Unhealthy INFJ Challenges: Balancing HSPs, Empaths & Intuitives

Unhealthy INFJ Challenges: Balancing HSPs, Empaths & Intuitives 3034-25-300x168 HSP (Highly Sensitive People) INFJ & MBTI Lifestyle Popular Posts

If you’re an INFJ, HSP, empath or intuitive personality, it is safe to say we all share the challenge of staying balanced emotionally in life. But it has to do with a lot more then just emotions. Our bodies and mind are way more interconnected then we want to believe they are, and when you are facing emotional distress in life it can often come in a physical form, like burnout or depression. Western healthcare have always approach health in a very non holistic way. That mental and physical health are separate issues and have often only put emphasis on treating symptoms then actually solving health problems or preventing them. Health should be approached as a whole process since everything in our body is part of an whole, your brain controls your entire body and your brain is the outlet of your conscious self. Chronic illness can stem from longterm emotional distress, just as mental illness can grow from always being sick in your body.

Being an intuitive, empath or HSP type of personality makes you even more vulnerable to these kinds of health issues. You are easier pressured and stress is felt on a higher level then other people do. Emotional distress from things that happen in your life takes a greater toll on you and demands from family, friends and work can easily leave you feeling burned out and unable to handle, or even face the situations. Most of us learn all of this the hard way and statistics show that all of us will be depressed and reach some form of adrenal burnout during our lifetimes, some more times then others. If you are more susceptible to these things then you are also in more danger of suffering major depressions, mental illnesses, eating disorders, drug use and health issues like for example hypertension and cardiovascular disease.

Because of this we owe it to ourselves and others to develop good coping mechanisms in life to help us overcome these problems and also show others how they can. If you look around yourself in life among your friends and family, you can easily see that we all have some kind of crutch in life, something we can depend on for safety and comfort when life becomes painful. It might be as common as comfort food, using television as an escape or abuse of alcohol, drugs, sex and pornography. Or if you remember those kids back in school that used to pick on everybody, that was their way of coping with their own issues at home, like and escape so they would not be the ones feeling the worst all the time. Needless to say we all have these habits as a way of self defense from our own pains. The problem is these habits can grow out of control and cause further issues in our lives. When you never learn to correctly face your own emotions and problems you will eventually grow unable to handle them at all, this is where depression, panic attacks, chronic fatigue syndrome and the like kicks in. It is at this point where you realize your crutches doesn’t hold up anymore and you feel overwhelmed and hopeless, unable to rid yourself of your own pain. In almost all type of depression and stress disorders, particularly feelings of overwhelm and hopelessness is the primary culprits.

The way we need to change here is in the way we view the world. Because the world is not responsible for our own emotions, we are. What we need to understand is that peace and happiness is not something we will every find out there in the external world, it is something that we can only find within ourselves. To quote the Buddha, the mind if the forerunner of all things. Just as you are what you eat, you also are what you think. If you keep grasping and holding on to pain, longings and demands you put on people and life, you will never be able to get away from those negative thoughts. Only when you understand that the world and our minds are ever changing, that every negative emotion and thought will pass just as the one before it. That you as a person is not made up by your thoughts, they are just as clouds floating by on a blue sky. What you need to learn is to see them for what they really are and let them pass by.

What I’m talking about here is very much the practice of mindfulness and meditation, two healthy ways of learning to understand your mind and emotions. They offer ways of overcoming the pain of life and also how to reach a state of happiness not related to anything in our external world. The best thing about mediation is that when you finally understand that peace is something you already have within yourself, issues that arise in your life won’t matter that much anymore and you can approach these in a healthier way without relying on false crutches that offer nothing more then temporary relief.

The reason why I haven’t been posting that often here is because of this subject I’ve been talking about in this post. I’m actually working on an ebook about how important our mind and body connection really is and how to take care of it. The book is laid out to offer practical solutions and skills you can learn and apply in your own lives to easier overcome emotional pain, depression, illnesses and also to focus yourself and reach your goals in life. Even though the book will be made for HSPs, empaths and intuitives the skills can be applied by anyone. Of course everybody on the mail list for this blog will receive a free copy as soon as I’m done with it, which should be sometime this winter. The book will touch a range of subjects from meditation, mindfulness, yoga, achieving happiness and emotional freedom, herbal medicine, supplements, exercise, acupuncture, floating and more. Basically many techniques and habits you can apply to your life to live happier and healthier, all through a HSP, empath and intuitive perspective.

