Judith Orloff MD: Relationship Secrets for Highly Empathic People.

Loneliness gets to some more than others. But why it hangs on isn’t always apparent when read by traditional medical eyes. In my psychiatric practice in Los Angeles and in my workshops I’ve been struck by how many sensitive, empathic people who I call “emotional empaths” come to me, lonely, wanting a romantic partner, yet remaining single for years. Or else they’re in relationships but feel constantly fatigued and overwhelmed. The reason isn’t simply that “there aren’t enough emotionally available people ‘out there,’” nor is their burnout “neurotic.” Personally and professionally, I’ve discovered that something more is going on.

Emotional empaths are a species unto themselves. Whereas others may thrive on the togetherness of being a couple, for empaths like me, too much togetherness can be difficult, may cause us to bolt. Why? We tend to intuit and absorb our partner’s energy, and become overloaded, anxious, or exhausted when we don’t have time to decompress in our own space. We’re super-responders; our sensory experience of relationship is the equivalent of feeling objects with 50 fingers instead of five. Energetically sensitive people unknowingly avoid romantic partnership because deep down they’re afraid of getting engulfed. Or else, they feel engulfed when coupled, a nerve-wracking, constrictive way to live. If this isn’t understood, empaths can stay perpetually lonely. We want companionship, but, paradoxically, it doesn’t feel safe. One empath patient told me, “It helps explain why at 32 I’ve only had two serious relationships, each lasting less than a year.” Once we empaths learn to set boundaries and negotiate our energetic preferences, intimacy becomes possible.

For emotional empaths to be at ease in a relationship, the traditional paradigm for coupling must be redefined. Most of all, this means asserting your personal space needs — the physical and time limits you set with someone so you don’t feel they’re on top of you. Empaths can’t fully experience emotional freedom with another until they do this. Your space needs can vary with your situation, upbringing, and culture. My ideal distance to keep in public is at least an arm’s length. In doctors’ waiting rooms I’ll pile my purse and folders on the seats beside me to keep others away.

With friends it’s about half that. With a mate it’s variable. Sometimes it’s rapture being wrapped in his arms; later I may need to be in a room of my own, shut away. One boyfriend who truly grasped the concept got me a “Keep Out” sign for my study door! For me, this was a sign of true love. All of us have an invisible energetic border that sets a comfort level. Identifying and communicating yours will prevent you from being bled dry by others. Then intimacy can flourish, even if you’ve felt suffocated before. Prospective mates or family members may seem like emotional vampires when you don’t know how to broach the issue of personal space. You may need to educate others — make clear that this isn’t about not loving them — but get the discussion going. Once you can, you’re able to build progressive relationships.

If you’re an empath or if the ordinary expectations of coupledom don’t jibe with you practice the following tips.

Define your personal space needs

Tip 1. What to say to a potential mate

As you’re getting to know someone, share that you’re a sensitive person, that you periodically need quiet time. The right partner will be understanding; the wrong person will put you down for being “overly sensitive,” and won’t respect your need.

Tip 2. Clarify your preferred sleep style

Traditionally, partners sleep in the same bed. However, some empaths never get used to this, no matter how caring a mate. Nothing personal; they just like their own sleep space. Speak up about your preferences. Feeling trapped in bed with someone, not getting a good night’s rest, is torture. Energy fields blend during sleep, which can overstimulate empaths. So, discuss options with your mate. Separate beds. Separate rooms. Sleeping together a few nights a week. Because non-empaths may feel lonely sleeping alone, make compromises when possible.

Tip 3. Negotiate your square footage needs

You may be thrilled about your beloved until you live together. Experiment with creative living conditions so your home isn’t a prison. Breathing room is mandatory. Ask yourself, “What space arrangements are optimal?” Having an area to retreat to, even if it’s a closet? A room divider? Separate bathrooms? Separate houses? I prefer having my own bedroom/office to retreat to. I also can see the beauty of separate wings or adjacent houses if affordable. Here’s why: conversations, scents, coughing, movement can feel intrusive. Even if my partner’s vibes are sublime, sometimes I’d rather not sense them even if they’re only hovering near me. I’m not just being finicky; it’s about maintaining well-being if I live with someone.

