Primary Perception and Sensitives

Cleve Backster discovered Primary Perception with a lie detector, plants and other lifeforms.  This is a controversial theory.  When the scientific method is used as experiments, repeatability is a serious problem.  Any plant grower can tell you that plant respond to their environment.  Amount of sun light, types of soil, amount of water are factors in how plants respond.  Some plant are described as fickle, like the African Violet.  Perhaps that's why the University of Rhode Island recommends pasteurizing the soil for these house plants.  As an empath I can concur with Backster in that plant do have emotions and do communicate, but they do this in their own way.  I would like to share what I found out about them, what we know about them, and why I think the experiments are not adequate.

Common trees are the plants that I've felt.  Empaths feel emotion and are great listeners and communicators by nature.  We can just about relate to anyone.  Through my experiences, I find that the basis of thought is emotion.  That is contrary to popular belief.  Trees don't relate like we do.  Their timeline is much longer than ours.  They are not concerned about many things, but they do live in the present.  They are joyous with the sun, and they are quiet in the winter.  They are aware of themselves and trees around them.  When they are sick, they feel ill and don't want anyone to be around them.  Their emotion follows their looks.  Humans have are able to look at a tree and determine its state for may centuries.  The ground around them they consider to be theirs since their root system is in it.  I guess you can say that they are territorial.

Science does say that trees are alive.  They grow and reproduce.  In their own way, they also move.  Humans can look at a tree and determine its state of health.  Trees are made up of many cells and lack a central nervous system.  There are animals in the ocean that look like and act like one animal but in reality are a community of animals.  In a similar way, the cells of a tree work together to collect nutrients and gasses and light for the common good.  A government is not an one organism, but made up of many people in different functions all working together with all kinds of communication going on.  How do the cells of a tree work together unless they communicate somehow?  If the cells communicate with each other, what bars them form communicating with other lifeforms especially of their own species?  Humans don't readily communicate with trees, so its logical that they consider trees as non-communicative beings.  That would be due to ignorance rather than science.

So why would the science be so inconclusive?  I think one of the problems is the assumptions of the experiments and the experimenters.  If we are talking about communication beyond our five senses, and we are using our five senses then we are doomed to failure.  Even our electronic equipment have not been vetted to detect such communications.  We assume they are.  We assume it must be electromagnetic communication.  We assume that brain waves we know of are the only form of communication beyond the five senses.  I say we assume too much.  When the experiments are inconclusive then there is more research to be done.  There is more to be learned.  There is likely a whole field of study that we know nothing about that we need to explore.  Another problem is that when were talking intuition, analytical science fails to understand.  Science is a total analytical process.  Intuition does not obey the rules of analytics.  Its like trying to understand quantum mechanics with Newtonian Physics.  It just doesn't work.  Computer programmers try to get around the gap between the way a computer process information and our analytical operating of our brains by using fuzzy logic and other AI techniques in programs and devices.  Can Science take the same leap?  I believe they were able to do it in Physics by revisiting their assumptions.  They added probability to the equations.  This, Einstein notoriously hated.  A new approach to investigate Primary Perception is needed.

So Primary Perception just might prove to be a real thing one day.  Trees are living beings and empaths can pick up on their emotions.  Just because science produces inconclusive experiments doesn't mean that's the end of the story.  Reevaluation of assumptions and means of measuring is needed to create experiments that can have a positive result.

Accounting For Weakness

Arnold Schwarzenegger, David Petreus, and a host of other powerful men have had their infidelities plastered all over the press.  More often than not these type of men have affairs in our society.  I don't doubt that there are powerful women who have affairs as well, but seem to not manage affairs well.  Sometimes our weaknesses get the better of us and we do wrong things.  This gives rise to the question, 'how do you manage weakness?'.  Let's look at some weaknesses, and how to manage them.

