Are You Really an Empath or a Clairsentient?

I had always called myself an empath. Always. I thought it was what I really was. I'm so atuned to the feelins of those around me, I can tell when others are lying, and am...well...different, in that sense. So empath seemed like a great fit.

NOT.

An empath regularly experiences the feelings of those around them themselves. This means that if you see someone who is crying, you start to cry, and if someone is angry, you are suddenly angry.

That's literally never happened to me. It's just feeling.

Well, for a while, I didn't know what I was. I had kinda let my heart sink a little after I learned I wasn't a Clairsentient. I thought that my gift was going to be unlabeled forever, and I'd never be able to understand what I had or if there were others out there who had openly come out about this 'talent' they had. Then I stumbled upon an article by fellow Exemplore writer Bev G. She wrote an amazing article on Clairsentience and it sounded exactly like me. Here's a few of the traits or things that those with Clairsentience are able to identify:

1. You can tell when someone is lying. You don't know how you know; you just do.

2. You can identify the different energies in a house. You can feel each room and the house overall.

3. You need longer periods of time alone. You sometimes are overwhelmed by those closest to you, or people you intereact with day to day. Sometimes you choose to take time away, others you just don't feel like messing with people at all and can't change it. You don't know how to.

"Clairsentience, which means clear sensing, is the ability to feel the present, past or future physical and emotional state of others, without the normal use of the five senses." says website Phychic Library. "Psychics who are clairsentient or able to retrieve information from houses, public buildings and outside areas. Many people have this ability without consciously realizing it."

So now we've covered that someone who is clairsentient can cleary see into someone without any filter. They are able to sense emotional states in others. However, an empath can also do this. An empath is able to actually show the emotions of others through themselves. Empaths are more likely to get stressed or upset when in a large crowd or in a room with a large group of people. For empaths, it is harder to tune in to just one person at a time. It comes much more naturally to clairsentients. Do note that people can be both empathetic and also be a clairsentient. People who have both of these abilities experience both empath 'side effects' as they do clairsentient ones, but can be more 'gifted' at just one of these things.

There's one major way to see the difference between an empath and a clairsentient is that empaths feel the problem physically. Let's say that an empath sees (or I guess senses) that someone in a meeting at work is going through a very stressful time at home. The empath wouldn't have any choice but to feel at least some part of what the other person is feeling. However, if this was a clairsentient instead of an empath, they would know what the person was feeling, but would not themselves be affected.

There are still people who are both empaths and Clairsentient. These people might experience something more along the lines of empath 'powers' than they so clairsentient ones and vice versa. It is not as uncommon as it seems, but it is also not as common as it might be made out to be.

Both empaths and clairsentients can both heal emotionally. However, an empath does this by, either knowingly or unknowingly, drawing the feelings that hurt the person to themselves. A clairsentient does not do such things. While they undertand the person's pain and treat it as their own, clairsentients don't have to take on the emotions of the person. This does not make being an empath easier than being a clairsentient, and it also does not make the life of an empath any harder than that of a clairsentient, or anyone, for that matter. These beings are just blessed with the gift to understand those around them in a much more meaningful way.