Forum Activity for @hop-daddy

I think so many of us struggle with accepting empathy and psychic skills as a gift. For many of us it seems anything but a gift as it causes some daily struggles. We've all discussed the challenges of being an empath with all that goes on in our heads (not to mention the anxiety and depression that often comes with this). I was watching a movie on TV the other night, and Morgan Freeman's character had a few lines that really hit me as profound. And I wanted to share it and see if it resonates with any of you the way it did with me. Here goes:

"You do what you are. You're born with a gift, if not that then you get good at something along the way. And what you're good at, you don't take for granted. You don't betray it. If you betray it, you betray yourself. That's a sad thing." -Along Came a Spider

This is not my usual area of expertise. But I will say that tumeric and elderberry have some amazing health benefits. Really any of those Indian spices usually have a lot of health benefits. A lot of people like teas.

The lady that runs the website in the below link is a naturopathic pharmacist. And she's always writing about various herbs and spices that are tasty and add to your health. You may want to review some of her spice articles to see if any of her ideas jump out at you.

https://suzycohen.com/?s=spices

@hermes:

I currently value my sleep too much to try this. But you and I have spoken about Erin Pavlina before. And she has some pretty simple tips on her website on how to Lucid Dream. What she does is set her alarm for an hour or two after she falls asleep. Shen then gets up for a minute or two and goes right back to sleep. And that's how she accesses lucid dreaming. My problem is that if I did that I would risk not being able to fall asleep again and be a wreck the next day (I have particularly bad empath days if I get less than 7 hours of sleep a night). But it may be worth your while to go to her website and try out her technique?

I did want to say that nowadays I rarely remember my dreams. When I was younger I had some wonderful dreams that I remember to this day. But now that I'm much older I don't remember much when I wake up.

I saw a dreaming article today that I wanted to post. While it doesn't really help with dream interpretation, it does summarize some of the science of dreaming.

https://suzycohen.com/articles/nightmares/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Interesting+Causes+and+Weird+Facts+about+Dreaming&utm_campaign=18-07-10+~+Nightmares+and+Dreaming+Newsletter

@jonig:

Thanks for clarifying. Is your son also an empath?

Cooking herbs? Or are you talking about essential oils?

This sounds a bit like that movie Midnight Special that came out a couple years back. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2649554/

@crystalsage is looking for some dream interpretation to figure out what this is all about. Was it just a dream or is their deeper meaning? I'm hoping some others in the community can help with this one.

Thanks for everyone's responses. I knew this would be a little controversial. But for those looking to quiet the mind before or after a stressful event, it's nice to know that options like this exist. From doing my research the U.S. is not okay with shipping CBD oil products derived from the marijuana plant since marijuana is still illegal on the federal level. However, the CBD oil in the hemp plant contains no THC so this is allowed.

The science on CBD oil has really been exploding in recent years. And it's been a proven way to find relief from severe anxiety, seizures, and side effects from brain injuries. So while this isn't for everyone, I plan to keep a bottle on hand for the occasional stressful times in life where I need a little help. Airplanes and family funerals have been my two events where I feel these will be most beneficial for me. But I also think about how useful having these would have been when I was a newbie empath years ago dealing with intense levels of anxiety when I was unbalanced. This would have been a game changer back then. That's a big reason why I wanted to post about this product.

I had someone message me to ask how it made me feel. There was no high since there is no THC. It felt like having a glass of wine except it was a deeper relaxation than that. But what was odd was that I was both more relaxed and more alert at the same time. The bottle says to take a gummy 30 minutes before a stressful event. Although I found that the relaxation set in real quick in 5-10 minutes. I ended up finding that for me 2 gummies before take off in the plane did the trick. They supposedly keep you calm for 3 hours but I found that it was closer to 2 hours for me (which was fine).

@jonig, I'm glad CBD oil works for your son. I have a 14 year old daughter who gets a lot of empath anxiety and I was wondering if this product was okay for her to use at her age. Your comments sounded promising. I wasn't sure and wanted to research that.

@crystalsage, I love your fasting idea. I've read your other posts and it's really cool that you've had such positive benefits. For me, fasting is like Garfield used to say about diets that are "die with a capital T". I can diet, but fasting was too hard for me to do. I tried it a few times and decided it wasn't for me.

@womanwhowalks, it says on the mfg website that they don't ship out of country due to all of the international laws. But I was reading that on Oct 17th this year that Canada is legalizing marijuana. You should be able to get CBD oil and anything else you want in your hometown by that date.

@hermes:

Thanks for the kind words. This post was very interesting to read and participate in. At first I just read ManWhoWasFound's post to try to zero in on what he was experiencing and needed help on. And then I took a look at all of the comments from others and saw that there was a melting pot of emotional responses from everyone. This is what makes this site so great. We all get to volunteer our feelings and responses and great discussions usually evolve. And we should always keep in mind that we are not only helping the post person with feedback. But since these posts get filed away, we are creating answers for others to find when they search the archives down the road. 

@manwhoislost:

It's pretty rare to run into people who practice the dark arts. That would be scary because those people bring in evil spirits and demons to this world. And empaths are targets for those type of entities. But more likely, she was just a narc who knew how to use her powers of persuasion and manipulation. When they know what they are doing, narc energy can be very intoxicating to empaths and be very hard to resist. Just like how many unrealized empaths have been using their powers to heal their whole life, narcs also learn how to use theirs. It's very subconscious to both sides. Typically when a narc consciously learns who to use their skills for bad intent, they make the jump to becoming a sociopath as they try to inflict harm. It's hard to say which category your ex falls into. But either way, she was not good for you. But it was a lesson to be learned that will make you stronger as you experience life as an empath (should you so choose).