Everyone has weaknesses that need to be addressed in some fashion.  It seems that people these days major on their strengths and minor on their weakness.  I suppose some even ignore their weaknesses.  Other people, on the other hand, have no choice but to account for theirs.  Many weaknesses are of a personal nature.  How people manage their sexuality is a common one.  By nature, sexuality is supposed to be private.  These days, we understand that there are a variety of sexual lifestyles.  Most of them would abhor any one individual because were so diverse as a society.  Some sexual lifestyles are illegal, and some sexual acts are illegal.  People should find ways to keep their sexuality private and legal.  For some keeping things private is hard because there are people who pry for both personal and professional interests.  Romance is another area of weakness.  Some romance is fine to see in the right public setting.  Sometimes people are offended by public displays of affection.  People do tend to personalize the things they see.  I would avoid romance at work altogether.  I try to keep romance private or semi-private as well.  The less people know about your weakness, the higher they think of you.  There are weaknesses of a medical nature.  These society endures but prefers not to see.  How you take your pills shouldn't be public knowledge.  Talking about how gross your wound is might offend someone.  Some weaknesses are simple hygiene.  Wiping your nose on your sleeve is offensive in public.  Smelling in any way is offensive in public.  Too much perfume is offensive in public.  Contrary to the belief of some, perfume does not take away bad smell, it just adds more smell.  Sometimes just soap is not enough to take away bad smells.  You may have to use a disinfectant.  Some weaknesses are behavioral.  Touching a person in anyway may deemed offensive.  Many jokes are offensive.  Be very careful when it comes to joking.  Fights have started on a off color joke, and law suits have been filed for some as well.  Not smiling when someone smiles at you or not waiving when someone waives at you could be deemed offensive.  This is not to point fingers at anyone or for anyone to point fingers.  We all suffer from many of these weaknesses and more.

Weakness does not go away after it's addressed, it must be worked on continuously.  Making habits that compensate for weaknesses is a good idea.  Communicating in a good way is a habit that everyone needs to work on.  Cleaning yourself and dressing yourself appropriately are daily habits to develop.  Habits as to when and where to practice your sexuality and romance are just as important.  For the high profile people, it costs them a lot of money when they get caught.  What will it cost you?  Continual self evaluation is a must to keep face and a job let alone advancing these days.  I'm not talking about abstaining either.  The more you bottle up a need the more lightly it will explode at a later date.  No, it's better to manage it often.  If we have a desire to show violence, we play a game, or watch a movie, or read a violent book.  We don't go out causing fights.  In other words we let our minds simulate what we need emotionally.

Identifying your own weaknesses and learning how to manage them is important.  Though most people are not high profile or in the news often, it's still important to keep your weaknesses in check.  Even though you may not notice them, everyone you come in contact with will.

Precious Human Value

Value is a common word.  It's a word we use to describe something in a quantitative way.  I want to talk about the innate human value of everyone.  I use value instead of worth because worth has some negativity associated with it, such as "What's your worth?" or "How worthy are you?" or "Your worthless".  I feel value is impartial.  I'm taking you to the core definition of human value, then the past and present that shows our disregard for life, and then talk about championing human value.

Vietnam War Boat People

In this age of information,  we understand how computers work and often make comparisons between computers and the brain.  Sci-fi stories like the Matrix raise the question if we are in a simulation or not, and if we were, we would never know going about our own lives.  Therefore, our best understanding of our basic existence is 'Cognito ergo sum,' which translates into, 'I think therefore I am.'  It's a definition of ourselves that highlights the greatness of our reasoning and our sheer ineptness to affirm our own existence.  It does something else though; it shows our value as individuals to understand, change, build, destroy, and have emotional responses to the world we live in.  Now it's a statement that we more often than not apply personally.  Now consider that every human on the planet thinks.  If they think, they are.  They all have value.  They all have the same value as I do or as you do.  This is the beginning of compassion.  Their fate should be the same as mine.  The better the fate, the better for all.

If we think about how many people have died in wars, in accidents, in suicides; we can understand how lives have been extinguished before their time.  37,000,000 died in World War I, 60,000,000 died in World War II,  1,035,585 died in Vietnam War, around 2,000,000 died in the Soviet Afghanistan war, and around 14,700 and counting have died in the U.S. Afghanistan war.  There are countless wars; each with their own death count.  These wars are fought over ideologies.  We seem to adopt the notion 'Cognito ergo occidere,' which means 'I think therefore I kill.'  If we all really thought, we'd wouldn't be doing this.  If we considered that all have the same value, we would find other ways to solve issues.  What is the value of these people who died?  Well, instead of reaping the fruits of a free life and giving back to society, their value is to teach us to change.  Let it not be for nothing.

