Think You Might Be An Empath?

If you wonder if your an empath there are no lack of websites and advise on how to tell.  Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) is a term that has a presence on the internet.  It's a psychological term for empath.  There now are several psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, and coaches who cater to HSPs.  Many have tests from psychologists or esoteric teachers.  These tests can give a sense of disappointment if you prove not to be an empath or HSP.  If you wonder if your and empath, you're really on a quest to understand yourself.  To seek to understanding your strengths and weaknesses is a noble quest.  Every type of person is important, and everyone should understand how they can contribute to their themselves, their loved ones, their community, and their society better.  I will give a couple of ways that would seem less bias and a more generally beneficial a way.

The personality test I recommend is the Briggs-Meyer test.  You can find many free online Briggs-Meyer tests just by googling.  The result of the test is four letters that describe you, or your preferences.  You can read up on it in the link I provided.  When you do take the test, I recommend to take it 3 times to get some consistency.  You may not be familiar with the language of the test so that would skew the results.  Taking it more than once is a good idea, with the idea that the last time you take it is the best result.  Also, taking more than one test online might be a good way to go as well.  Now there are 16 distinct results from the test.  You are only one of them.  Where do HSPs fall into?  They fall into the results that have NF in them.  There are 4 of those: INFJ, INFP, ENFJ, ENFP.  Now just because you have NF in your result may not mean that you are indeed an HSP.  I'm not a researcher on this, so I have to allow for this possibility.  With any result from the test, it's a good idea to read up on it via Wikipedia and other sources.  Always check out the sources mentioned in Wikipedia because academically Wikipedia is not a valid source in and of itself.  If you do have NF in your result, then you may want to check out the other empath and HSP tests that are strictly geared for HSPs.  This test lets you know of your preferences on how you operate and relate to things and people in your world.  Understanding these can help resolve long standing problems you may have encountered in communicating with other people.

The bad news about HSPs and empaths is that they have a disability.  That disability is that they sense too much.  So much so that they will be involuntarily affected by peoples emotions and/or pain.  This disability will show itself in everday happenings.  Evaluating and acknowledging the happenings that go on around you and affect you can confirm if your an empath/HSP or not.  Mind you it seems that through meditation, a normal person can become clairsentient and feel as well as empaths, but it doesn't mean they are empaths/HSPs.  Personally, I'm affected by people's emotion.  Strong emotion from another person will cause me to act in kind.  I take on their emotional state and imitate it without thinking.  Which is why I have made arguing matches into shouting matches, been overly sad by a sad event, and able to reflect emotion to a person.  Of course if you find out you are an empath/HSP, then you have a lot of work to do.  They need time to train themselves how to operate in a emotional and painful world.  Over time, they can turn the disability into one or more abilities.

[UPDATE]
I've been reading Emotional Freedom by Judith Orloff.  It's a great book for all people.  It has self evaluation tests and helps you determine emotional problems and preferences.  I highly recommend it, especially if you want to evaluate yourself.  Dr Judith Orloff is Psychiatrist and an empath herself.

To take an empath or HSP test is not enough to find out who you are.  Taking the Briggs-Meyer personality test and evaluating your behavior in daily stimuli can give you a bigger picture of who you are and whether you are an empath/HSP.  Either way knowing yourself is important for your self development and the betterment of the world.  The Ancient Greek maxim "Know Thyself" comes to mind when I think of how to better myself.  We are a mystery most of all to ourselves.