13 Signs You're An Empath
Updated 2025.05.13
Empath definition
An Empath is someone with the keen ability to feel the thoughts, emotions, and energy of others, and generally, people who are empaths are affected by these influences.
Empathy is the psychic ability of heightened clairsentience.
This gift can be embraced, managed, and you may even enjoy it.
Highly sensitive people can become assets to their families, as they are known to be more attuned to risk and danger, and likewise love and joy.
What does it mean to be an empath?
Empaths are persons in touch with and acutely aware of their surroundings.
Empathy is the ability of clairsentience - clear feeling. Instead of manifesting in psychic readings, or in mediumship sessions for your clients, empathy is out there manifesting in the physical world.
While you interact, you pick up on the thoughts, feelings, and physical concerns of physical people, animals, and entire ecosystems.
Many people are already working with their gifts in the physical world through exercising their empathy with others.
Honestly, empathy is about embracing it. Becoming okay with being an empath is simply a matter of managing it and growing more aware of it.
Below are the most common signs you're an empath -
1. You carry the weight of other’s burdens following your interactions with them
Think about how you feel after someone's just unloaded all their problems and worries onto you. Is it easy to walk away or do you worry about it for the next 3-4 days?
If you tend to take on energy, think about who these feelings come from and if it's healthy for your life to take them on. Empaths often feel bad for reasons that are not theirs and you can release this guilt-free.
2. Certain social situations have become increasingly uncomfortable
Listen to your body and emotions.
Think of familial gatherings, hospitals and work events. In the digital space, consider negative social media threads that make you feel bad about your situation.
These places are often trigger points, and they're different for everyone. Over time, how you process these situations can be reworked and you can learn to observe but not absorb.
In the interim, keep in mind what drains you. Notice what your time limit is for persisting in such areas. Be supportive, but always lighten your load whenever possible.
3. You like and enjoy a person's company for reasons you can't yet pinpoint
Empaths can read people's energy. Even the energy that others unconsciously carry. Sometimes when you do get a read on a person, and you like it - it’s okay to let this energy brush off on you.
If conversely, you pick up negative energy after interacting with the person (you feel worse when leaving their presence), brush it off. It could be energy they absorbed from elsewhere or another temporary, fleeting reason.
4. You get energy highs from crowds
A sign you're picking up on other people's energy, and it's time to space clear.
Empaths regularly get energetically hyped up when they're picking up on incoming energy that's more elevated than their own. You often have to clear it to rebalance your energy field.
I like to simply ask that all energies no longer serving me please depart my energy field while smudging my body with sage. In the absence of sage, visualize blue light travelling through your body and washing your chakras clean.
5. You go through waves of emotions, including heights of joy
Another sign you're dipping into and out of other people's energy and back to yours.
Feelings of low energy are often related to the pulls of lower vibration earth energies. The higher vibration joy sensations you get back into, are a sign you're quickly picking back up into connection with your higher self.
6. You are quickly excited about ideas, dreams and the hopes of others
This one is one of the benefits of being an empath - you can hop on an idea with you and ride it right to the top. When you're an empath, you can tap into sadness, just as readily as you can tap into joy. The experience of each is heightened because you feel things more deeply.
Some empaths are great creators, for their ability to tap into suffering and transmute it - they can also be great amp up people, too. The way you do this is when you sense suffering, ask yourself internally, “What can I do to lift this energy up?”
Though keep in mind, not everyone wants their suffering removed and that is a topic for another blog.
But for those who do, you can readily add to and sense the joy of others. When you’re in your best mood and in a supportive environment, you accelerate the happiness and motivation for others.
For these reasons, empaths can make excellent life, wellness, and intuitive coaches.
7. People discuss their issues with you and you solve them easily
People naturally do this, not to hurt you, but rather, because their intuition tells them that it is you who knows how to help, as empaths are often very sympathetic as they are clairsentient, so they can match energy.
You can also tune into the emotion behind the problem, which is where you will be.
Set boundaries for yourself regarding when you can help and how. This will help keep you from feeling drained.
If you do use your empath gifts for a living, boundaries will keep you available for your job, as they prevent you from overgiving in places where you’re not receiving - think: a family member who always dumps on you but never says thank you, doesn’t take your advice or ask how you are, in return.