Energy vampires are a very interesting topic. In my experience not all energy vampires are narcs. Quite a few people I meet in life are just very damaged souls who are desperate for the healing light that empaths provide. My mother-in-law is one example in my life where she is definitely not a narc, but drains my energy like no other. And when I do have to spend time with a narc, I typically feel drained in a sickness kind of way. Narcs make me feel nauseous and tired if I am around them for more than a few  minutes. But ironically, I make them feel really insecure and uncomfortable without even uttering a word. So it's a two-way energy battle that I experience with narcs. It;s actually kind of comical to a degree to experience because typically narcs are the alpha male or female in the room. And when I'm around they start feeling really insecure and go out of their way to impress me. I always notice this dazed, confused look in their eyes as they feel uncomfortable in their skin around me. 

I'm going to check out that book you cited. I have an aggressive energy grounding technique that I use when things get bad that incorporates convulsing my stomach as I push bad energy out. And it's the same stomach muscles that are used when vomiting. This is something that I've come up with on my own so it's intriguing to hear from you that a similar technique has been used by an ancient culture.

And lastly, I was the world's biggest skeptic on all of this stuff at the beginning. When I was awakening as an empath I kept allowing my skeptical mind to explain away what was happening to me. But eventually I gave in and opened myself up to the spiritual possibilities and like pieces of a jig-saw puzzle, things in my life started falling in to place on a spiritual level. Due to your skeptical and analytical mind, you really have to go through a process of scientific testing before you'll be able to buy in to all of this spiritual stuff. And that's okay. With me when I started running out of scientific reasons why things were happening, I then took baby steps toward believing in spiritual and paranormal things.  

@empathdad:

You bring up excellent points. And I have also read that alcohol and recreational drugs used to block anxiety are not accepted by many empaths. Although my own beliefs are everything is okay in moderation. I've also been told by others in the past to go out in the world without protection crystals and any form of protection and take in the energy of the world. But like taking an aspirin when you have a headache, there are various tools that can be used to provide short term relief when empath energy is too much.

I don't know if you have ever had anxiety building to a panic attack, but that's how my empath journey started. One was so bad that I ended up in the hospital. It's hard to explain how debilitating heavy building anxiety is. But it's an awful way to live. Over the past three years I have calmed myself with grounding and with use of protection crystals. And I still deal with occasional places that overwhelm me and anxiety kicks in. But my kryptonite is airplanes. The anxiety I pick up from others during pre-boarding and take-off triggers me. So while I normally would agree with you that empaths should not use devices to block empath stressors, there comes a time for every empath where they need a little help. Some empaths on this site have commented about struggling to ground and let go of the anxious emotional energy they pick up each day. And for those struggling, and learning how get grounded or balanced, I think this product can help with occasional use.

As for the energy I pick up on planes, I would say it's 90% others, and 10% my own. Going back pre-empath I wasn't really afraid to fly. But a lot of people are. And a lot of people are especially nervous at take-off. I pick up on all of that. And the other 10% of energy is myself recognizing the flood of emotional energy that is quickly building anxiety in a "crap, here we go again realization".

@manwhoislost:

I'm a little late to the party here. This whole post thread seems to be very active based on the length. Anyway, I've been an active participant in this community for a few years. And I tend to get a decent energetic picture on people from their emails, texts, and from forum posts like this. And if you don't mind the additional input, I'd like to share a few things that I am picking up from you. My below comments are based on your original post as I have not yet read through the follow up comments from everyone else:

*Setting my energy analysis aside, your words are not those of a narc. You have communicated with thought and respect. Nothing in your post was "me,me,me" or showed any type of manipulation that a narc would post. Narc's can't help but make everything about themselves. Your post shows concern, empathy, and curiosity. And above all, you showed politeness, and class. A typical narc exchange would frankly be the opposite of what you posted.

*I think most likely you are an empath. And I am picking up on that what you feel may be narc feelings is the energy that you are picking up from your female friend. You also feel guilty about how you interacted with her. And that's an empath thing as narcs don't have regrets of how they mistreat people. You are basically doing what I call mirroring where you self-identify with the energy from your friend. The hardest thing for an empath to do, in my opinion, is to separate their own feelings from those feelings that they pick up from others. This gets especially muddied when love is involved because the power of love and attraction makes us blind to what is going on and instead floods us with a very strong high that blocks our common sense and senses.

*Everything you have described or quoted from your girlfriend shouts out "narc,narc,narc" to me. It sounds like she wants you to somehow fear and respect her as a sociopath. But my sense is that she is a narc who is just more open about how messed up she is. She's a troubled person who gets off on guys being intimidated by her. And as you probably know, narcs have a unique knack for finding and capturing/dominating empaths. It's no surprise to me that she found you and charmed you. That's what narcs do. They typically stay in an empath relationship long enough to absorb all of your energy and then they leave you abruptly.

Empaths seem to often fall under the spell of narcs all the time. I don't know if it's the Florence Nightingale effect, but many empaths walk into the narc trap like zombies while everyone else can see that it's a bad match.

