Whose Energy Is It Anyway?

Empaths often pour themselves into those around them while at the same time absorbing the pain and suffering of those very same people.

This episode shares what is happening at an energetic level and includes a guided meditation to help you reclaim your energy and release what doesn't belong to you. I also include a way to send loving energy to these people in a way that will not drain you, and in fact, will fill you up even more!

If you want to jump straight to the meditation please join in at around the 27:30 time mark.

Transcript

Welcome to the Empath Playground.

I'm your host,

Heather Brown.

Join me on a playful journey of self-discovery,

Healing,

And transformation.

If you're a sensitive soul,

A healer,

A therapist,

Coach or teacher,

Maybe that friend that everyone leans on,

This space is yours to thrive through guided meditations,

Energizing exercises,

And vibrant discussions.

We'll unlock your potential,

Delve into energy work,

And share strategies to avoid overwhelm.

I want you to know that as we embark on this journey together,

I am so thrilled that you are here.

Your presence and energy are vital ingredients in this journey,

And I'm grateful for the opportunity to create this space of healing and growth with you.

Together,

We can illuminate the path to a more nurturing and radiant world.

Hi,

Welcome to the episode.

If you listened to the last episode,

It was all about the body.

It had a guided meditation for a body scan,

And I did briefly mention the energy body.

This episode is all about the energy body.

I'm gonna go further into what I mean about that,

But I've noticed in myself and other empaths that two things are going on with our energy.

One is that we tend to pour our energy into our clients,

Into our family members,

Into our friends,

And a lot of the energy that we're pouring in,

There's two spaces often that energy can come.

There's more than two,

But there's two main ones.

I'm gonna speak about the two spaces that the energy pours out of and how you can shift how you're pouring energy out while still supporting your friends so that you're not completely depleted at the end of the day.

The other thing that happens with energy is not only are we sending it out,

But we're taking it in.

And so when we are being that supportive friend,

That supportive therapist,

Teacher,

Whatever your profession is,

When you're out there being a caring empath,

You can tend to start absorbing other people's sadness and stress and various things.

Now,

At the same time,

You can absorb their excitement too,

And sensations that you may label as positive.

So it's not all bad,

But really it's not yours.

So I want to speak with how to,

One,

Release things that are not yours.

Two,

Call back the energy.

So that's what we're gonna talk about today,

And I'm super excited.

I'm also going to include a guided meditation at the end that is about everything I just mentioned.

I will put a note in the description of this podcast in the show notes for where that is and like at what time it starts.

So if you want to get straight to that,

Or if it's a practice you want to keep going and repeating,

Then you'll be able to look at the description and see the time that that starts.

Otherwise,

Stick with me and we're gonna have a conversation around this whole energy thing.

The truth is that our body has lots of systems in it,

And one of them is an energetic system.

So we have our cardiovascular system,

We have our nervous system,

We have our skeletal system.

All of these things get pieced out and separated,

But really they work as a whole.

And your energy system includes what is known as chakras,

Or what can be known as chakras.

That's one way to understand them.

You may hear it called energy,

The biofield,

Chi,

Prana.

It's going to be called various things,

Maybe even called the aura.

We're talking about the same thing,

It's just different labels.

Now I will be focusing on it with a lens of the chakra system.

And the chakras in your body,

You have tons and tons that even go out above your body.

I'm going to only talk about the seven main ones.

And honestly,

I don't know if I'm going to get all the way into it.

I think today we're probably mostly going to be talking about the two that I feel and I've seen that empaths use the most in giving away their energy and absorbing energy.

And those two are the heart chakra and the solar plexus chakra.

So those two are the main ones we're going to talk about.

So the heart,

I'm sure you can figure out where that one is.

It's,

You know,

Starting at the center of your chest and kind of going out from there.

Solar plexus is going to be just above your belly button,

Below your rib cage in that area.

And if you have no idea what this means,

It's okay.

