For the empaths

what grief and regression revealed to me

The other side opened to pull my parents through to their afterlife, and that opening left a bright light. Things I had worked through, forgotten, forgiven, and let go of, started appearing as the shadows were swept away in their pure light.

I share this favorite photo of my son because look at that light

These memories and revealed issues are visits, only temporary, and they don’t mean any harm. It seems to me they are here for deeper healing because that’s how love works. It says,

Don’t look away. Remember. Trust yourself. Know. Heal.

There is so much work to be done in the spaces between those words.

Autonomy is slippery in the first place, and re-discovering it after the death of your parents puts a person in a vulnerable state. For me, feeling orphaned despite the loving support of people still around me has been jarring.

One would think my autonomy, individuation and independence had already arrived since I’m 50 years old, but then the loss of my parents came and it’s possible, for me, that the light is shining on my need to agree to a freedom in being wholly myself without apologizing for being in the world just as I am. If I’m being honest, I had never completely broken free of the expectations and beliefs of others about who I am.

I’m working on radically accepting my very truest self just as I am in the same way I have accepted life on life’s terms. I am working on maybe even celebrating who I am, just as I am.

I had come so far in past seasons, but now, grief—it reaches down to the darkest hidden things and pulls them up into that light my parents left behind. It is the light of pure love, soul, and spirit from their new wholeness and they are pouring it over me.

And I am basking in that, while also looking around at the shadows beyond the reach of that light; into the most human parts of my…well, humanity. The light reveals new layers of the misinformed core beliefs that have been treated through therapy and sobriety and are…well…not gone.

Dammit.

I’m not sure they ever completely leave. Maybe we put them to sleep, or tame them. Maybe we speak the truth over core beliefs that are lies, but they are still somewhere inside a big oak tree on our insides, rooted in the very deepest heart-parts of us, weaving through the generations before us and keeping us stuck when we are going through so much that we can’t keep our heads on straight about what we’ve learned and grown through over and over again.

The magic is this: When we regress or feel confused or stuck, we are miraculously still in motion toward a return to wholeness.

As an Empath with a capital “E”, these intense feelings that come with loss seem to have opened the Pandora’s box of Things. Things mostly related to my past selves. I don’t know if it’s happening to anyone other than me in this particular way but I have a hunch fellow empaths might need to hear it, and so I write.

An empath as a long-time primary caregiver to two dying people will lose some of her boundaries and joy; there’s no shame in that. At times there is nothing left to build on; it’s going out, not in.

And this empath will deplete herself in the name of love, well-meaning though she may be. She will revert to co-dependency. She will allow behavior around her and from her, that is not in harmony with who she really is. Meanwhile, the sense she’s always had that she is unlikable and unpalatable to people with different personalities than hers, can creep back in. She will hear all the voices over all the years: She feels too much. She cries too much. She is too much. She’s so intense. Her beliefs are too wrapped up in feelings. She needs to take better care of herself…

I tried to perform better under the gaze of those that resented my way of being as a child and for most of my life. I tried to stay small enough for them to feel better because it always felt like it was my job to make sure everyone felt better. As a child I’m guessing I was confused about why people around me seemed to resent me. I could feel it. There was no denying it. Empaths have a meter that is accurate. We read a room. We gauge the temperature. We are aware of the feelings of others like a tuning fork in a deep and undeniable way.

As a young person, I was free-spirited—heart on my sleeve, wide open, adventurous, outgoing, curious, wildly transparent, creative, joyful, and deeply sensitive and empathetic.

And I was not mis-reading the responses from others my existence caused. The message was clear: it was not okay to be who I am. It was like I was accidentally sucking all the energy out of the room and obviously people don’t like that. Maybe they thought I was doing it on purpose.

So I tried to keep it down, like music that shouldn’t be played so loud in a shared house.

The truth of most families is that someone ends up in charge of making everyone feel better, and it’s going to be you if you are seen as “the problem”, the different one, getting in trouble at school for not shutting your yapper, for showing too much emotion, for running off to be with your friends all the time. When your existence—too this, too that—is believed to be something that makes life too feel-y, it becomes your job to stop what is in you that was meant for good, that is good, to save others from having to feel what they don’t want to feel.