I like to talk about championing human value.  Yet, I find myself at a loss to understand how.  I suppose it starts small.  Kindness is a common word.  It's a word we take for granted.  When your kind to someone you show them that they are valuable to you.  We like to think of ourselves as kind.  We should evaluate ourselves though.  How kind are you to that shop person who is not giving you what you want?  How kind are you to the teammate on your team who is opposing you?  How kind to that person who just made fun of you and you don't like it?  As a highly sensitive person, I see a lot of frustration.  It's at work, it's in the stores, and it's at home.  Frustration can lead to anger, and anger can lead to violence.  Kindness can temper frustration.  Showing someone their value to them.

Examining what human value is shines bright in the darkness of our devastation of it.  Taking ownership of it anew and starting to show kindness to later take bigger steps is important.  We are in an era of post world wars.  Europe does not make war among its nations anymore.  Dialog has taken over.  The middle east seeks freedom.  The world is changing.  The change will be permanent.  Weapons will lessen.  We can help usher the change by being kind.

Pile Up

Sometimes things pile up.  Several conversations happen in rapid order with many people can cause emotions to pile up like some kind of multi-car accident.  It leaves the Highly Sensitive Person (HSP, empath) in a state.  I had this experience with a lot going on at work.  By a lot, I mean excitement and other emotions from about thirty people in a fairly small space.  It was all good things, but the emotions flooded in me and kept on pouring in.  I could sense each of the feelings and all of them at the same time.  They were good feelings, and they were strong but not as strong as anger.  All the same, I was affected.  My behavior was erratic; it was hard to focus.  It was like being in a crowd but not as intense.  Afterwards, I decided that I should get rid of them.  The following is what I do to get back to normal or some semblance thereof.

First, I push the emotion out.  What I do is get into a meditative state and then use my will (intent) to push out the emotions out of my body and away from me.  It's a simple and effective technique.  It can be used in a moment when needed.  A problem with it is that if you like the emotion, you may find it hard to push it out.  What I do is try it several times.  Every time I feel a little more like normal. I guess it's a judgement call on how much you want to feel the emotion.  It's like turning down the volume on a music player.

Second I try to get into a meditative state to allow emotions flow through me but keeping my soul untouched.  This does take some practice, and does take some getting used to.  I've called this being detached.  I guess it's a compromise.  I figure sometimes it's hard to hold back the ocean of feelings, so you might as well run with it.  Yeah, I've mentioned these two techniques in other posts and for other situations.  They can be a harmonious way of dealing with this world.

A good night's rest is good after the ordeal; though, the emotions can linger for a few days.  Did I really wanted to get rid of all of the emotion?  No, not really.  I just wanted to get to a manageable state.  This way I could have control over my behavior.  After the rest I had a calmer disposition.

  Some empaths like to use shielding to not be affected by others' emotion.  My problem with it is that it's not always necessary to go to such drastic measures.  I like to experience the feelings of my environment, and shielding just diminishes that.  It's like throwing out the baby with the bath water.

Pushing out emotion, being detached from the emotion though it flows through you, and rest should help to get back to normal.  Yeah, getting back to normal. Some would question what normal is.  Of course if your an HSP, you may never know what normal is.  In this case, I am referring to what is normal for you.  It's a crazy world and from time to time it gets a little more crazy.