I'm going to try to simplify it in a way where it makes a lot of sense.

Before we go further into chakras and how that all works,

I want to start just by saying that you as an empath probably experience other people's energy a lot more in that you notice it.

So everyone in this world,

All the humans,

Are exchanging energy all the time.

Depending on if your biofield is really out there,

It can grow and shrink.

So if it's really out there,

You're taking in a bunch of information energetically.

And if it's really small,

You're taking in less,

But you're still exchanging energy whenever you're walking by someone,

Having a conversation,

Anything like that,

We're exchanging energy.

The difference between an empath and someone who isn't is that the empath is going to get some more information from that energy.

They're going to sense it.

You might not physically feel it.

Sometimes you might,

But you will start picking up on those emotions,

On physical symptoms going on with people.

And you will be overwhelmed possibly if there's a lot of information or if you're in an area where a lot of people are under stress.

And if the world has a lot of that,

You're picking up on it.

So it might be like,

Gee,

Why is everybody else not bothered by this?

Well,

They're not bothered because they're not noticing all of the subtleties like you are because you have this highly tuned body,

Energy body,

Physical body,

Mental body,

All of that.

And I had mentioned in the last episode how a lot of times that goes into a mode when we're younger to try to understand our environment,

We kind of crank up the volume.

Some people maybe are born into the world with a volume on full blast.

But for whatever reason,

It doesn't mean that it has to stay on full blast and you can turn it down.

Something that happened to me recently that I recognized,

Oh,

I need to talk about this.

And that is picking up on actual physical symptoms.

So years ago,

Before I completely understood my empathy,

I was working as a doula.

And a doula is someone who assists birthing people when they go into labor with emotional support,

Physical support,

And informational support.

And they typically stay with them.

They meet with them a couple of times during their pregnancy.

They stay during the entire birthing process and meet with them a couple of times postpartum.

So I was working as a doula.

One crazy thing that would happen to me,

And I thought it was making it up at first,

But it was consistent,

Was that when my client would go into labor,

My uterus,

My non-pregnant uterus,

Would start contracting.

It would start contracting before they had even called me to tell me that they were in labor.

My energy had linked with them in such a way that I was getting that information without knowing it in a way where like they called me and without being in the room with them.

I was at my house and my body would signal they were in labor before I would even get the call,

Which just seemed crazy to me,

Which is why I thought I was making it up until the second part happened.

My cycle would begin when they were having their baby like pretty much every time during the first year of my practice.

It wouldn't matter if it wasn't supposed to start for two weeks.

If it started a week ago and it was over,

Like it was going to start and I would feel this very subtle little contractions happening in my uterus in sync with picking up on my client.

So I had to learn how to have some boundaries over what was going to come into me and what wasn't.

I was a doula for about 13 years and only in that first year did that happen until I learned how to kind of have those filters.

And so when I talk about filters and boundaries,

That's what I'm talking about.

And it doesn't have to be physical.

Not everyone feels that physical.

But the reason that I bring it up again,

I kind of forgot that that had happened.

It was so many years ago.

I mean,

It's been a while.

Just recently,

And I really feel like I was just getting this nudge to share this.

I was at my house the night before I saw a client and I was like,

Oh my gosh,

It feels like I'm getting an ear infection.

This is so weird.

I haven't been sick,

But my ear is like hurting.

It's aching.

It feels like an ear infection.

And it was my left ear.

The next morning,

The first client I saw,

I said,

Hey,

How have you been?

And they said,

Oh yeah,

I have an ear infection in my left ear.

And as soon as I was done working with them,

My ears stopped hurting.

So I was a little worried that my boundaries weren't working,

That the energy clearing that I was doing wasn't working,

That I needed maybe some more rules that I set with my guides of what's allowed in.

I can choose what comes in and how soon.

And I was concerned that that wasn't working anymore.

But then I definitely got this download of like,

You need to share this on the podcast.

Since then,

I haven't had any more of that happening.