I think in summary you are a good person with empathic abilities who frankly can do better then chase a woman who is so clearly your arch-enemy who will inflict great damage. So many of us have made the mistake that you made. But in a lot of cases it's an important introduction to the manipulative powers and heart break that can be caused by narcs. I'm sure you regret the relationship with her. But all in all, you learned a lot about narcs who hunt empaths for energy dominance.

I am usually in pretty control of my empath anxiety in crowds. And when an occasion hits where I am having a bad day of anxiety struggles I will usually avoid certain places or situations. But every now and again I need to fly in an airplane, and I find the nervous energy I take in from others is often more than I can take. I start feeling like a panic attack is going to hit and get this immediate fight or flight feeling where I need to get out of there. And of course, this is not what an empath wants to deal with when readying for take-off or landing.

I've had varying success with protection crystals helping with my travels by air. But I was looking for something a little stronger. And I found a product online called Sunday Scaries that I wanted to share. (Full disclosure, I have no connection with this company, this is just me sharing a product that I found useful). Here's the website:

https://forsundayscaries.com/

The active ingredient in these gummy bear supplements is CBD oil. CBD is generally known as a relaxation compound found in marijuana. But the above company derives their CBD oil from the hemp plant. And that's how they are legally able to sell this product in all 50 states by mail (all of this is explained on the website).

Before my flight I tested out these gummies by taking one at work to see how it felt. I wanted to know if it made me feel dizzy or sleepy. And I found that one gummy made me really relaxed similar to a glass of wine. But I also had no problem doing my job. In fact, in some ways I did my job better because the gummy helped clear my mind. When I traveled by plane leaving my city I found that 2 gummies did the trick. I was very relaxed and this CBD oil helped shut down my empath sensitivities to where I had no anxiousness from people energy during the flight. On my return flight I took another 2 gummies right before boarding. I did start to feel some minor anxiousness. And attribute this to the return flight being 100% full and running late. I think that added to everyone's anxieties and that impacted me. But despite that, I was still so much more relaxed that I didn't have any panic attacks.

For me airplanes are my problem area as an empath. For each of you, you probably have your own tough situations that you have to get through as an empath and need some help. I highly recommend this product. And hope that it can provide some help to any of you that have had an especially bad empath day, or are about to take on a tough empath environment. And as a general disclosure, if you have health issues or take any meds, it is recommended that you speak to your doctor about this product before trying it out.

@js71219:

Wow, so you have three kids with gifts plus you? How does your wife handle all of that? We laugh at ourselves at our house as it must look like a freak show to my wife. All sorts of things are attracted to our household.

My kids are a little older. My son is 16 and sees ghosts. His strongest skill is that he can meditate very easily and can astral travel with ease. He currently has very high self-esteem and has a very high vibration and can flip the energy in a negative environment really fast. People are very drawn to him. My daughter is 14 and appears to have the most psychic abilities of the three of us. She's a very strong empath and sees and hears spirits regularly. But she really struggles with low energy she takes in from humans and entities. I've posted about this many times that we've struggled to keep entities from attaching to her and bringing her down as she's really suffered through depression this past year. My theory is that because she's the most special of the three of us and is vulnerable as a teen girl, entities are pretty attracted to her energy. We think we have the upper hand on the battle to keep her healthy. But it is a daily chore to battle and prevent things from sucking the life out of her.

As for me, my empathic abilities have been changing over the past few years. I was a very strong emotional empath, but that has become more tuned and balanced. And now I've progressed to being a stronger clairaudient where I hear and feel the presence of the unseen (but usually don't see them). And I have visions, and have a general knowing sense. I'm going through a phase where I get a lot of angel number messaging and believe I am close to making the leap to being able to communicate with my spirit guides.

Thanks for your other post comments on the pendulum. I'm looking forward to learning more.

@js71219:

Do you have any web articles or books that I can read up on what you referenced. I definitely want to learn and implement deeper protections. Thanks.

@js71219:

I am in a very similar situation as yours. My two teenage kids are also empaths. And all three of us have slightly different psychic skills so I've been busy researching everything to help them keep grounded and balanced and feel like normal teenagers (as much as possible). My poor wife has to put up with the three of us and all of the strange things we experience plus the mood swings.

This website is a really good place to start. Click on the empath forum tab at the top of this page and browse the library of topics. There's a ton of good reading here. And you can always post topics of curiosity and see what responses you get. The more you learn and educate yourself, the more you will open the doors to your abilities. It's the "use it or lose it" mantra. Like you, I have had periods of my life when I blocked my abilities and they shut down. And like you they reappeared like an angry ex-girlfriend later in life. And what I mean by that is they reappeared unexpectedly, and with an intensity that forced me to pay attention. And from there the more I researched and worked on it, the more my various psychic skills strengthened.

There are also many shamans and teachers that you will find online who will offer educational classes on various topics. I also have two of the below websites that I read from quite often that have helped me answer a lot of questions, and enlightened me on things that I needed to learn. I have also read dozens of books on various empath and psychic topics. All of this really builds a knowledge base to expand upon. 

https://www.erinpavlina.com/blog/archives/

https://slade-roberson.squarespace.com/archive

I have not. But like you I am interested in learning.

