights using both, so it’s important to know that you don’t have to choose one method over another. Keeping a balance of each will serve you well.

  Enter Observer Mode Quickly

  This exercise is perfect for everyday situations with people you interact with briefly or casually, like strangers standing next to you in line who may be throwing off some difficult or funky energies and emotions.

  Follow these steps to practice getting into an observer frame of mind in just moments.

  1. Quickly imagine the energy field that naturally surrounds your body as a cape or cloak. Imagine this magical garment any way you like: soft and comforting or flashy and runway ready. Now picture yourself drawing that energy cape or cloak very close around you. Or you can imagine your energy body pulling away from the other person so there is open space between the two of you. Or you can imagine your energy body shrinking back into your physical body as if your physical body is a shield.

  2. As you notice the energies or emotions of this other person, name them in your mind (frustrated, bored, happy, anxious, sad, excited, confused, angry). As an empath, you might get extra intuitive data, like perhaps how this person’s mood has to do with their frustrations about the future or an underlying loneliness.

  3. Observe with curiosity how this person is feeling, but stay in your head instead of going into your heart. (Example: “Oh, that’s interesting. This cashier seems a little bored and down. I’m getting the intuitive information that it’s because there is something in her life outside of work she’s unhappy about. I’ll be sure to smile at her when she gives me my receipt. It has nothing to do with me, so I’ll let these observations fade away as I walk out of the store.”) These observations will probably come to you quickly as a mental download, which means you are using the intellectual psychic pathway, claircognizance.

  4. Take your attention somewhere else directly after your interaction. One of the most powerful ways we tune in to other people is simply by thinking about them. When you do not want to engage in their energy, though, it’s important to take your mind to another subject or engage your body in an activity.

  Practicing witnessing energy in these everyday situations will slowly give you the skills and confidence to practice observer mode when the emotional stakes are higher and more personal.

  Your energy body is connected to your physical body, yet also larger than—and not limited to—the confines of the physical body. Empaths have a very sensitive energy body and naturally notice the changes in their own and other people’s energy bodies.

  List Ways to Connect with Your Unique Energy

  If you’re feeling scattered or drained by the energy of those around you or the larger world, a fun way to re-ground in to your own energy is to celebrate or emphasize the unique ways that you do you! The following list will help. Complete the statements, jotting your answers down here or writing them in your journal. Refer to this list whenever you need to feel more grounded.

  • I love to spend a lazy day…

  • The following causes are close to my heart…

  • My ideal longer vacation involves…

  • My ideal day trip is…

  • My creative outlet is…

  • When I’m scared, I typically comfort myself with…

  • I’m most connected to my spirituality when…

  • I feel most alive and on purpose when…

  • I always feel centered and grounded by…

  • Some of the things that are most unique about me are…

  • I’d describe my sense of humor as…

  • My favorite way to celebrate is…

  • I express my love for people by…

  • Some adjectives I would use to describe myself are…

  • I adore dressing in…

  • Some of the things I love most about myself are…

  • People often compliment me on or admire me for…

  • My biggest dreams and life goals include…

  • I’m naturally good at…

  • I’ve learned to be good at…

  • My favorite foods are…

  • My favorite musical artists are…

  • My favorite nature settings include…

  • My favorite ways to nurture or connect with my body are…

  • I think part of the reason my soul is here is to…

  • Someone I talk to when I’m upset is…

  • People I like to share my big and small wins with include…

  • I am almost always cheered up by…

  • Some of the things I’m most grateful for in my
life are…

  Tune In to the Energy of Nature

  Empaths have a special relationship with nature, and strolling or sitting in nature at least once a week gives your energy body a tune-up. Seek out places where you feel immersed in nature, if possible. Before you start this exercise, locate a calm, immersive outdoor setting where you can ground in to your own energy—pick a spot where the vibes are chill and noise levels are relatively low. Allow at least 20 minutes, or even 30 to 45 minutes, alone for this exercise. Practice what you’ve learned in the other exercises in this chapter about tuning in and focusing—you want to achieve a gentle, soft focus, encouraging your sensitive energy body to open up and feel. To get started:

  1. Take a few deep, calming breaths to get into your physical body and out of your mind. Whether you’re sitting still on a park bench or strolling along a boardwalk, try to slow down your thoughts so that you experience fewer thoughts. Work with a mantra if that helps, like “I’m resting my mind for a bit.”

  2. Engage mindfully with your five physical senses. Are you smelling the damp dirt and moss of the forest floor? Do you hear a squirrel scampering through a bush as leaves shake loose behind it? You might be watching waves rush up to a beach’s shore, or feeling the wet, grainy sand beneath your feet. If you’re sipping water, coffee, or kombucha, notice how it tastes.

  3. Observe how you feel. Do you feel less scattered? Ideally, you’re experiencing relaxation now. If your mind is chattering or wandering, continue to try to notice your surroundings. If you’re near trees, focus gently on the color of the leaves and the texture of the bark. Noticing the details of your environment will help your mind settle. Take more slow, deep breaths.