So I do feel like my guides kind of let that through so that I could share it with all of you.

So if you are somebody who actually is experiencing physical symptoms from the people around you,

You maybe know it,

You maybe don't.

It may be coming in from places and you're not realizing it.

The second part of this story is while I was experiencing those things,

I also had some other symptoms going on that couldn't be explained from my clients.

They weren't having the same symptoms.

I started feeling exhausted and really drained.

This concerned me because it was an old thing that used to happen and it hadn't been happening anymore.

I used to pour all my energy into everyone around me and have nothing left for me.

And I have worked so hard to not do that anymore.

So I was kind of like,

Oh,

What's going on?

This is not good.

And now I have a practice that I'm going to share with you later that calls my energy back to me at the end of the day.

So if I am having a conversation with a friend and they're going through a hard time,

It's natural that I would pour some of my energy into them as I'm sitting with them.

And it's natural that I would maybe absorb some of their sadness or some of whatever their struggle is.

And at the end of that conversation,

I will call back my energy and I will probably during the conversation too,

But definitely after release the things that aren't mine.

But basically I was having symptoms of exhaustion and things that made it seem like I wasn't pulling my energy back.

It made it seem like all my old habits of pouring out all my energy into my clients were happening,

But I knew that I had kept the same practice.

Then my son said,

It smells like eggs.

And it turns out we have had a low level gas leak in our house.

We had a plant in the house,

A few that were starting to die in a room that I often sit in.

And when I looked up the symptoms of gas poisoning,

It was definitely all the things that I had been thinking were being drained by clients.

So that said,

If you are feeling like you're being drained,

Maybe check and make sure you don't have a gas leak too.

So perhaps that message is for someone who is a little suspicious,

Especially if you have plants dying.

And I also think it's very wise to check out and make sure there's not something bigger going on with your thyroid.

There's various reasons for feeling exhaustion besides just being an empath.

And I do want to mention them.

I'm going to proceed as if the issue is that you are giving away your energy to other people and that you are taking on things that are not yours and holding them.

So that's where we're going to start.

So as you connect with,

I'm going to say a friend,

But it could be a client.

It could be anybody.

As you connect with that friend,

Your solar plexus is that energy center that holds most of your personal power,

Your self-confidence,

That kind of energy.

Now,

All of your energy centers,

They run up and down your spine and they all are like spinning around like these big wheels and they're not flat.

It's like a ball of energy.

And as they spin around,

They share energy with each other.

So if you ever think of that toy from when like you're a child playing in the sand or the water where all those wheels connect and you pour the water through and all the wheels spin,

That's how the energy is.

And it moves up and down your spine and a healthy energy system has all of the wheels spinning and moving and sharing energy.

But the one that is your solar plexus,

It's signified by the color yellow.

That one is the one that's really like your energy,

Your personal signature kind of thing.

As you connect with friends or even like thinking about a loved one,

Some of that energy is going to like shoot out like a thread,

Like a light,

Like a strand of light.

You can see it as that or a ribbon,

However you want to visualize it.

But it goes out and it goes to them and they get a little bit of their,

Of your energy.

And if at the end of the conversation,

We aren't mindful,

It may stay connected and they might continue pulling that energy without you even knowing it.

And it's not like they're doing it intentionally.

It's just kind of how it works.

That is one way to start draining your energy without knowing that you're draining your energy.

And then the other is that that solar plexus wants to help so badly and so it starts pulling in what you're feeling from them.

So if you're feeling that they are scared,

It might start pulling in some fear or loneliness or whatever they're going through.

And here's the wild thing about energy.

They don't have to say how they're feeling or what's really going on for you to start pulling it in and absorbing it and understanding it.

And as an empath,

There's a big chance that you're going to know how people are feeling even when they don't,

If they're not in tune with how they are.

This can happen where you can go to,

Let's say,

A party and everybody seems like they're in a good mood.