I’ll keep updating this blog with small bits and pieces from chapters that will be coming in the ebook. Meanwhile I want you guys to comment or email me if there is anything particular you want me to research and include in the book. You can comment at the end of this post or email me at alex@infjramblings.com

Until next post, take care!

Comments

  1. Saraphina says

    Thank you. as an INFJ HS Empath who is also been in an awakening process, I needed this!! Weird, I hate labels, i am always like “Don’t box me in to your labeled perceptions based off the limited knowledge you have chosen to obtain.” Yet i find myself in a time of raw transition where i have been rejected by ALL family, grown children and friends because i will not conform to the culture conditioning of old school Christianity and trapped mindsets. Although I dislike labels, it is exactly what i used to search for instructions to assist in moving through this transition when i found you :} If giving people you love everything and learning everything is not enough and they exiled me like a serial killer. Although I understand I do not have to identify with their projection, i am still struggling with how to pull the hurt of finding out that love doesn’t always matter from my being or finding a healing perception that will stick. If people do not want to change, there is nothing you can do,Their journey is their choice. Funny the same Jesus they used to crucify my ‘out of the box’ personality, is the same Jesus that showed me, he too experienced similar mindset. They killed him for it. The knowledge base still doesn’t seem to pull (what my brain thinks a physical pain) from the top of my stomach.its been 3 years now. I loved your article. If you have any additional knowledge to share i would be grateful Namaste.

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  4. lola says

    seeing another snippet in there, in the article, that seems to point towards an issue of mine, something to deeply dwell and meditate on because it is sure hitting a spot. one that i think is one of my main problems. copy and pasted and sent to myself for remembering. funny when something hits a spot and one can tell it´s a real spot.

  5. lola says

    through this dis ease i´m feeling every little change depending on what i eat. instant bodily reactions.

    everything tied together. a little factory.

    also before i had this i would feel differences in the body and brain depending on what i eat and drink.

    which has a direct influence on my emotions.

    how can one not see things are tied together.

  6. lola says

    ´´ Western healthcare have always approach health in a very non holistic way. That mental and physical health are separate issues and have often only put emphasis on treating symptoms then actually solving health problems or preventing them. Health should be approached as a whole process since everything in our body is part of an whole, your brain controls your entire body and your brain is the outlet of your conscious self. Chronic illness can stem from longterm emotional distress ´´

    this is what happened to me. i developed diabetes 1 a couple of years ago and am figuring out how i got it, none of which the doctors talked about. and it´s looking like i´m not fully dis eased, through reading a little snippet somewhere saying something could have a positive effect on it, which i tried out and it does seem to be having positive effects. i am not sure i would have gotten the information from the doctors, nothing pointed towards that i would receive that kind of information. the exact reasons why i became ill i am not sure, but stress was a driving factor i believe. i´m having some success and am thinking it is also tied to physical things that were neglected through shock. studying that now.

    to me all of it has to do with emotions – stress – dis ease.

    i also read that too much cortisol – stress hormone – can stop insulin production.

    no one told me that. i read it by myself.

    they didn´t go into what happened leading up to illness. extreme stress.

    quite peculiar, not to hear things from doctors, but from doing one´s own research.

  7. Vivek says

    Very nice . I am indian teen , I am HSP , empath and INFJ and have anxiety disorder . But in india I am discriminated for all these things . I have a friend who is too INFJ but next year he is go
    ing USA .