This awareness of disdain for who I am was killing me.

No.

I was allowing it to kill me.

The other day was an awakening day, thanks to a friend that sent me this Carl Jung video about why empaths are often resented. Thank you, N. Thank you always.

The video is long for the year 2025, but I was captivated in every moment of it. The title of it mentions an envy of the empath, but for me the video was far more focused on resentment of the empath than envy. (I’m probably saying this because it makes me uncomfortable to come across like I’m saying people are jealous of me because I’m an empath. I did not make the video, but watch me want to protect people from thinking that I think they’re jealous. Watch me try to make sure no one feels bad.) See? My healthy person skills are a wee bit lacking at the moment. I’m working on it. Progress, not perfection.

I want to stop allowing what people think of my empathetic nature and all that comes with it to dictate my way of being in the world. If wholeness is around the corner, and it is, should anything hold me back? I think not.

I think not.

This video also encouraged me to ask myself what role l am playing in relational dances I want to take part in about as much as any middle school kid wants to dance the do-si-do in gym class. And I see my role. I acknowledge it. Not with shame, but with joy in the path to overcoming my two left feet. To overcoming taking someone’s stuff and making it mine, and then taking it personally.

I imagine any artists, writers, seekers, empaths and deep thinkers that haven’t seen this video yet may feel understood and validated by the message of it. I hope passing it on reaches you in just the right moment, to guide you back to your light, especially if you feel small and misunderstood and dark right now.

Keep walking, keep going. You are not doing it wrong despite what their tone or face or “you’re just sensitive” might be saying to you. I know you cannot help but feel it all. For better and for worse, there’s no turning it off. We intuitively read it all—all the energy in all the rooms, at all times. We feel when someone has disdain or judgment for our existence in the world, even if they don’t know they feel this way about us underneath it all.

It’s hard. And that’s an understatement. But we can do this. We can remember it is not about who we are or how we do things, unless we make it about who we are and how we do things, by allowing ourselves to fold, to smother our light in fear of judgment. We can take responsibility for the times we cannot be on top of our behavior like we’d like and then fail; have a fit or too long of a pity party. We can see that those “failures” come from times when we feel every small and big resentment from others and it overcomes us. But we can stop for a moment, and turn back to the light.

If you have experienced this resentment at home, at work, or wherever you have met it, remember with me that most people are not doing it on purpose. They may not know what energy and messages they are reflecting back to you. Your intense feelings and thoughts, from their view, need to be controlled and reduced. But of course they do not because you are just being who you were made to be, and that’s beautiful. You are trustworthy.

Sometimes the beautiful things about being an empath, like vulnerability and authenticity, feel like a threat to others. It’s not your fault.

We empaths, just as anyone else, simply want to exist as our full selves. We want to live without constantly questioning ourselves as a result of being questioned and doubted because living from the depths of emotions is frowned upon. They’ve even now said it out loud: Empathy is a sin.

Imagine that. Call it absurd. Listen to Florence & the Machine’s Shake It Out, and dance.

The irony is that our empathetic/sensitive spirit ways only become problematic when we allow ourselves to be doubted and held under the expectations of others. When we listen to those voices, we trigger people-pleasing in our core selves, along with a desperation to be understood that can get quite noisy. Oops. It’s not…appealing, when we demand to be heard, but despite what you have been programmed to believe, tampering down who you are was never the answer either. That only puts the light out.

And so it is that this video was life-changing for me especially in that it tells you HOW to deal with the pain of feeling rejected or resented by the shadows in the souls of others. And HOW to not take it personally. I took two pages of notes. May I remember, again.

Your light is also for you…turn the warmth inward and let your heart speak of its needs and fears…within the shadow lies treasures…Will you protect that light even when someone is angry that you have it?

Just keep walking down the dark halls with it, no matter what others say or do, knowing that not everyone wants to understand it. - Carl Jung

Remember, being an Empath means more than being sensitive. So much more. It is a gift. You were made this way to serve the world with love, to read every wild and multi-faceted misfit on your path, and reflect back their light, no matter what, with tender grace. That’s magic.

We don’t do it perfectly of course, but we stand up and try again. We can’t help it.

Peace to you.