Tip 4. Travel wisely

Traveling with someone, you may want to have separate space too. Whether my companion is romantic or not, I’ll always have adjoining rooms with my own bathroom. If sharing a room is the only option, hanging a sheet as a room divider will help. “Out of sight” may make the heart grow fonder.

Tip 5. Take regular mini-breaks

Empaths require private downtime to regroup. Even a brief escape prevents emotional overload. Retreat for five minutes into the bathroom with the door shut. Take a stroll around the block. Read in a separate room. One patient told her boyfriend, “I need to disappear into a quiet room for ten minutes at a party, even if I’m having fun,” a form of self-care that he supports.

In my medical practice, I’ve seen this creative approach to relationships save marriages and make ongoing intimacies feel safe, even for emotional empaths (of all ages) who’ve been lonely and haven’t had a long-term partner before. Once you’re able to articulate your needs, emotional freedom in your relationships is possible.

Follow Judith Orloff MD on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JudithOrloffMD

Jodi Lipper and Cerina Vincent: Cures for the Breakup Blues.

Pictures of lunar eclipse from California – CNN iReport.

This is beautiful.  – Renee

Let Your Favorite Color Guide Your Career – Careers Articles.

In today’s challenging economy, you have more career opportunities than you might think. Modernize your dream career into a higher paying, more job opening niche or related occupation. Don’t be afraid to get nosey and take the time to look around or invest in developing a specialized skill inside your chosen field. Use every opportunity to network and promote yourself.

• Everywhere you go, ask questions like, “What do you do during your workday?” “What’s fun, not fun?” “Any opening in your company?”
• Be a temp. Ask for short term assignments so you can taste different jobs and learn about opportunities.
• Join career specific organizations and get your friends on board.

Dreams come true with niche-specific educational training or on-the-job experience. Looking for the perfect niche? Consider the scientifically valid Dewey Color System test that measures career satisfaction at record-breaking accuracy. It lists the top 50 careers suited for you, plus hundreds of related occupations, niches and career specific organizations. To provide accurate and thorough results, data was obtained from 750,000 CareerBuilder online users.

– Take the Dewey Color System test

In order to take the test, you first have to choose the color you like most from yellow, blue and red. Then choose which color you like most from green, purple and orange. Remember your choices and see what your selected combination says about your career prospects:

Yellow-Green

If you selected yellow and green: Your ability to understand others’ viewpoints and diplomatically express your thoughts increases efficiency. You know how to make products, systems, and services best fit the environment.

Make more money by seeking careers where you can assemble support structures or make living situations more comfortable.

Consider niches as in landscape architecture or real estate sales, or consider a career as a counselor, designer or social worker.

Yellow-Purple

If you selected yellow and purple: You prefer fast-growing companies with non-repetitive jobs that offer a constant barrage of fresh perspectives and non-stop new tasks. Your ability to communicate with finesse breaks down barriers and opens profitable doors.

Make more money by developing and communicating strategies for project-oriented settings that involve constant change.

Consider niches as a public relations representative, corporate communications manager, youth counselor or radio/TV announcer.

Yellow-Orange

If you selected yellow and orange: You know about the newest available resources, pertinent facts, or innovative ways to solve workday pressures. Your open-minded yet analytical approach creates must-do activities and programs.

Make more money by inventing new ways to market your business, better utilizing resources and talents, or making what you do more efficient.

Consider niches as a statistician, geologist, researcher, librarian or product developer.

Blue-Green

If you selected blue and green: You are at your best when you can anchor others with supportive suggestions. Your personable listening skills make you a success with colleagues, customers or clients who trust you with even their most crucial decisions.

Make more money by seeking environments that give you the opportunity to manage people, information or workplace environments.

Consider niches as a writer, actor, accountant, psychologist or departmental manager.

Blue-Purple

If you selected blue and purple: Use your big-picture thinking to develop new markets, new ideas and new businesses. You can see what’s missing and know how to get things done.