Old Emotion

When your hit with a very deep old emotion.  These are hidden issues in life.  They tend to make you feel funny or strange.  On the surface you feel fine, but deep, deep inside there's a storm raging.  It's quite an odd feeling experience.  Sometimes this happens to me.  Once, I had to take action, and I knew there was going to be a bad result for a particular person.  I had been working with this person for a long time.  The patterns  that arose in them were self destructive in nature.  In the end, there was nothing I could do about it.  It's like watching a train wreck in very slow motion.  The guilt emotions came up even though I see I had done everything I knew to do.  These guilt emotions were familiar to me.  When I was very young, my parents divorced.  The guilt feelings developed then; now they were back.  This is nothing less than emotional trauma.  After consulting with my highly sensitive friends (hsps, empaths), I figured out how to deal with the situation.  I'll talk about the symptoms, the investigation, and the recovery of this trauma.

The first thing I want to talk about is the symptoms.  For me the symptoms were emotional and a little weird.  Overall I felt fine, but the underline emotion was not fine at all.  I could sense that.   I couldn't shake my mood.  It was like my emotional being was preoccupied, and it couldn't handle any new emotional situations.  So I was not myself.  In that state you question what could be the matter.  I had to rationally think of what the matter was.  I could not use my intuition to help with that but I had to use my analytical brain.  A sense of panic was starting to come over me, and a sense of hopelessness as well.

To get a handle on my emotional situation, I had to go into a deep meditation state and started to ask questions to myself.  These were inquisitive and investigative questions.  I got my answer.  It was guilt I was experiencing.  Then I kept on asking questions on why the guilt was.  I got my answer again.  It was a guilt pattern as when my parents divorced.  To me that was a revelation.  Years before, I wondered if I experienced guilt due to the divorce.  I was very young and did not remember much from that time.  I only remembered some glimpses of scenes.  You really don't want to remember the bad stuff.  Sometimes you just blank out the bad stuff, but emotional evidence of them will probably remain.

The first step of recovery for me was in the meditative state.  I reasoned out my feeling of guilt.  I told myself that my parents divorce was not my responsibility and was not my fault.  Surprisingly that went quite well.  I suppose it's because over the years I gathered enough information about the divorce, and I reasoned how it indeed was not my fault.  So it seems though I knew that, I still had a pattern of guilt operating in me.  Now I was dealing with it.  Then I had to move on to the more recent situation.  I told myself that I was not responsible for the outcome and that I did do what I needed to do.  That I also did everything in my power to make things better.  That was the first step.  The next steps is day by day living with the outcome.  Though I feel fine, I do have a residual feeling that I went through something very traumatic.  So I have to take it easy.  I have to do some grounding exercises, and push out the old emotion to move on.  It's a struggle, I have to admit.  It will take time to fully recover.

Trauma of any kind has symptoms, needs an investigation, and demands a recovery.  Emotional trauma is not different.  You may experience some emotional shock.  Make sure that you keep yourself comfortable, warm, and hydrated.  Talk to others to help sort out the pieces.  Seeking help from a psychological counselor is a good idea.  These old emotions are wounds that have festered over years.  Recovery won't be immediate, but immediate headway is possible.  I'm not a psychologist or psychiatrist.  I'm just a highly sensitive person sharing my experiences, recommendations, and opinions.

Listening To Intuition

Highly Sensitive People (empaths) are nothing if they're not listeners.  We listen to everything and sometimes wish we didn't.  People in general have intuition.  People in general don't seem to listen to their intuition enough.  Dr. Judith Orloff has an article with a test on how much we listen to our intuition (see Dr. Orloff's article).  Do you listen to your intuition?  We get really busy and focused in our daily lives.  It's common for everyone to get tunnel vision and we loose sight of what is going on around us.  When we do that, things may happen that can affect us without us realizing it.  So it's helpful to stop look and listen to intuition.  What I want to do is highlight some things that may prevent us from listening to our intuition.  Through experience, I found out that trusting intuition does not come easy,  interpreting intuition can be hard, and wishful thinking is a hindrance.

In our society we are told not to listen to feelings, hunches, and imaginations.  Well, not in so many words, but over time and the fact that hard cold facts is what gets listened to rather than preference.  So, it's not surprising that we don't trust when thoughts come to us out of the blue and give us information that seemingly has no evidence.   Our overgrown analytical minds want proof.  The reasoning goes nuts without logical steps.  So we blow the information off.  That information is our intuition telling us something.  We must learn to trust it.  It took me some time to understand that my intuition was giving me good information.  Sometimes even now, my mind wants to say that it's just all my imagination.  That's how strong my analytical brain is.  I have strong reasoning abilities and it often clashes with my intuition.  Telling yourself that there could be something to this information and testing the information is one way to start trusting it.