This happened to me after the pandemic actually,

But everyone had just gone through a long,

Long period of isolation.

And I went to a party and all I could feel was loneliness and sadness.

And if you looked around the room,

Like if it were a movie,

It looked like the best time ever.

Everyone was laughing and smiling and having a good time,

But all I could feel was the underlying loneliness and sadness.

And I came home so drained and had to sit and release all of that from my body and pull all my energy back because everyone I interacted with,

I was having that energy exchange.

If that resonates with you,

There are things you can do about it.

You can start calling back your energy.

You can begin releasing what is not yours.

And we're going to do that in just a little bit.

I just wanted to make sure that you understood kind of how it was happening and what was going on.

And again,

Not everyone is so sensitive to knowing that that's what's happening with them or feeling,

You know,

How other people are feeling even when they aren't feeling it.

But it's very real and people around you that you share it with may tell you you're making it up,

But I'm here to tell you it's real.

And if you are in the healthcare field,

Healing arts,

Kind of space therapist,

A teacher,

It makes you really good at your job because you really can see your clients,

Your students.

You see them maybe even more than they can see themselves.

And that can allow you to guide them,

To teach them in a way that's very tailored and very helpful.

And I feel like it is such a gift.

And I also understand that it can feel like a burden.

I talked about that in the first episode.

And my goal really with this whole podcast with sharing these things with you is because we need people like you out there in the world helping.

Helping guide people who can't feel what's really going on with them and are feeling lost and,

You know,

Need direction.

The fact that you can sense that is huge.

So I want you to not burn out.

I want you to know how to care for yourself so that you can get out there and make the world better.

And this world,

You feel it,

It's messy.

But the more people who are empaths,

Who show up instead of just hiding away,

Feeling overwhelmed.

And I'm no offense to that.

I understand you need to do that if you're not feeling safe.

But I want to help you be able to start feeling safe and start feeling your energy,

Right?

Like feeling confident again,

Pulling that energy back so that you can get out there and so that you actually want to get out there.

Yeah.

So if that resonates with you,

I'm excited that you're listening.

And if there's somebody that you know who you think needs to hear this,

Please share the podcast with them because we need light,

Light,

Light for all the healing that this world will benefit from.

So with that said,

I mentioned there were two places that we often give our energy from.

The first was that solar plexus that I talked about.

The other one I want to talk about is the heart.

And the heart chakra is a really cool place to actually share your share energy.

I say your energy,

But it's really the energy that moves through the heart is,

As we say in Reiki,

It's like this universal energy.

So this heart chakra will receive love frequency.

So this energy,

It's like a divine universal energy.

So,

You know,

Depending on your religious beliefs,

It may be called something different than what I'm saying,

But it's basically an unlimited source of pure loving energy.

It comes into your heart and it just continues.

It's like never ending.

So when you want to send love and support and care to someone,

If you intentionally are sending it from your heart chakra,

Then you aren't going to run out.

You're not going to feel drained.

You're not going to feel tired where if it's coming from your solar plexus,

Which is our kind of default of what we all do,

It's going to run out because we,

It's our energy versus universal energy.

So what I love to do,

Because when I'm interacting with a friend or something like that,

You know,

I will,

Energy will come from my solar plexus to them.

It just will.

That's normal.

There's nothing wrong with it.

The answer is like at the end,

Okay,

We need to pull it back.

But if you're being intentional about sending that energy out or calling it back,

Maybe you just sat with somebody you really cared about and they're grieving and you realize,

Oh,

I,

You know,

As we were exchanging,

I shared this energy from my solar plexus,

But I need that back.

They're still grieving.

I want to support them.

Or I've had like a lot of moms that I've worked with that have poured their energy into their children and they don't want to just pull their energy back from their children.

They want to support their children.

So this is where understanding that you have more than one place where your,

Where energy can come from that you can send to people.

So if you're going to pull back that solar plexus energy and return it to you,

You can,

Even before you pull it back,

You can start sending that universal energy from your heart to that person,

Filling them with that.

