How to Stop Absorbing Other People’s Emotions

Fascinating story from The Mind Unleashed. This article explaines how some people are like sensitive sponges that can pick up on the emotions of other people, and experience them as their own. It sounds strange yes, it sure does. This article explains it all, and how to stop it if you’re a sensitive/hypersensitive one?

2014 From The Mind Unleashed:

Emotions such as fear, anger, frustration, and immobility are energies. And you can potentially ‘catch’ these energies from people without realizing it. If you tend to be an emotional sponge, it’s vital to know how to avoid taking on an individual’s negative emotions, or even how to deflect the free-floating negativities in crowds.

Another twist is that chronic anxiety, depression, or stress can turn you into an emotional sponge by wearing down your defenses. Suddenly, you become hyper-attuned to others, especially suffering with similar pain. That’s how empathy works; we zero in on hot-button issues that are unresolved in ourselves.

From an energetic standpoint, negative emotions can originate from several sources: what you’re feeling may be your own; it may be someone else’s; or it may be a combination. Here is how to tell the difference and strategically bolster your positive emotions so you don’t shoulder negativity that doesn’t belong to you.

Stop Absorbing Other People’s Emotions

1. Identify whether you’re susceptible. The person most likely to be overwhelmed by negative energies surrounding you is an “empath”, someone who acts as an“emotional sponge”. Signs that you might be an empath include:

• People call you “hyper-sensitive”, “overly sensitive”, etc., and they don’t mean it as a compliment!
• You sense fear, anxiety, and stress from other people and draw this into your body, resolving them as your own physical pain and symptoms. It doesn’t have to be people you don’t know or don’t like; you’re also impacted by friends, family, and colleagues.
• You quickly feel exhausted, drained, and unhappy in the presence of crowds.
• Noise, smells, and excessive talking can set off your nerves and anxiety.
• You need to be alone to recharge your energy.
• You’re less likely to intellectualize what you’re feeling. Your feelings are easily hurt.
• You’re naturally giving, generous, spiritually inclined, and a good listener.
• You tend to ensure that you’ve got an escape plan, so that you can get away fast, such as bringing your own car to events, etc.
• The intimacy of close relationships can feel like suffocation or loss of your own self.

2. Seek the source. First, ask yourself whether the feeling is your own or someone else’s. It could be both. If the emotion such as fear or anger is yours, gently confront what’s causing it on your own or with professional help. If not, try to pinpoint the obvious generator.

• For instance, if you’ve just watched a comedy, yet you came home from the movie theater feeling blue, you may have incorporated the depression of the people sitting beside you; in close proximity, energy fields overlap.
• The same is true with going to a mall or a packed concert. If crowded places upset or overwhelm you, it may well be because you’re absorbing all the negative energy around you.

3. Distance yourself from the suspected source, where possible.Move at least twenty feet away; see if you feel relief. Don’t err on the side of not wanting to offend strangers. In a public place, don’t hesitate to change seats if you feel a sense of depression imposing on you.

4. Center yourself by concentrating on your breath. Doing this connects you to your essence. For a few minutes, keep exhaling negativity, inhaling calm. This helps to ground yourself and purify fear or other difficult emotions. Visualize negativity as gray fog lifting from your body, and hope as golden light entering. This can yield quick results.

Continune Reading@Themindunleashed