As an additional comment to what @iimb-alicia said, it is very hard to determine whether emotions are yours or from someone/somewhere else. I've had days where my personal issues were pretty closely related to energy I picked up from others so it's hard to really break it down at times. I think most empaths would say that's the hardest part. It takes quite a while to reliable learn how to discern. Even harder, is knowing where it is coming from. It could be someone sitting in a room with you, or it could be someone next door or down the street. And many times, it is multiple people's emotions impacting us. That's why so many of us empaths struggle with being around groups of people. I personally have trouble with group emotional energy in places like churches, shopping malls, busy restaurants, and airplanes.

@lisastarry6:

Without sounding too mystical, I think fate has brought you here. You are going through what is called an empath awakening. I had similar feelings years ago and was googling mental illness and stumbled upon the definition of empath and found this site. And as with me, it appears that you found the right place. We are here to support you and share what we know and understand. The good news is that there are ways to control the intensity of the feelings that you pick up from others. And then from there if you choose, you can expand your psychic skills. But for starters I usually suggest that you take a couple empath quizes. It will give you some personal validation as to whether you are an empath and whether what you think is mental illness is actually a heightened sensitivity skill. After taking the below two quizes please share with us your thoughts and questions. And we as a community can help you take the steps to understand your empathy and learn to master it.

http://www.empathtest.com/

https://lonerwolf.com/empath-test/ 

I've struggled with the "sending it back" strategy as well. In theory it seems like a great idea. But often I get a boomerang effect when I try to send out any negative energy. And in speaking to my own beliefs and not wanting to offend anyone, I think we empaths are actually wired to take in energy to ground it as @goodenergyhealing noted. We are energy changers. If we walk into a hostile office meeting, for example, and send the negative back to everyone, we are perpetuating that anger-hostility energy. But if we instead do what we do and absorb low energy and ground it, we thereby are taking that anger emotion out of the room and are clearing the air (raising the vibration). 

I bring this up because I have had opportunities to break up fights or resolve differences in hostile work environments. And when I was on my game and doing it right I was able to absorb the energy and diffuse the anger, and have everyone cooperating and laughing by the end of the meeting. I've even had to do this a few times at Thanksgiving family dinners where tensions were high due to half the table was pulling for Trump and the other half pulling for Clinton. In having these experiences it has reinforced my belief of what empaths are supposed to do with our gifts.

@cat-whisperer:

You never know how your life path is so supposed to go. But along those lines, you fixing your son, could be a major milestone in your life. It is not only an enormous challenge, but you will develop the experience in addition to potential new skills to apply that to others later in your life. You may just be getting advanced on the job training to heal a very damaged person. There aren't many that can do that, so my hat is off to you!

@cat-whisperer:

I think we are all products of our environment. And I firmly believe that "energy is everything". If your ex was a negative low energy person, they he very likely transferred some of that to your son. It also sounds like he grew up in your ex's home in an environment without love and support. And being recovering addict, he clearly has life issues that led to that.

I think your son being around you will allow some healing. I think your bright high vibrational energy will help him get out of the dark existence that he's had and turn the page to a new life. But it may be rough as he finds his way, and that will likely have an impact on you. I think you have to be strong & patient.

It also sounds like your son has psychic abilities. I have had periods of time when I was really angry and frustrated and lights would flicker as I walked by, some electronics would glitch etc... I've had this conversation with others on this site before that I think some of us empaths have a dark side where our energy can be very volatile. The good side of us is we can absorb and read energy of others. The dark side is that we can also project some really strong psychic energy when upset and angry. It can be so strong that it impacts electrical currents around us and literally pushes people away. 

It kind of sounds like your son may have gifts. But he probably needs some counselling to manage his anger and sadness or else no one is going to want to be around him.

@spiritualskies:

I think you may have answered your own question. But I went through a period of time about 6 months ago where I would hear the same 1-2 songs over and over again. Sometimes 10 times a day. It didn't matter what radio station I would tune to, they same 2 kept coming through more often then they should. And they were songs that were not normally in the present popularity rotation on air waves because they were a couple years old. And to my frustration I could not figure out the relevance to either song. And then as the weeks passed on they went away. I think there was a message for me in there somewhere, but I missed it. 

I do believe that our spirit guides try to communicate with us in many ways. And those of us that are psychically inclined are better able to notice these communications. I get angel numbers all of the time (repeating numbers that have meaning). I also like you had songs coming up repeatedly for a time. And I've also seen some messages on billboards and signs that caught my attention. I think in your case, your guides may be giving you messages through the songs. It may be something personal for you to understand, or it may be a message for you to help someone else. Although, you seem to have the ability to really get inside people's heads and take on their emotional energy in an overshadowing type of way. I think you are highly tuned and are getting help from your guides to better understand what is going on so that you can help people. 

@cheshire-cat:

I follow Erin Pavlina's blog and she's had a few occasions she has shared where she was over powered by an entity and broke the attachment with laughter. There is definitely something to raising your vibration through love and laughter to defeat these things. I think God gave some weapons here on earth to raise our vibrations, but they are like Easter eggs that we need to find. I think crystals and stones are one of them. Salt is another. Music is another. And coffee is another useful natural drink that we now know can help us escape the blues.