The heart chakra is known to be a green color.

The green is the color that represents it.

Often when people are meditating,

When you get to that heart chakra,

That's the color they'll see if they see visuals when they meditate.

So you can visualize this green light,

Just going to those people.

We're going to do that in the meditation later.

And then seeing that yellow light pulling back to you into your solar plexus.

And so then when you find,

You know,

Maybe you're hearing things that are happening in the world,

There's some very horrible things happening right now.

And as you're feeling that,

Being able to do something mindful of sending loving energy from your heart to those places and checking in to see,

Oh,

Did I send some solar plexus energy?

Can I pull that back?

Because it's just going to drain you and then you're not going to be as effective here in what your day-to-day and how you show up in the world for yourself and for the people you care about if you don't have your solar plexus energy.

Thinking about that and using and tapping into that universal energy of that pure loving light and sending that to them instead through the heart chakra.

And how you do that is just with your intention,

Just intending on you want it to come from your heart,

Just intending on you want to call it back.

Energy moves very quickly and it will shift.

It will listen to you.

It's not like,

It's not complicated.

It can sound really complicated and you may hear people say,

Oh,

You have to do this,

This or this,

Or you can't eat meat or you can't do this or that.

You know,

There are things that can enhance your feelings of being clear with that,

But it'll work no matter what your diet,

No matter what you do.

It will still work.

Obviously,

We have optimal health in our physical body by doing various things.

So there is optimal energetic health,

But there's nothing special you need to do.

You don't need to,

You know,

Sit in a certain position.

You don't need to meditate for three hours a day or anything to be able to do this.

You just simply have to have the intention and that's it.

It's so simple.

So with that intention in mind,

I think it's time to start the meditation.

If you're driving,

Obviously pause this,

Come back to it later.

Don't do this while you're driving.

You can do this meditation laying down or sitting,

But if you feel like you might fall asleep,

I recommend doing it while sitting and you can always sit propped up in a chair or against a wall.

If you think about the way that you see pictures of people meditating,

You don't have to look like them.

You can sit any way that you're comfortable,

But that you will be alert and it can help to have your spine straight.

As again,

We are working with that chakra system in your body and that energetic system does well within aligned spine,

But if that's not comfortable for you and you're going to be sitting in your chair thinking how uncomfortable you are,

Then being comfortable is more important.

So that said,

Get settled and we will begin.

Welcome to your meditation.

You are invited to journey with me today through your energy.

We will be spending special focus on your solar plexus and your heart chakra.

And if you don't know what that means,

Don't worry,

I'll guide you through it all the way.

But before we go into energy,

Let's first begin with your breath.

Start to breathe in slowly,

Filling your whole belly with air.

And as you exhale,

Releasing that even slower through your nostrils.

Making your exhales just a little longer than your inhales.

Breathing in and out of your nose if that's available to you.

Notice as you're slowing this breath,

How your shoulders begin to soften,

How your whole body begins to move into a state of relaxation.

Notice how the focus on your breath begins to take your mind away from all the busy thoughts.

And as we're meditating,

If the thoughts come back in,

That's normal.

Just come back to your breath,

The sensations in your body,

Or my words or your visualization.

So one more nice deep inhale,

Filling the lungs and holding,

Holding,

And exhaling it out nice and slow.

And then just allowing your breathing to return to whatever feels good to you.

And now I want you to start tuning in to your heart,

Your heart chakra,

Right at the center of your chest.

Begin visualizing a beautiful shimmering green ball of light.

And as you do that,

We're going to welcome in the frequency of universal love,

Of Reiki.

And as you invite in that frequency,

Feel how the energy center,

That green ball of light,

Begins to swirl stronger in your chest and begins to expand wider,

Feeling into this love frequency.

Notice if the colors of green are shifting as they shimmer.

They may change shades,

And you might even get other colors that come in as well.