Interpreting the information gleaned from intuition can be hard to do.  Interpretation is a function of the analytical brain.  To interpret intuition, we need to have a "common frame of reference".  Yeah sure, I took that one from Spock in Star Trek IV The Voyage Home (see quote).  You do have to have a common frame of reference to have practical information.  I see most of the common reference is learned in life as we associate feelings with situations.  Intuition comes in the form of emotion, and emotion is a language in and of itself.  Some things don't translate.  Some things are hard to put in words.  Some things you can only describe.  Some things are a driving force for action.  I went to a balloon race last weekend, and there was a large crowd with a festival.  There were lots of vendors of food and drink.  There were even some student dancers.  I picked up on the overall intuitive emotion int the area and my mouth relaxed and the ends of my mouth were edging upward.  That told me people were relaxed and were enjoying themselves overall.  Sometimes intuition comes like that.  I interpreted that one based on how I reacted to the emotion.  It's quite an art to interpret intuition. 

Wishful thinking is an enemy to intuition.  It will try to override the intuition information.  What I mean is that if you want something bad enough you may try to wish it into existence.  It's important to distinguish between what you want and what your observing.  I use this word observing in the sense of picking up information from intuition.  I have a hard head, as my wife would say.  That means my will is a strong one.  I blame genetics for that (thank you parents).  So, what I have to do is to get into a meditative state and listen for the intuition.  Sometimes, this takes a while.  I don't think it's because the intuition doesn't come to me.  I think it's there all the time.  It just takes a while to quiet down my analytical hard head.  By the way what I call analytical mind Dr. Orloff calls linear mind.  I use that word because I understand that the brain is very very complex, more than science understands.  So I don't think the work linear quite describes it.  Wishful thinking is a function of the analytical mind and it's made when we establish an intent (wish, desire, manifestation, prayer) we made earlier.

So, trusting intuition, interpreting it, and handling wishful thinking can help you listen to intuition.  As you listen, you come to realize that everything changes.  Then the more they change, the more they stay the same.  Sure, it's a paradox.  I think life itself is a paradox as well, but don't ask me to explain it.  The more you listen, the more you will change, and the more you become yourself  and you shed the facades you have in life.

Patience

 Patience is said to be a virtue.  Highly Sensitive People and Empaths are patient listeners.  It's one of the very special gifts that make interpersonal communication so enjoyable.  You can ask yourself how does patience help me in my interpersonal communication and how does it make me feel?  I'm going to explore how patience in interpersonal communication is a power for uplifting emotion.

In law enforcement there's the idea of letting people talk things out.  This requires patience.  Police are usually involved in talking to people who are emotionally charged.  Letting people talk it out helps them sort out the situation mentally.  Sometimes as an empath, I talk to people in regular situations that are passionate about a subject.  Their voice gets louder, they may talk faster, and/or they may have a more active body language.  I let them talk it out until they seem calmer.  Often they appreciate just the listening.  I don't choose these times as a time to argue so I avoid contradicting them.  That includes holding my opinion about the subject.  You might think that this somehow invalidates or ignores my opinion.  On the contrary, I feel it opens the person up to listen to my point of view since I was kind enough to listen to theirs.  As a result, a feeling of friendship and respect develops.  If you have trouble making your point of view known, or your view is not well received, try some patience with your audience.

I love how patience can change your life around.  Judith Orloff's article on patience emphasizes how patience is a powerful tool, though some people may look at it as weakness.  I know a type of person who will try and try to manipulate a highly sensitive person like me into doing whatever they say.  This person does not practice patience but the opposite, they practice urgency.  That is, they make you feel like you have to act now without thinking through the situation.   This is a mean trap.  Listening and being patient without reacting can help you avoid this trap.  I also use other techniques in such situations, like emotionally detaching from the individual.  It's really quite dangerous falling in such traps, because these people will make you their slaves if you let them.  In extreme cases, physical distance can be a good defense.  Using patience can protect you and can help the other person change if they are willing.  You don't have to point out that they need to change it will be evident to them naturally because of the feelings that patience on your part creates in them.