  8. Chickenlady says

    Well it’s quite the journey trying to nail down my type, smile. Most of my life I thought I was a warped INTP. Now I am finding out I am not warped, I seem to be an HSP INFJ. I have been looking for others like me for decades and only lately have found 2, one of whom is now deceased. Ever since I was old enough to have the required depth of unified field of knowledge, I have been able to tell instantly whether a situation will succeed or fail based on the presence or lack of the innate balance in the situation. I just know. (These are the 2 like me whom I met). I try to explain this to others but they just give me this blank look. I also don’t like crowds of people. It’s like I can feel their personalities banging against one another. A cacophony of personalities. Just give me alone time and a good book, smile. I am always searching for the bottom line in any situation. I find it usually dwells in a serene combination of truth and beauty. If not, then it’s usually not worth exploring, smile. One of my personal credos: “Always build whatever you are doing on the bottom line. “. I love and intuitively pull facts and impressions from from many angles at once. It’s how I naturally meet any situation. Unfortunately, I am usually a few steps ahead of others in on the topic and my “answers to the situation” often get greeted by smiles or frowns, sigh. I get the feeling the others just didn’t see all the angles I did. I think in pictures. If you ask me where something is, I run the picture slides thru my mind’s eye until I find it and then I can describe where it is. ( on the bottom shelf of the hutch in the kitchen, not the living room.) smile. I am a peacemaker. Always Looking to take a situation to the middle of the road where everyone an agree and get along, even if they have differing ideas on a topic. I make bibliographic databases for fun. And make non-fiction research projects, sharing the results to help others learn. Usually it is science oriented requiring “out of the box” thinking. Love doing it and researching info for other people. Esp. the rare and obscure but not the dark or bizarre. Remember, it’s about truth and beauty. Just would be nice to make money at it, but oh, well. Have few friends and don’t really crave them as the conversations usually aren’t deep and interesting and it’s tough to try and stay interested. I sure wish I could find a group of people who would like an open-minded discussion which just flowed and explored for the sake of it without dissolving into a debate, or everyone trying to push their views on everyone else, sigh. I think that’s why I love to research topics so much. It’s like having a conversation just based on learning more without all the hoity-toity mental maneuvering which goes on in so many discussion groups, sigh. Well, does that sound like an HSP INFJ to you? Best, Chickenlady

    • belle1777 says

      Hi Chickenlady. Geesh, do you sound like me.

      I often feel like I’m connecting dots that are invisible to others. I know how a situation will turn out, I understand others’ motives, I can spot a lie from a mile away. I have also come to find I have an innate understanding of spelling and language. Sure, I have blind spots and I make mistakes, but I understand subtleties I don’t recall having ever been taught.

      I do believe I am more sensitive than others. It literally pains me, physically and emotionally, to see others in pain.

      And don’t get me started on crowds! They’re so LOUD, and not just in noise!

      I’m so happy to finally find out I’m not just weird. Well, I may be weird, but at least I’m not the only one!

  9. Donna says

    Hi Alex,

    I have just discovered this site and it is great to know there are others ‘out there’ like me.. I have spent the majority of my life feeling kind of unique.. I too find that I cannot escape the relentless treadmill of life.. I have a responsible and demanding job in the public sector and a family to bring up, along with all the related financial expectations.. I crave alone time and dream of pursuing more enjoyable activities like writing and painting.. It always seems out of my reach.. Constantly dreaming and in my head.. I am too much of a control freak to give up work and let my family down but how else will I find peace ?

    Donna : )

    • Alex says

      Hey Donna,
      Thanks for sharing! I know how you feel. There is always things we can change for the better and most of the time it is us who create these big walls around us of what we can and cannot do. There are tons of books out there that can help in re-planning your life to suit you better, even if you have a family and financial obligations. A nice thing to start with is try out the 80/20 rule. In most cases only 20% of everything you do in life is responsible for your happiness, and the other 80% is not. Draw a line in the center of a paper and on the left side you write all the things that make you happy, and on the right side the things that don’t. Then you start to change the things that bring you no happiness, one by one. Maybe one a week, or one a month. Change is a gradual process, not something that happens over night. Eventually I think you will find solutions on how you can find time to pursue the things you like.

      Good luck!
      Alex

  10. Kara says

    Hi Alex: Thanks for this post. As an INFJ and HSP, I realized today, that I was grumpy and very exhausted. I go through this from time to time, but it often sneaks up on me. I realize I am slightly burned out due to trying to find appropriate work/income, and trying to promote my writing, both of which have been difficult. Instead of meditating and getting more rest, I plowed ahead and now I’m exhausted. I will eventually get back on my feet as I always do, but I thank you for this post. Look forward to the eBook.

    • Alex says

      Hey Kara,
      I know exactly what you mean, I tend to do the same all the time and have been plowing for the last 4 years. I decided that it’s not going to work in the longterm and took 3 months off work this summer. I realized I don’t need half off the things I think I do, and time is the thing in life which I value the most because it enables me to pursue all the things that interest me. I think it is easy to get lost in the never ending struggle for financial security, freedom or in the search for meaningful work.

      • says

        Loved reading this.. So much about me.. I was diagnosed as a Certified Empath / Senitive by Psychologist Dr.Greg Smith · Wichita, Kansas.. Great reading this.. I honestly thought I was losing my mind until I found a awesome psychologist who was one himself .. How lucky could I have gotten.. I’m right in here with you guys and gals <3

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