On your other note, I too get the ear ringing when entities are close. Sometimes they are folllowed by whispers or a the hair on my feet and legs stand up on end. I don't typically see them (although lately I have seen a black floating circle out of the corner of my eyes that seems to be following me). But I most definitely hear them. The ear ringing is supposedly them trying to communicate. But we only hear ringing since we are not yet attuned to receive the message. I'll send you a PM as I had an idea for you.

@tigerlily:

I'm glad you found a coffee blend to make you happy. I too have some coffee types that don't sit well with me or make me to agitated and don't mix well. But I've found my sweet spot and it really does help set my balance for the day.

I think I have some insight for you. But can you give an example of two of what you mean and how it happened?

@cheshire-cat:

That Robert Bruce book was very good, and very eye-opening. I found the book to try to help my daughter with her depression and neg attacks. And very interestingly, every time I would pick up the book to read it, I would have very creepy ghost/entity activity around me. In fact, there were plenty of "ah-hah" moments for me in reading that book where I found confirmation of greater understanding of things that we have experienced in our home. And there was an immediate reaction to the spirit energy around me (banging on walls etc...). It was almost as if they didn't want me to understand how they operate and how to defeat them and they got upset when I had an "ah-hah" moment reading the book. So in a nutshell, that book was life changing for me, and I found it almost by accident at a time when I really needed that help and insight.

The biggest take-away I learned from the book was that we empaths/light workers are targets for entities. We possess special energy that makes us more attractive to them (and they need to absorb people energy like food to exist). Robert Bruce also states in the book, that entities aren't really interested in non-empath energy unless it is someone depressed or mentally ill that they can take advantage of. And there is a definite good versus evil battle going on in other dimensions so light workers are targets that they would like to disable or take out. When empaths are healthy and high energy, these entities have a really hard time breaking into our auras to attach. But when we fall down the rabbit hold of depression, our aura is exposed and armor is off and we are easily corrupted by entities. And in a lot of cases, when an entity attaches, it not only saps your energy it lowers your vibration. In doing so it can manipulate your thoughts to make things worse and more depressive so that you fall deeper as they take more of you away. The manipulation is so sneaky that some of these entities will allow you to experience abnormally high pleasure from doing things that are bad for you (like drug use, gambling, cheating on your wife etc...). And then they will punish you with physical pain and complications when you try to do good things (like seeking help, going to AA etc...). It's very scary but yet important to understand  what is going on with entities who enter our realm and manipulate people because we have all seen examples of this in our own lives (particularly with alcoholics and drug users who have spiraled out of control). And with my own daughter even after I worked with her on making changes in her life to raise her vibration to beat back these entities, she would still make decisions to do things that were bad for her and would keep her in a depressive state. In fact on a few occassions she was really angry with me for trying to help her. But honestly, the angry look on her face was not her energy. I knew that was foreign so I kept persisting with helping her. But the negative entities had a manipulative lock on her. And I had a breakthrough moment where I was saging my daughter's room and teaching her to use white light to push them away, and I was deliberately attacked in a physically painful manner by one of her entities. (Side note, we also had a shaman remove over 13 entities from her. And as each one was removed from her, the shaman described a personality trait or abusive behavior that belonged to each entity that my daughter had been exhibiting over the past year).

So long story short, I do want to recap the book for everyone. The challenge is that there is so much packed into that book, I don't know how to properly summarize it in a post without it being 5 pages long. I'm still thinking about how best to present that. But I will do that soon.

P.S.- I did share some of what I learned in the book with @zacharias . See this link to read a little on that:http://empathcommunity.eliselebeau.com/community/forum/new_posts/50764/can-a-church-be-haunted

@cheshire-cat, I love that quote. Thanks!

I'm glad to hear that impacted you so well. Did you just fast for the day or was it longer? It has been proven that fasting clears out your body of toxins and reboots it fresh and makes you feel better. Here are some news clips that I found:

A study, conducted by Dr. Valter Longo and colleagues from the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles, found longer periods of fasting - 2-4 days - may even "reboot" the immune system, clearing out old immune cells and regenerating new ones - a process they say could protect against cell damage caused by factors such as aging and chemotherapy.

Since the body is unable to get its energy from food during fasting, it dips into glucose that is stored in the liver and muscles. This begins around 8 hours after the last meal is consumed. "A detoxification process also occurs, because any toxins stored in the body's fat are dissolved and removed from the body," he adds, noting that after a few days of fasting, higher levels of endorphins - "feel-good" hormones - are produced in the blood, which can have a positive impact on mental well-being.

"When you starve, the system tries to save energy, and one of the things it can do to save energy is to recycle a lot of the immune cells that are not needed, especially those that may be damaged," Dr. Longo explains.

In their study, published in the journal Cell Stem Cell, the team found that repeated cycles of 2-4 days without food over a 6-month period destroyed the old and damaged immune cells in mice and generated new ones.

@cheshire-cat:

Thanks for looking that up. I was purely guessing that the heat from roasting would destroy most of the pesticides. I know organic coffee that tastes good is hard to find and is pretty pricey so I typically don't buy those. I happy to hear from you that roasting gets rid of a very higher percentage of the pesticides.

Also, you have some very interesting methods of improving your bedroom's environment for sleep. I have not tried any of those methods. A Faraday cage is a zapping electrical grid. That may be a bit extreme for most. Although I just finished reading a book that recommended that for people who are harassed by spirits at night. The electrical grid keeps the spirits out of your bed area. 