Patiently hearing out someone creates a bond of friendship.  This bond of friendship is spurred by respect you've shown by being patient in listening.  People have very few opportunities to be heard, and it's an innate need for all humans.  The right of free speech is an example of the need to be heard, to be listened to.  Parliament is derived from talking.  That's what legislatures are all about, talk or to be heard.  This is how we get our laws for our societies.  Likewise, being heard is how we derive at rules for ourselves and form ideas about personal situations.  Patience is essential for interpersonal communication to be uplifting.  Have you ever heard people arguing before?  They tend to interrupt one another.  This interruption just perpetuates frustration for both sides.  When one side is patient to listen without judgment, then the other usually reciprocates the courtesy and they both get heard.  Even if they disagree, they can walk away from the conversation feeling uplifted.

I looked at patience in interpersonal communication.  Being patient to let people talk and counter unreasonable urgency meets the need of people to be heard.  Patience is quite a power.

Obsession or Focus?

As a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) I tend to get focused on things.  My loved one says I get obsessed about things.  In fact I get so focused that someone could come up to me an startle me.  I usually give out a sudden high pitched sound and jump up.  That sounds kind of crazy.  They always apologize for it but it's really not their fault.  As kids, my brother would do this to me to see me jump.  There was an amount of shame and guilt associated with this.  For years, I did not understand what was going on.  Now, I would like to describe what this concentrating is like and what I do to help my situational awareness.

I've learned to accept that being focused is part of being a HSP or an empath.  I think it's natural for us to think intently on a subject or item that's in front of us and analyze it or read it.  In such a mode, I seem to naturally shut off all other distractions.  It takes someone coming up to me, sometimes closely to break the concentration.  Other times it takes someone talking rather loudly to break the concentration.  Something else is curious about this.  I tend to concentrate on something for a long time.  Several minutes can pass before I break the concentration myself.  The concept of time warps for me in these instances.

One thing I try to do when I concentrate like that is to take a look around every once in a while.  A problem with this is that the concept of time is warped for me.  So I may look around a couple of times a minute or not look around for several minutes.  That's not very consistent.  So, someone could and do still startle me.  Yeah, it's still a problem I'm dealing with.  At least people just shrug it off, especially when I say it's OK after I literally jump out of my concentration.  Sometimes the other person gets scared and I have to assure them.  It may sound comical, but it's really not for me or the other person.

Well, I gave a short description what this concentration is and what I try to do to minimize it's effects.  Living with this all my life can be traumatizing.  A bully can pick up on this situation and have their way with the HSP.  This is pretty much involuntary for me.

Handling Ever More Stress

In this age of ups and downs, it's important to make it a habit to relax.  I coming to realize this more and more.  My personal schedule is getting busier, and as a consequence so is my apprehension to loading up my schedule.  Having a busy schedule can cause a lot of stress and, for people like me, an empath and a migraineur, can cause migraines and emotional insecurity.  Sometimes having a loaded schedule in necessary, and that's when some good practices can come to the rescue.  Grounding, pushing out emotion, and rest are three things that can help.

Grounding is getting away from everyone at least by 50 feet and for about 10 minutes.  This can help you find out how your feeling and let you know what personal areas need attention.  Sometimes coaching yourself helps or other techniques while grounding.  Being around plants or a quiet place helps.  This gives some time to recuperate during the day.  You should feel better equipped to keep going on afterward.

Pushing out emotion is a technique that you can do on the fly.  When you feel too overwhelmed with emotion, take a couple of breaths.  With each exhale, push out energy from your body with the use of some intentions.  I usually imagine the energy leaving my body through my hands, feet, and head.  You can do this with people around you, or whatever situation your in.  It helps with the immediate need.

