|
I literally feel others pain.
I'm not delusional, and if you don't believe me, leave now. I will only ignore your answer if you don't believe what I'm saying, don't waste your time and typing. For example, someone I just met and only interacted with once and never spoke to again. I suddenly had a hunch on her relationship with a girl and found out every last detail was correct. At school a woman was talking about her spinal cord injury, and said she cracked her neck, and a back bone got broken or whatever. Then my neck and spine inexplicably started hurting. Happens for everything. Is this weird? Mom says I'm an empath or something like that…
[ ]
Want to answer more questions in the Health & Fitness category?
Maybe give some free advice about: Mental health?
This is very strange. I hereby issue a writ of hocus-pocus.
From moi to you,
Miss Piggy
]
Not weird. Totally normal to feel other people's pain. Doesn't require a spiritual connection or any special powers. It's just part of being human.
When we observe another person being touched, or when they describe physical sensations to us, our brain mirrors what they are describing. These 'mirror neurons' simulate the experiences of others in our brains, even though we aren't experiencing the physical pain.
At a basic level, it's the reason we flinch when we see someone else fall or hurt themselves. Our brains literally go through the motions as though we are the one who have been hurt.
Some people have much more nuanced or intense experiences than others, but to some degree, all healthy human brains do this.
'Mirror neurons' are a relatively recent scientific discovery, but they have helped to explain a whole bunch of how people learn by watching others, and how people develop empathy and a moral code. It's even helped to uncover what happens when those mirror neurons aren't doing their jobs correctly - like for people with autism who dislike being touched and struggle to learn things the rest of us find simple by observation.
As deeply cool and special as these things aren't, t's not magic or telepathy. Your brain may be practically skilled at these sorts of things, but it's still all in your brain.
It's also totally normal to sometimes make absolutely correct assumptions on the details of another's person's life - and think you have some special sort of insight - but that's not really the case. It's just that you are far more likely to remember when your assumptions were right, then to remember the thousands of assumptions you make each day that turn out to be wrong. You are also probably experiencing something called Confirmation Bias - which is one of the ways our brains are prone to making incorrect assumptions - and it's what happens when you have a cool idea like "I'm an empath" and you start to pay extra attention to the information that confirms your initial idea and your mind just ignores the evidence that doesn't. We all have the desire to prove ourselves right, and we can't help but pay selective attention to the ideas we like, more than the ones we don't.
I know you have absolutely had the experiences you're describing, and they are awesome experiences, but they aren't magical. They are pretty well understood, natural phenomena, because you are lucky enough to have a truly awesome device to use: a human brain.
]
No delusion here. Some have great powers of empathy and intuition. The more you do it the greater you build a subconcious 'database' (as it were) of experience and the more intuitive you become, the more you are able to see from other the perspective of another (not simply your own). We might hear the ability called 'people skills'...'great communicator'...'she seems to read my mind and know what I'm thinking' and so on. Far less intuitive people recognise the ability when they see it. The mirroring of physical sensations when you hear about them, read of them or observe them in others is something called 'auto-suggestion' and it's quite common. (If you've got a minute look up some info on testing of new medical drugs, and in particular, look at 'The Placebo Effect' if you want to see how powerful auto-suggestion can be. Look at use of subliminal techniques in media advertising too...it's prohibited, and you'll see why. Our minds can be 'screwed with', and it's not that hard if you know how!!) It's more acute in some than others, some may feel direct sensations and symptoms...but most people will for instance 'squirm' or feel their 'toes curl' when hearing about someones discomfort. You're not delusory. You have strong empathy, are very intuitive and strongly auto-suggestive. If you ever think you can PREDICT, or have premonitions of events that will happen either to yourself or other people...then, sorry...you're delusory! It cannot happen, even the theory of it being possible is not coherent on any level. Your intuition and that partly subconscious 'database' of experience might suggest that a certain couple are destined for relationship clashes for example...and you might many times be proved right. But to predict it with certainty...this we cannot do. Thought-transference belongs in the world of science-fiction too I'm afraid. When our thoughts converge with others it's because all human minds assimilate and process information in the same way. The tendency will naturally be towards convergence. A good example is that in our distant past, ONE MAN did not invent the wheel and take his knowledge all over the earth. There was no facility for intercontinental travel for a start. Neither did he somehow 'beam' his knowledge through the atmosphere, across oceans etc. Each nation and culture, even community, invented its 'own' wheel. They were all round and they all worked the same. The ancient Greeks attached great spiritual significance to Mount Olympus, the Japanese to Mount Fuji, the Tibetans to Mount Everest and so on. The civilisations never met. There was no dialogue. Yet their thoughts all converged to mountains. In short, I believe you completely. The intellectual powers of the human mind are awesome at times. But not supernatural!
ps. The auto-suggestion/feeling pain link is so strong because regardless of which part of the body is afflicted and CAUSING the pain, we FEEL the sensation of pain in our mind. That's why pain-killing drugs are not specific (ie there's not a leg-pain killer, an arm pain killer, a shoulder pain killer etc.) They all work by targetting the brains 'pain centres'. You bandage the cut leg (to stop the bleeding), but the pain killing tablets or injections act neurologically (to 'stop it hurting'). Morphine would perhaps be the most extreme example. In a strong enough dose it will mask (or suppress) the most agonising pain imagineable anywhere in your body, but it won't cure what's causing it in any way. It just totally zaps your ability to 'feel' it.
]
More Questions: |