I mostly try to exercise early evening to strip off some of the stress. And the exercise makes my body tired. A nice hot salt bath also relaxes and gets me ready to sleep if I had a tough day. And then I always use over the counter sleep aids like melatonin.

@zacharias:

I'm the same. I used to drink many many cups of coffee through each day in addition to diet cokes. But as soon as my empath awakening happened, I had to cut back my caffeine intake as my anxiety and high caffeine levels were a bad mix. I kicked the diet coke habit which was probably a good thing due to all of the chemicals. And now I drink 1-2 cups of coffee in the morning and 1-2 in the afternoon depending on how my day is going. I will say when I am down in the dumps, an immediate cup of coffee really gives me a positive boost. I'm not going to say it totally cures the blues. But it certainly helps. And since all of us empaths don't sleep well anyway, the caffeine helps us cope with being tired during the day.

@cheshire-cat, I wonder whether the pesticides are depleted at all when coffee beans are washed and roasted?

That's great. Hopefully you see some improvement.

@gracie25:

Welcome to the community. As someone new to all of this I'm sure you have a lot of questions. A good place to start is to take a couple empath tests. This will give you some personal confirmation of whether all of this is real. Here are two empath tests below:

http://www.empathtest.com/

http://www.empathconnection.com/quiz.html

@bing:

Good article. Thank you!

I did want to also note that if you also deal with a lot of anxiety, you will want to keep your caffeine intake at a more moderate level. I had some sleepless empath nights years ago where I tried to power through the day by drinking extra coffee. And that was the tipping point for a severe panic attack. So on my anxiety days, I now typically drink a lot less coffee and tea.

We've had quite a few people posting about depression lately. And as an empath, we all deal with regular bouts of mood shifts and depression. I happened upon the two below health articles that detail how regularly drinking coffee significantly improves depression. And in the 2nd article it notes coffee drinking greatly reduced suicidal tendencies for those who were deeply depressed. And I thought I'd share this with all of you as this may be advice that you can incorporate into your daily routine to help you feel better.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/313988.php

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2378708/Could-coffee-help-prevent-depression-Two-cups-day-reduces-risk-suicide-50.html

@zacharias:

I totally agree. For some reason it is very human to allow oneself to become exposed to negative things. It reminds me of the old newspaper adage "If it bleeds, it leads". How many of us can't wait to read about about a messy celebrity divorce, a cheating scandal, or even an untimely death? We pretty much all get sucked into negative stories, events etc... But understanding that is part of the process with being able to raise your vibration. We are all only as good as our weakest link. Examine that, and limit negative exposure on the path to raising your vibration.

@just-stevie:

That's great news you are swimming in a salt pool. That does all sorts of good.

My daughter has been in a similar situation to what you describe where she has had entities attach deeply to her. And it put her in a deep depressive mess where she couldn't even make it through an hour of school without an anxiety attack. I ended up hiring a shaman to remove entities from her. The shaman removed 8 the first time and sent most of them to the light. But a week later more entities had attached and she needed a 2nd session. I was with her during the sessions and watched the whole shaman process and it was legit. The shaman lady would say things like "this one is attached to your head so you may feel dizzy while I remove it since it will likely fight the removal process. And my daughter said she was feeling dizzy even right before the shaman told her that. The same thing happened with different sensations when these things were removed from her stomach.

But like I said earlier, the entities don't make it easy, and do fight back. I know you are experiencing that fight back now. You have to stay strong. In fact, in my case as I was dialing the shaman to book the appointment, both my cell. phone and wife's cell. phone stopped working. And then internet went out. It took 15 minutes to get the phones working again. And we're in a populated area with plenty of cell towers so that shouldn't happen (and has never happened before). I also took steps to smudge my daughter's room and one of the entities came after me with a psychic attack that caused me severe stomach pain, and I started getting dizzy with shrinking tunnel vision (like when you are about to pass out). So we've been in a bit of a fight. But we appear to be on the winning side of things so far. I just wanted to let you know what to expect, and to stay strong. Keep fighting, and get your house & life back to normal.

P.S.- I can't tell my daughter that these things aren't real because they are real. But I am teaching her not to be afraid and to be more empowered. The shaman told her that as well. 

@just-stevie:

The way this works based on my research is that taking showers or swimming in an ocean/running river weakens them. The entities on the surface of your aura will pretty immediately jump off you when in the shower. But entities that have been there for a long time are more deeply attached inside the shell of your aura and likely aren't leaving. But the running water still does weaken them. And in theory if you made a point of taking long daily showers for a week, you may weaken them to the point where they also detach and leave. However, a lot of people report them fighting back when you attempt to get rid of them. I had this problem with my empath daughter who while in running water at my suggestion had a vision of a scary witch running at her screaming. It made her jump out of the shower in fear. And for the entity, that was mission accomplished since the running water exercise was stopped. So expect to get some push back from any deep residing entities in your head or body. They hear your thoughts and know your intent. They may try to put up a fight when you are learning and applying things to get rid of them.

I also wanted to ask if you have considered hiring a shaman to clear you and your home? This is the highest form of professional help that you can get. 

