This can certainly be a strength—but other times, intuitive empaths may find their abilities to be a weakness. Here’s why, plus signs of an intuitive empath and how to thrive as one. An intuitive empath is someone who connects to the energy and emotions around them through their intuition, which is particularly strong. “So it’s basically a sixth sense,” explains psychotherapist Annette Nuñez, Ph.D., LMFT. “And it really takes practice in order to be in tune with what’s going on for them in their internal body, and not logically overanalyzing it,” she adds. It’s also worth noting that there are technically four “clairs” of intuition, according to Richardson, with intuitive empaths typically experiencing one or more of the following: clairsentience (intuition through feeling), clairaudience (intuition through messages that come through as words), clairvoyance (intuition through mental images), or claircognizance (intuition through instantaneous insight or “downloads”). According to Judith Orloff, M.D., psychiatrist and author of The Empath’s Survival Guide, empaths in general tend to be “sensitive, loving, have big hearts, with finely tuned intuition.” But those big and receptive hearts can also be extremely vulnerable to negative energy. In fact, Orloff says, intuitive empaths in particular may absorb things unwittingly, so it’s important for them to have ways of setting energetic boundaries. While intuitive empaths may not necessarily be “introverted” per se, they may become overwhelmed by busy places or crowds and require alone time to recharge because negative environments can be highly draining. Nuñez notes that many intuitive empaths have likely had these traits since they were children, and if anything, they were even stronger then. As children, she explains, we not only have difficulty understanding intuition and gut feelings, but the world has a way of making us doubt ourselves. There’s even some research that backs this up, with one 2006 study noting that “high sensory-processing sensitivity […] is associated with greater perceived stress and more frequent symptoms of ill health.” To that end, Nuñez warns against trying to rationalize away the things that come up for you and rather to explore your mind-body-soul connection and all the things that connection can tell you about your environment and the people in it.