Get extra rest.  Get extra rest.  I can't emphasize it enough.  Get extra rest.  Dr. Judith Orloff also mentions this point in her article How Listening to Your Body Can Improve Your Life.  Empaths and highly sensitive people need extra rest.  We live through enough emotions everyday as it is, more so than other people.  We need extra rest.  Taking at least 2 hours can turn a painful day into a lighter one. 

In this day and age we are bound to get more stuff on our plate.  Grounding, pushing out emotion, and getting rest can help alleviate some of the effects of stress.  We may find ourselves going in several directions at once.  Managing ourselves is just as important, if not more, as taking care of our other responsibilities.  Don't let yourself fall apart.

Insensitivity

Insensitivity is rampant in our society.  We tolerate narcissists and bullies.  We develop some bad learned behaviors as a result.  Pushing, screaming, shouting and other behavior stem from anger.  The anger is because we feel we're not listened to.  These learned behaviors we pass on to our children as they grow, and they in turn pass them on to their children.  We tend to be inconsiderate of peoples' feelings, desires, and needs.  We are led to believe that we have free reign over anyone who says yes to our smallest request.  There are three ways you can counter the insensitivity in yourself once you realize you need to.  The three ways are meditation, listen to people, and considering their situation.

Daily meditation helps stop the bad behavior.  Simple basic meditation is all that is needed to calm and quieten your mind.  Once the mind is quiet, then teaching it new things can begin. You can tell yourself what is OK and what is not OK.  For instance, you can tell yourself that it's OK to feel anger, but it's not OK to take anger out on someone.  In this way you can calm your nerves as well, and refocus.  If you have too much energy, push it out of yourself as you meditate.  Let the world at large absorb it.

Listening to people is key for healing.  When your talking to someone, do not only listen with your ears, but with your eyes, and feelings as well.  Take in the verbal and the non-verbal communication.  What is his/her face like, what are his/her hands doing, and what story is his/her body motion telling?  If your a sensitive or empath, read what their feelings are.  Take the whole person in.  It's important to not respond with anger.  You can have strong energy, but be mindful of how the other person reacts to it.  Above all, learn to acknowledge what they are saying with nods and saying the occasional 'yes'.  You might want to repeat what they are saying to you so you both know you have the message clear.

Consider the situation of the person your talking to.  I mean, see it from their point of view.  Then tell them what your seeing.  They may brighten up and appreciate that you indeed understand them.  Once you do this then usually something magical happens.  They start to listen to you.  You get to share your point of view, whether you agree or disagree with theirs.

Using meditation, listening, and empathy can help turn around those bad behaviors.  You can become a great communicator.  If someones verbal, non-verbal, and emotional communication do not agree, do not trust what they are saying.  When people are honest all their communication ways agree.  This is about retraining yourself after being affected by the narcissists and bullies.  You can only make yourself better.

Strong or Loud Emotion Friends

Everyone is different.  Everyone has a unique emotional signature.  On top of that everyone emits more or less emotion.  It's hard for empaths to be around strong or loud emotion people.  I will define these people and give a couple of suggestions on how to handle the situation.

So, what do I mean by strong or loud emotion?  Well, empaths like me pick up on people's emotions unconsciously.  Some people have a very strong signature.  I liken it to sound.  If you stand next to a person who speaks really loud, that's what its like.  The loudness distracts you.  The person may be a very nice and considerate person, but they are loud.  The same is true with emotion signatures.  Empaths can get distracted if someone with a strong or loud emotion is next to them.  I remember one time I was correcting a test when one of my students came up and stood close to me without me seeing them.  I immediately lost my train of thought due the the strong emotion signature this person emitted.  I ended up taking a couple of deep breaths to get in the right mind to deal with the situation.

Say your an empath and have reason to befriend a strong emotion person.  What do you do?  The emotion will distract and tire you out.  What you do is that you learn to let the emotion flow through you without you taking action on it or owning it.  I call this emotion flow.  This takes considerable practice.  You have to tell yourself that it's OK, and that it's not yours.  This helps relieve the desire to jump back or pull away.