@spiritualskies:

I plan to be here until they force me out!  Although the energy drain and fatigue around 6-8PM most days is a little frustrating, I take it all in stride and try to see the positives. And my pick up of the greater consciousness comes and goes. It's not every day and tends to be when something major has happened or is about to happen. But I have in most cases found ways to see a positive in any of the negative experiences that I get as an empath. I've spent a lot of time reading up on this, studying myself, studying others. I feel that I have a pretty good handle on how most of this works, and how I can ground and lift myself back up. I think the #1 thing I've learned is to notice when my vibration is dropping and know that I then have a pretty immediate need to raise it back up. That keeps me out of the dark depressive space that we all fall in to with lower vibrations.

@spiritualskies:

To answer your question: As far as I can tell, anxiety energy that I pick up during the 6-8PM time period has nothing to do with myself or my family interactions. In fact, quite often I'm the first one home at 6PM and that energy is there well before my family gets home. I was reading an empath self-help book a couple years ago that spent a whole chapter covering the drama energy around dinner time that empaths pick up on from society. And when I was reading that it was an ah-ha moment for me. Because I always feel a anxious, fatigued and a little beat up during that time period. That book also noted how many empaths become energized at night when most of society is asleep. And that is also me. In fact, I have a tough time settling down most nights to go to bed at a decent hour since I feel a caffeine-like energy high from 10:30PM on.

I did want to note that I know that all us empaths have different sensitivities. In my case I've noticed that over the past couple years I have become more in tune with the mood of my community, and even the mood of the country. And sometimes this gives me an ominous warning. I remember feeling sick to my stomach that morning back in 2016 when those Dallas Police officers were ambushed. That entire day I felt sick and nervous and had a feeling that something bad was going to happen. And then that evening that maniac was on a building roof in Dallas with a sniper rifle and he killed 5 police officers and wounded 11 others. If you all remember that was a real ugly time with riots and race relation issues in summer of 2016. I picked up on all of that before events happened.

@zacharias:

You didn't mention if the entity left when you asked it to? Or maybe you are waiting to see?

Your description of the pipes in that room is interesting. The entity may very well be trapped back there by the parameters of the pipes. When you read that book you'll find that the running water in utility pipes imprisons them (since if they try to cross the pipes the running water zaps their energy). Some entities can navigate around the pipes while others that are often referred to as astral wildlife are more blind and get stuck.

Entities have no need for high vibrational energy/happy people. It's the low energy they seek. I had an assistant years ago who could see entities. And we also had another lady that worked in my office years ago that was just a miserable alpha female type. She was bitter, outspoken, and seemed to delight in yelling and degrading others in the office. And my assistant used to tell me that she could always see several black spirits circulating around that awful person. The entities are very drawn to miserable & negative humans like that. Their low vibrational energy feeds them. And very often entities that attach to that person's aura will indeed influence their thoughts and personality (called overshadowing). So I think you've done some pretty good detective work finding an entity in an area surrounded by pipes and a person who works there that exudes low energy. They also like to go after children as they are an easy target and easily influenced.

From what I have experienced and read, it's probably only 50/50 at best that entities will leave when you command. It's really only the more harmless spirits that will move on. The rest know exactly what they are doing and have less than honorable intentions. And they are there to get the energy that they seek and have no intention of leaving. And there are other steps to take at that point (including getting a shaman or someone with very strong medium abilities to clear an area and either send the entity to the light or relocate them).

@cheshire-cat:

I feel very weighted down, foggy brained, and emotionally exhausted during weekdays from 6-8pm. I get home from work close to 7PM each night and often feel so weighted down that I almost fall asleep on the drive him. It almost feels like someone cast a spell on me. I read somewhere that this time frame is family conflict time through every community as families come home from work and activities and argue among each other during dinner (plus stress of getting kids to do homework bath, and go to bed). So there is a lot of anxiety in the air. And I think that makes sense for me as I pick all of that up and just feel really drained. And then magically around about 10PM I get energized like I just slammed down a couple espressos. I also read that because most people are winding down or asleep by 10-10:30, that all of that emotional energy in the ether goes away. And I really feel that as I feel very free, well, and excited for my personal free time between 10:30-12:30. Studies have suggested that this why empaths are largely night owls.

In thinking deeper into this I think when we fall asleep we go to a different place. Many spiritual and psychic people claim that when we sleep we astral travel to different worlds and dimensions. If so, this would be consistent as to why you and I feel an energy pick up after a lot of the world is off to sleep with their minds in another place.

@womanwhowalks:

Excellent points. Except that you're talking about some advanced concepts that I don't think a lot of empaths know how to do. It took me quite a while to discern which is outside energy and which is my own. As it turned out the most depressing feelings I had were not my own. But they still made me feel upset and depressed so it was all very confused. When you're at that point, you just want to feel better. What ended up helping me was finding alternate methods to pull myself out of the dumps via grounding techniques. And I did that through salt baths, crystal work, and self-care (extra sleep, doing more enjoyable things like exercise outside etc...).

But if you could better explain your methods then maybe it's not as hard as I think it is to practice?

And while I do believe there are people out there who know how to practice psychic attacks, I also have seen with my own eyes people who have that ability and do it unknowingly. You know the type. The extremely jealous, or alpha male/female types. If you look at them wrong or try to threaten their dominance they strike with ugly looks, and words. My point being, there are a lot more psychic attacks going on then we can really quantify. And then add that to how many people are just unhappy in the world, and all of us poor empaths have a lot to overcome each day.

Depression is a miserable thing to go through. I've been there many times so I feel for both of your. Especially when you can't identify the cause. And empath depression is just like that. You often can't figure out where the energy is coming from that is effecting you.