Make more money by working in environments where you can organize, develop and bring situations, people or markets together.

Consider niches in advertising and sales or as a public relations representative, trial lawyer or research scientist

Blue-Orange

If you choose blue and orange: You’re a natural both at developing new products or procedures and delegating tasks. You prefer a busy environment because you enjoy learning. Pressure stimulates you.

Make more money in careers where you can gauge productivity, analyze efficiency, and oversee or implement change.

Consider niches as an operations manager, civil engineer, builder or product salesperson.

Red-Green

If you selected red and green: You know value and how to best use resources to make money. Your practical guidance keeps others focused on the bottom line and expenditures under budget.

Make more money in positions where you decide how to best utilized resources or spend money.

Consider Niches as a securities manager, auditor, banker, teacher, property manager, nurse or surgeon.

Red-Purple

If you selected red and purple: When others speak, you sort out the facts from the emotions and establish a step-by-step action plan. You know how to calm those around you and offer quick solutions.

Make more money by selecting work environments where you’re in control of all necessary resources and can offer win-win suggestions.

Consider niches as a human resources interviewer/manager, event planner, editor or executive assistant.

Red-Orange

If you selected red and orange: You use facts compiled from past mistakes and successes to deliver strong opinions that are hard to refute. Others learn invaluable information from your critiques about the efficiency of a project.

Make more money in areas where you can sail your own ship by constantly examining, in detail, what needs to be done and express your opinion when things go off course.

Consider niches as a budget analyst, computer support specialist, production manager, manufacturing manager or business owner.

Ervin Laszlo: 10 Questions to Test Your Consciousness.

Einstein said that we can’t solve a problem with the same kind of thinking that gave rise to the problem. His insight applies also to the domain of consciousness: we can’t solve the problems of our time with the same kind of consciousness that created them. We live in global times, yet most of us have a tribal kind of consciousness — it’s me or you, my group or yours, and whoever isn’t with us is against us. The continuation of tribal consciousness is nothing less than a recipe for disaster in a world of nuclear weapons, environmental devastation, increasing population and dwindling resources.

There can be no doubt: if we’re going to live sustainably and in peace with each other, we must all shift from a tribal to a planetary consciousness.

But just what is planetary consciousness? Here is how we defined it in the Manifesto on Planetary Consciousness that I drafted with the Dalai Lama and other luminaries of the Club of Budapest in 1996: “Planetary consciousness is knowing as well as feeling the vital interdependence and essential oneness of humankind, and the conscious adoption of the ethic and the ethos that this entails.”

It was our conclusion at that time that the evolution of planetary consciousness was the foundational imperative for the survival of the human species. I remain more convinced than ever that this is the case.

But what do you think? Assuming you agree that we must evolve beyond tribalism if we are to survive, would you consider yourself to have planetary consciousness? Here are 10 questions that I believe, if answered honestly, will tell you whether you do.

Do you:

1. Satisfy your basic needs without diminishing other people’s chances of satisfying theirs?
2. Pursue your own happiness with due regard for the similar pursuit of others?
3. Respect the right to economic development for all people, wherever they live and whatever their ethnic origin or belief system?
4. Live in a way that respects the integrity of nature around you?
5. Work with like-minded people to safeguard and restore your local environment?
6. Require your government to relate to other nations peacefully and in a spirit of cooperation, recognizing the legitimate aspirations of all the members of the international community?
7. Buy from companies that accept responsibility for stakeholders at all levels of the supply chain?
8. Consume media that provides unbiased information relevant to you and your community?
9. Do something to help at least one other person escape the hopeless struggles and abject humiliations of extreme poverty?
10. Believe all young people are entitled to the education they need to be productive members of their community?

Answering these ten questions with an honest yes doesn’t call for money or power. It calls for dedication and solidarity, for the spirit that creates true community, both locally and globally.

The evolution of planetary consciousness is without question an imperative for human survival on our planet. In its absence it’s difficult to see how all seven billion of us will be able to live in peace — or even just survive. To paraphrase Gandhi, “Live consciously, so that all of us may live.”