@ Rachel I would see close similarities between sympathy and looking down on a person to a degree, as sympathy isn’t necessarily understanding a person…..it has a quality of listening to the person and then patting them on the head and saying “awww”. Calling them pathetic however, I don’t see as relating to either sympathy or empathy.

I too have been curious about empathetic and empathic as I can’t remember which term we used at Uni and I’m having to right it in my CV at the moment.

The use of the term ‘empathy’ to describe an extra-sensory ability is inaccurate, confusing and misleading. It is a a term that is increasingly being abused by people who have no real psychic ability. Empathy is a normal human psychological trait, and it is something all people have to some extent (unless you are a psychopath, sadist or pathological narcissist).

Empathy basically means being able to place yourself in someone else’s shoes. It is the natural tendency we all have to identify with, and be understanding of another person’s feelings, motives and circumstances. Some experts believe we are born with it, while others say we are taught to be considerate towards others by our parents.

The more sensitive or empathetic you are, the more able you will be to comprehend and sense how others are feeling. But this is NOT an extra-sensory ability! You are not an Empath just because you are able to pick up on someone else’s feelings through cues you get from their body language, their facial expressions, their tone of voice, as well as behaviors like crying, or sighing, etc.

Yet many people go around announcing that they “have empathy”, which makes them somehow special or gifted. By implication this would mean that all people who do not consider themselves Empaths, but instead see themselves merely as normal, caring people, should in fact all be called psychopaths and narcissists.

If you are someone that has strongly developed empathy for others (i.e. you are very ‘empathetic’) you would naturally be very aware of emotional signs and moods in someone else. But that does not make you an Empath. It just makes you a very well-adjusted, kind and considerate person.

I am an Empath myself, and in my experience an Empath is a person who has vivid ‘clairempathic’ experiences or abilities. This means that the Empath has a direct experience of the other person’s emotions and moods, as if they were his own. Often you don’t even know where these feelings are coming from.

Empaths who are unaware of their own ‘empathic’ ability are known to go around for years ‘picking up’ unwanted emotional signals wherever they go, without understanding why their positive state of mind has suddenly changed to a really bad mood the moment they went out in public.

Therefore, being ‘empathetic’ is not just about identifying with someone else and feeling bad for them when they are having a tough day. With clairempathy you literally feel the sadness along with the other person, often without communicating directly with them or being in the same room with them. The Empath doesn’t only know or understand how others feel, he actually feels what others feel and also knows what the cause is and what could be done to resolve it. With normal empathy you don’t necessarily know why someone is sad, but you still feel sorry for them. With clairempathy you know where their feelings are coming from without any prior information, and you know how they will feel tomorrow and you also know how their current feelings are linked to their childhood, etc.

Clairempathy is further also associated with physical sensations or medical symptoms. For example, I would be in line at the supermarket and suddenly feel pain or numbness in my shoulder, and when I turn around there would be someone further down the line of people who has their arm in a sling. Clairempathy or ‘empathic’ ability is considered to be an aspect of clairsentience (clear sensing or feeling).

So, clairempathy or ‘being empathic’ is a developed extra-sensory perception of emotions and feelings. It is a paranormal phenomenon and it goes beyond empathy or ‘being empathetic’ as a natural human trait. Your distinction between being ‘empathic’ and being ‘empathetic’ is therefore useful and meaningful.