Anxious Empaths Introduction
If you struggle with anxiety, and you are highly sensitive, you might be what I call an “anxious empath”. First let me define what I mean by this. To start, anxiety is a state in which your body and mind feel “on alert”, tense, restless. You might struggle with intrusive thoughts, panic, chronic stress, tense muscles or fear about real or imagined threats. In short, anxiety is exhausting. And it’s an epidemic in our modern culture. As an anxiety specialist, I treat these symptoms in my office, but I take a different approach. I believe that our symptoms occur for a reason, to tell us a message, to teach us to take better care of ourselves. We decode symptoms, understand the mind-body connection, and learn how to use anxiety as a tool for self awareness, in a place that we feel in control of our anxiety and not the other way around.
Over the last several years in my practice, I’ve found that many, many people come to me with anxiety, only to discover that they are highly sensitive and empathic towards others, and the anxiety comes from a place of living as a sensitive person in a world that is not so highly sensitive. They absorb the energies of others and coupled with a lack of self care or self awareness, manifest with anxiety symptoms. They feel that THEY are the problem. But it’s not that at all. High sensitivity and empathy are gifts, but they must be carefully attuned and self care is a must for all anxious empaths. Empathy means “to feel into”. It’s the experience of feeling into another person’s experience. Some people are more able to do this, they are born with it, they develop it from trauma or negative childhood experiences, or they learn it.
If you are an empath, you might experience the following:
Everyone comes to you for advice and to listen to their problems, even strangers!
You can walk into a room and feel the mood of another person.
You are highly attuned to the feelings of others and will often work (to exhaustion) to help them feel better (*** this behavior can evolve into codependent relationships)
You can feel tired after interacting with others
You experience panic attacks and can “feel” others’ anxiety
You are introspective and have a deep inner life
You cannot watch scary movies, and have trouble clearing your mind after watching the news
If these resonate with you, you might be a highly sensitive person. And anxiety can result if you do not take the care to create good boundaries with others and take care of yourself.
The following are ways to help you to manage this gift.
1) Create boundaries with others. You don’t have to counsel everyone you meet. It's okay to compassionately put up emotional and energetic boundaries.
2) Begin to learn your body’s messages. If you begin to feel drained around people, places, events, take a moment to ground yourself and take care of yourself.
3) Learn to receive from others. Talk about yourself, try to create give-and-take relationships and practice allowing others to care for you.
There are many more tools to work through walking the world as an anxious empath. Seek help from a therapist or spiritual helper and be sure to start working towards a self care plan that includes mind-body practices like meditation, prayer, yoga and eating well.
Stay tuned for more information and videos about living as an anxious empath!