I've been reading a lot of books on negative energy and how it lowers a person's vibration. And in one book the author said that it's been proven that taking long showers releases negative energy. In fact the author cited the use of showers as being common relief prescribed for depressed patients by their psychiatrists. I was wondering if either of you would want to try that (although I know Karen has some water limitations). From my understanding, taking a shower while depressed is kind of like taking an aspirin while having a fever. The aspirin will make you feel better for 3-4 hours. I think the shower similarly gives you short term relief. But that in itself could be helpful.

@spiritualskies:

As an empath when you are anxious and depressed, that's a red flag that your chakras are too open and you are taking on too much energy. The steps to feel better start with removing/grounding that energy. And then working on closing and better balancing your chakras.

I would normally suggest several daily salt baths. But you don't seem to do well with those (although that's normally the #1 helper in this situation for fellow empaths so you may want to continue to try it). Are you near a lake or ocean? A swim in either place helps (especially salty water of the ocean will help). Grounding is basically off-loading that low energy and refilling your own personal high vibrational energy. Some people do that through meditation. But honestly, it  happens when you are out in nature, and doing things that you love. Some empaths feel better going for nice hike out in the forest. But another good option is music. Empaths as a general rule are very positively impacted by music. I would suggest going outside with a headset on while listening to some of your favorite happy music. Or watch a favorite musical movie that you like. Just make sure you do all of these things by yourself. Even having one person with you interferes with your energy.

Crystals are also a great way to balance out your chakras. Which ones are you using now?

@curious-child:

Great to hear nothing serious. And now that you mention it, I get like that myself when I am low on sleep. For me a bad night of sleep = bad empath day, and a lot of things go hay-wire. I take some sleep aids to help me fall to sleep and stay asleep (mostly natural melatonin based stuff). And it does help. I also think now that you know nothing is wrong with you, the pulsating will probably disappear soon.

It's most likely selenite then. It's one of the few crystals that scratch that easily. Selenite is basically gypsum (the stuff they make dry wall out of). But it's a very special stone and is one of my favorites:

A protective stone, Selenite shields a person or space from outside influences. ... Selenite is a crystallized form of Gypsum, which is used for good luck and protection. The powerful vibration of Selenite can clear, open, and activate the Crown and Higher Chakras and is excellent for all types of spiritual work.

I went through a similar phase where I thought something was wrong and that I might have high blood pressure. I got it checked out and BP came back normal. But it kept happening so I bought myself a BP monitor on Amazon. After testing myself extensively several times a day for weeks I finally convinced myself that hearing & feeling my blood pulsate through my body was just me being overly aware. Pretty soon after I stopped worrying about it, the whole incident stopped. Hopefully you will have the same luck.

@cheshire-cat:

Very interesting that your empath skills work differently with complete strangers. It's the same for me. It works like an anti-virus scan for me. When meeting a new person my subconscious empath meter does a full scan, and when communicating with people that I already know, my subconscious does a mini-scan.

Remember, this was just subset list (covering more of the strong psychic empath traits). A full list of empath traits should look more like this:

1. Human Knowing also called Claircognizance – You just seem to Know the answer
2. Synesthesia – Senses working together. We all have this to some degree.
3. Clairaudience – hearing words, tones
4. Clairsentience or Psychometric Empath – Ability to receive information through touch and physical objects
5. Clairvoyance – May actually see visual images, lights, colors
6. Telepathic Empath – Ability to read a person’s mind
7. Emotional Oneness - Emotionally Receptive Empath, may feel other person’s emotions as own
8. Emotional Intuition – Know how someone is feeling
9. Physical Oneness – or Physically Receptive – experience to their physical pain in your body.
10. Physical Intuition or Medical Empath – Know information on another’s physicality and state of health
11. Gustatory Giftedness – Smell & taste is highly developed. May even be able to see a photo or recipe and know exactly how the food will taste. Some also can immediately know how a particular wine will taste with the food.
12. Analytical Awareness – Notices the mechanics of how things fit together
13. Holistic Knowing – Can read more than one person at a time
14. Truth Knowledge – Get pure info, present state
15. Psychic knowing or Precognitive – Can see or feel events in the future, past or far away in space and time. Often shows up in dreams or as emotional or physical reactions. i.e. some feel anxiety or other emotions just prior to a major event.
16. Geomantic or Earth Empath - Can feel or understand signals, energies or messages from earth. Many have the ability to predict natural disasters.
17. Crystal or Stone Empaths – Feel and know the energy of stones, crystals, and gemstones
18. Plant Empaths – Can communicate with plants – often are gifted gardeners, or work with flower essences.
19. Fauna Empath aka Animal communicator – can hear and feel animals.

@curious-child:

If you worry about that you can of course go to a doctor to make sure your health is fine. But one component of being an empath is that you are highly sensitive. You are highly sensitive to emotional energy, and you are highly sensitive to your own body. Hell, we're over sensitive to just about everything. I've gone through similar periods of time when I could feel/hear my heart beat or pulse in an amplified manner. Thinking back I over-reacted thinking something was wrong and made it worse. I think I was unbalanced as an empath during those episodes. Now that I do a better job of keeping myself balanced and grounded, I don't really hear & feel blood pumping through my body anymore. Maybe the same will happen to you?