8. There are times you've suddenly felt stomach queasy for no reason at all
If you frequently get this sensation, it could be a sign you absorb the emotions of others, mostly in the form of worries and fears.
The stomach is considered the intuitive brain, and it can pick up on the invisible information all around you that perhaps your eyes can’t see, but your nervous system can sense.
It's also home to the Solar Plexus, which is a powerful energy center whose job is confidence and self-power.
So, if your stomach is telling you something, there's a reason they ask you to trust the gut feeling - listen. The Solar Plexus will always speak to you and let you know when you've taken on too much.
9. You can sense the thoughts of others and know what they’re thinking even when they aren't saying it
This is part of the clear-feeling gift. Most clairsentients have secondary heightened psychic abilities such as clairvoyance or clairaudience.
Psychic abilities often come in pairs. Telepathy is a clear indicator of clairaudient gifts coming in with clairsentient ones.
These gifts are perfect together. When you're on the right wavelength and around kindred spirits, it's honestly fantastic when you get around the right souls who understand you - you never have to over explain yourself because everyone just understands.
That said, empathic people can sometimes pick up on the thoughts behind the emotions they perceive, which can be an asset and improve your ability to read people and animals, or an entire room.
10. You can quickly tell when someone is uncomfortable
This is a sign you can read the energies behind words, just as you can determine the energy behind the people speaking those words.
This subliminal messaging is something empaths are especially good at determining - where it is, who's saying it, and where it is. In this way, empaths are excellent companions in any people oriented job, where deals and negotiations are made.
They also make great communicators through writing or music, and regularly have Archangel Gabriel as their guide, who can assist in reading these energies.
11. You've been called too sensitive
While it’s not always phrased in the right tone, this is a compliment. There’s really no such thing as too sensitive; this comment is usually said by those who are not respectful of the energy.
You want to take it as a sign that it’s time to find a tribe of people who are respectful of the way you were made.
In my industry, being too sensitive is an asset, something people covet and wish for more of. There are places, such as in the creative or psychic arts, where this label is valued.
12. You value your own emotions and what they tell you
The more confident you become in your true empathetic nature, the more you'll demand an equal level of respect in all the relationships you choose to invest in emotionally.
New relationships often enter life at the perfect times when you embrace your empathic nature.
Old relationships you have to walk away from make space for new, more respectful ones to enter your life. Know you can release the karma of others by stepping away from a person and allowing them to rebalance their energy.
Empaths often have to remove themselves from relationships that don’t value their true gifts - every time you say no to something that is disrespectful to your energy, you say yes to something else that is.
Empathic gifts are excellent teachers of true reciprocity - giving your energy in places where it is valued, so that you can receive similar energy in return helps keep your vibration high.
You can usually find new bonds quite quickly as soon as you start using your emotional energy to guide you.
13. You're able to walk into a room, and sense when something is off
Finally, you can sense when someone's been sad, when a house has been neglected for a long time, or when someone has unmet needs.
Notice seven or more of these signs?
These are all signs you can sense the energy, emotions, and thoughts of those around you and you may be an Empath!
Because many empaths sense things before they come into the physical, so they can be slightly futuristic in their thinking and they can be great at predicting markets or even trends.
Why empaths may also classify as introverts at first, but some flip to extroverts later in life once they find situations and people who support them.
Surrounded by the right people, in the right places, with the right energy - empaths can be just as extroverted as anyone else.
Being an Empath can be a blessing once it's been identified, managed, and under control - it can work for you!
Once embraced, Empath abilities can provide many benefits:
An ability to connect on a soul level with any person on earth who is willing, leading to more meaningful relationships
An ability to read others and your environment to better tailor your responses, interactions and to respond during times of need
The gift of being able to still offer love and compassion to others, all while maintaining your own personal boundaries and space
A more exceptional ability to manage your own personal space and integrity of heart, no matter who or what is around
The ability to start a business surrounding your gifts
A higher level of stability in your own emotional, physical, and mental states of mind once you identify the influences
A decrease in overall mood swings and greater feelings of peace
The ability to begin connecting and sensing those in Spirit, without body
Plus, so much more!
Your empathic abilities can be applied, enhanced, and developed to provide better outcomes in your life, more fruitful relationships, and a higher level of confidence all around.
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