By Catherine Viel, May 27, 2022
(Golden Age of Gaia)
May 26, 2022
Some of us are like trees that grow with a spiral grain
as if prepared for the path of the spirit’s journey
to the world of all souls.
It is not an easy path.
~Linda Hogan, Lost in the Milky Way
I wonder if I’m losing my empathy? I just can’t get worked up about this Texas shooting thing.
Recently, Janine gave a reading with different emphases for her viewers depending on which of three decks we picked out when watching her video. (1) I dithered between the first and third decks and finally settled on the third.
She channelled information and advice from the Universe, outlining where we’re at and where we came from, and advising how to navigate the coming events and after the events. Like many other commentators and channelers, she is sensing that these events are very close. Solar flare? Natural or man-made disaster? Ten days of darkness? Whatever. Something big is coming and it’s very nearly here.
The channeled information for the third option felt like a correct fit for me. I resonated with the first two readings but not to the degree I did with the third.
She identified viewers who chose deck three as extremely sensitive. Empaths, in fact. We feel everything deeply and have always been strongly intuitive. We’ve likely been working on spiritual matters, fighting the good fight, for many, many lifetimes. And we strongly sense what other people feel.
I’m reminded of Lt. Troi from Star Trek: The Next Generation. I identified deeply with her empathic abilities and was sure I had some rudimentary ability of my own. When the show originally aired in the 1980s, I wasn’t as aware of metaphysical matters as I am now. But having been accused of being overly sensitive throughout childhood and later, I knew what it was like to feel things too intensely.
So, where is my vaunted empathy for the school shooting victims in Texas? Why am I drawing a big blank when I let my attention glance that way?
*****
I think I’m already practicing the Universe‘s suggestion, as channeled through Janine, for how empaths can navigate this transitional time and the period after the events. Later, we will know when we’re ready to move into whatever our mission is—likely some form of healing work.
But for now, and perhaps for the year or so after the events, while the world catches up with what we already know…a kind of withdrawal could be beneficial. Detachment. Or nonattachment, which sounds slightly more warm and fuzzy.
Still, there’s no way to soften the basic premise of distancing myself from others to some degree. Not allowing myself to be wrapped up in world tragedies, world events, even the woes and worries of people I know personally.
This is difficult, because I think of myself as a friendly person, and it just doesn’t seem very friendly, this not-caring-ness. In fact it might be considered downright unfriendly.
*****
In “my” third-deck reading, Universe suggests that empaths will help themselves the most by keeping away from the sturm und drang of the newly awakening and their reactions to unpleasant news that isn’t news to me (for the most part, at any rate).
I found my empathic, sympathetic self in childhood, and it’s been one of my main character traits for as long as I can remember. I’ve never lost sight of it, deliberately set it aside, or felt it diminish on its own accord, as it seems to be doing now. It’s peculiar to sense a kind of barrier between my ready empathy, and those people or situations who seem to cry out for understanding and support—mass shooting victims, for instance.
If I haven’t exactly lost my empathy, it feels in a state of suspension or abeyance. This doesn’t bother me nearly as much as I’d think it would. I have a self-image of kindliness and compassion, and a mental shrug over tragedy seems the opposite.
As reflected by Janine’s reading, though, this might be my new normal until some time after the events. It feels strange at the moment, but I think I’ve been working my way toward this over the last two and a half years, as one by one people I care about get vaccinated, wear masks needlessly, and swallow wholeheartedly the ever-changing buffet of manufactured news that spews from their TVs and devices.
It’s been painful for a long time, watching these individuals take the path that seems unhealthy at the least, and possibly deadly at the worst. Maybe it’s no wonder I can now react to a mass shooting with a twinge of sorrow and regret, but no real engagement of grief. I feel bad, but not devastated.
Now that I think about it, that’s not at all a bad position to maintain. Given what’s likely coming, feeling bad for victims of atrocities, but not incapacitated by horror and grief, is a pretty healthy response. It’s sustainable in a way that an over-the-top negative reaction can’t be. I dislike horror stories, so avoiding engagement with the real-life ones happening now, and those that may still come, sounds appropriate and realistic.
In the meantime, Universe also advises finding beauty and things that make us happy, which, living in the paradise on the Pacific that I do, can be found by stepping outside my door and strolling down the street. The “bad” reality doesn’t go away, but I can focus on the environment I’d rather see come to be: friendly dragons, luminescent butterflies, brave unicorns, and rainbows every single day.
(1) Tarot by Janine, “Message from the Universe: How to Navigate the Darkness of the World! How to Be & Stay in the Light!” 5/24/22 (https://tinyurl.com/2p8692f4)