Notice the sensations that show up in the space.

And just taking a moment of extreme gratitude for this beautiful supportive energy.

And now we will move our awareness to your solar plexus.

That's going to be just above your belly button,

Below your rib cage.

Tune in to this space and start to get a sense of a beautiful golden yellow ball of light.

Feel it swirling and moving.

And you may find that this ball of light is a lot smaller,

May even be hard to notice.

Don't worry,

We're going to shift that.

Just notice what you can for now,

Even if it's light.

And again,

Even if it feels like you're kind of making it up,

Picking it up,

Noticing this yellow ball of light,

Or feeling it if you aren't getting a visual.

And I want you to ask this space in your body,

What is it you're holding that doesn't belong to me?

And just seeing what comes up.

Are there things here that simply don't belong to you?

Feel them now.

Let the sensations come through.

And as you feel them,

Exhale and release them out.

You may feel things from loved ones,

Things you've heard about that are going on in the world.

Whatever it is you're feeling,

Beginning to exhale that out.

Saying out loud or in your head,

I release anything that doesn't belong to me.

I release anything that isn't beneficial.

Feel everything you're holding that isn't yours and the solar plexus begin to dissolve,

Release.

And now come back and bring your awareness to that yellow ball of light again,

To your personal energy center.

And I want you to see if you can get a sense of any strands or branches,

Ribbons of this energy,

This light going out from you.

And as you notice those strands or branches going out from you,

See if you can follow them.

They may be leading to people that you care about.

They may be leading to places on the other side of the world.

They may be leading back to spaces that you haven't visited since you were young.

Just following them.

They might be going to your place of work,

Family members,

To friends.

Start noticing all these strands.

Chances are that you sent this energy out from you to support these people and these places.

And in this moment,

We're going to begin to call it back,

Calling back your energy,

Winding it back in.

And I want you to be aware that when we finish,

We will move to the heart and send the universal love to these people and places.

So as you call it back,

Know that we will send more later from an unlimited source.

So take a deep breath and as you inhale,

Just invite your energy to wind back in.

And just breathing normally with only your intention,

This energy begins to move in easily,

Effortlessly.

You can start to feel and sense your yellow light swirling stronger,

Growing bigger,

Intensifying,

Feeling that energy moving in you,

Expanding so that soon it will be filling your entire belly.

As you breathe,

Feeling more energized,

You may notice tingling sensations in other spaces in your body as well,

As all your chakras are connected and all the energy flows up and down your whole system.

Calling this back in,

Reclaiming what is yours,

So that you can show up in the world the way that you want to.

Impactful,

Compassionate,

Joyful,

Confident,

Energized.

Notice now how your solar plexus feels compared to when you first tuned in.

This is always available to you.

All you must do is claim it and call it in.

I invite you to move your awareness back up to your heart and envision all of those people and places that you had sent your energy to.

Just picture them all standing before you now.

If that feels too overwhelming,

You can just picture them as one beautiful ball of light.

And from your heart,

Tuning into that green light and inviting that universal flow of loving energy to begin pouring into you and through you,

To these people,

To these places.

You are a vessel for moving this energy with intention into the people who need it,

Sending love and compassion in a way that doesn't drain you.

Because as it fills and moves through you,

You stay filled as well.

You are still supported and your heart chakra is still flowing and pulsing and growing.

Feel this frequency of love and just sit with this for a moment.

And then come back in to you.

Feel your breath once again.

And as you breathe,

This time I want you to notice your energy field all up and down your spine,

Moving as your breath moves and making a conscious intention of who has access to your energy.

With the understanding that you can change it at any time with just your intention.

Thank you for joining me today to play with your energy.

And I invite you to start to bring your awareness back into the physical body,

Starting to rub your fingers together,

Begin to wiggle your toes,

Make your breath a little deeper,

Feel the surface beneath you,

And begin to flicker your eyes open and closed,

Slowly coming back.

And have a beautiful day with your energy.