The other thing to do is to practice quick meditation.  This also takes practice.  It's when you take a couple of timed breaths and you fall into a meditative state on the fly.  This is really practical and helps alleviate the need to react.  To practice this I recommend getting into a meditative state often during the day.  Taking timed breaths is a quick way to get to it.  I usually breath in for 4 seconds, then hold for 4 seconds, and breath out for 4 seconds.  If your out of practice, it may take you 10 to 20 breaths to get into a meditative state.  With practice you can get there in just 2.

Knowing what to look for in a strong or loud emotion person will help you take action with meditation and emotion flow.  These are good tools for everyday activities to go along with your routine of grounding or centering.  If your an empath and find that you are not handling it well, take breaks from people several times a day.  Work on getting grounded.  Remember that everyone is different.  So you may find you have to modify techniques you hear from me or others to suit your own situation and person.  Life is more fun when you can enjoy your surroundings.

Emotion Literacy

In this analytically society based on reason and science, there are oasis of emotional communication.  Some are bars, sports events, clubs, religious get-togethers, game night, or a dinner party.  At these we let our hair down and say what's on our minds with little consideration of the consequences.  We communicate our fears, concerns, hopes, and dreams.  It seems we need an excuse to communicate emotionally.  What if society communicated emotionally on a daily basis?  What if our fears, concerns, hopes, and dreams could be related every day to our friends, co-workers, and love ones?  Sounds scary?  Well, it could be at first, but I believe it could revolutionize our society.  Opening up communications about our concerns can be very therapeutic.  It can also give new ideas to businesses, shore up risks, and foster synergic efforts.  In order to do this people need to be educated on Emotion Literacy.  Emotion Literacy is all about reading people and their emotional state, interacting withe them using empathy, and build solutions and conclusions out of the conversation.

 How do you read people?  For Empaths it comes naturally to read and listen to people's emotions.  For non-Empaths it may take more of an effort, but it can be done.  The key to reading people is first to shut up and second to consider the other person.  To all my fellow talkers and extroverts, I say with all the love and humility in the world, "SHUT UP!"  When you have someone in front of you, you need to be quiet and listen before speaking.  Knowing when to speak, is a key skill to be heard effectively.  To the introverts I ask to withhold judgment until you get the full message.  Often times people need to vent about something that is causing them stress in their lives.  Listening to them eases that stress.  When you listen to someone remember to take in the whole person, that is not only their words but tone as well, their body language, and their facial expressions.  Empaths also take in the person's emotion since they can feel what the person feels as the conversation progresses.  You may ask yourself what is this person actually saying, and how do I summarize what their message is?  These are key questions to answer as your listening.

How does one interact with Empathy?  This Empathy is 'walking in their shoes'.  This means to imagine going through what they are saying they went through.  How did they feel?  What were the circumstances?  What was the outcome?  What could have been done better?  I think this is also as skill Empaths need to learn.  Empaths naturally will listen and not do much else.  They will feel emotion of the person and thus have a deeper experience in listening, but they tend not to think about how things could have been better.  Yes, this skill normal people call Empathy requires analysis.  You have to use the analytical brain to interpret what is going on and what could be done.  The outcome of using Empathy puts you side by side with the person as a friend, confidant, and guide.  That means there is an amount of responsibility on your part.  The other person most always appreciates any Empathy they can get even if they don't say so.

How do you build solutions and conclusions?  This skill is an active one.  You listen and you submit ideas and opinions.  You also acknowledge all the points of the other person.  You make known the points you agree with.  All the while you keep using both reading and empathy skills.  Where you end up in the conversation may surprise you and the other person as well.  What your doing is building.  You are building up the person and yourself at the same time.

The Emotion Literacy I'm defining here is made up of reading people, using empathy, and actively building.  I just looked up Emotion Literacy and got a wiki page. I believe that what I wrote here is in concert with the definition of that wiki page.  The difference is that I'm giving practical advice to use in an interpersonal communication setting, that is talking to someone one on one.  Like any interpersonal communication skill, using the advice here takes practice.  I believe you would see how effective this is.  I use this on a daily basis with people I meet, and the rewards are many.