If you can feel energy of people around you, watch this IMMEDIATELY

In this video, Aaron Doughty addresses people who identify as empaths—those who can sense other people's energies—and explains why they often attract narcissists and struggle with boundaries. He traces the root of this pattern to a shared abandonment wound, describing how empaths tend to abandon themselves to please others while narcissists seek control to avoid abandonment. Doughty introduces the "frame technique," a meditation practice that helps empaths feel safe inside their own bodies and stop taking responsibility for others' tasks. He weaves in Adlerian concepts of teleology versus etiology, emphasizing that present‑level subconscious goals, not past events, drive current behavior. The "separation of tasks" principle is presented as a way to recognize that each person is responsible for their own feelings and actions, freeing empaths from the need to manage others' perceptions. Throughout, he shares personal anecdotes of toxic workplace dynamics and childhood experiences, reframes labels like ADHD as high energy rather than pathology, and encourages viewers to shift from victimhood to empowerment. The video concludes with a call to join his free "High Vibe Tribe" community for live meditations, workshops, and further guidance on the frame technique.
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People who can feel other people's energies have the ability to know what other people are thinking or feeling. They have the ability to tune to other people to know their intentions. They have the ability to be normally the person in the friend group that everyone comes to when they have their problems. They tend to be people that have trouble setting boundaries. And until empaths learn this one idea that I'm gonna share in this video, they may remain in that energy pattern, attracting even narcissists, attracting controlling people because they're not aware of the subconscious energy that's inside of themselves. And in this video, what I wanna do is share with you what completely has transformed my perception, my energy in general from the inside out, and what I've seen help tens of thousands of people with this one idea that when you begin to embody, completely changes how you show up, how you relate to other people, and how you find safety inside your own body. Now, first off, let's look at the opposite sides of the spectrum, okay? When you say an empath or someone that can feel other people's energy, this is someone that in childhood most likely had a lot of tension in the household. They may have even had a critical parent. They may have had someone in their life that they felt they had to tune to in order to find safety. They might have been the peacemaker in a in a family where there was a lot of stuff going on. And what happens is, as a survival mechanism, what ability was gained is the ability to tune to other people, to know how other people are feeling and thinking, so that then there is this ability to mitigate how someone is, is being, to ease the tension. So then what happens is, through childhood, if they don't learn or they don't you'll see it's called individuate. If they don't learn how to embody more of their own energy and how to feel safe inside their own body, they will continue to be a doormat for other people. They will continue to also many times attract narcissists. And let me show you why. So if you think about this spectrum right here, you have an empath, someone that maybe has a, they're not in their own body. So there's a more fragile sense of self. And what happens is as a kid, it wasn't safe. It wasn't empowered to be different, to be an individual. And therefore there was this ability to tune to other people to get their needs met. Now what happens is on the other side of the spectrum, the opposite side, you may have that of a narcissist. A narcissist is somebody that has that in order to get their own needs met and they have a false sense of self. So whereas there's this unrealized sense of self within the empath, normally depending on the spectrum, there is that of a false sense of self that's being projected onto other people. Narcissists are very controlling. They do this thing called gaslighting where they have this intention of making your sense of reality feel faulty so that it reaffirms they are right or to remain in power. They can be very controlling, very manipulative, and it's the exact opposite. They generally have very little ability to feel what other people feel, or they just don't care. So on the opposite side of the spectrum, we have a narcissist and an empath. Now, what many times happens is empaths will attract narcissists. And you look at that and you go, they're so opposite, but think about our reality with polarity. In a way. It's also, by the way, founded in the same core wound. And this is where, when you begin to apply what I'm about to share with you, completely changes everything. Now, the core wound is an abandonment wound. It is feeling the fear of being abandoned, the fear of mom or dad leaving or the family breaking apart. And what happens is the empath abandons themselves to make other people happy. and then the narcissist controls other people to make themselves happy, but both have a form of an abandonment wound. Now, the thing that you wanna become aware of is where in your life are you abandoning yourself? And where are you even in your own body to know the difference between what is called self and other? This is a huge part of this process. And when I learned something called the frame technique, which is one of the most powerful techniques I've shared on YouTube. I get messages and DMs all the time from people that say this one technique has completely changed their lives. It has to do with feeling safe inside of your own body and not taking accountability for other people. Now, there's actually something to be learned, by the way, as an empath or someone that can feel other people's energy, from tracking that of a narcissist. What if in a way, in our reality, There are lessons we came here to learn. And until we actually learn the lesson, we continue to repeat it. And this is why narcissists are attracted to empaths. And what happens is they keep doing it even though the faces may change and they wonder why. Well, think about this too. A narcissist, their only options are people that are unaware of their patterns, and people they can manipulate. So if narcissist was to try to manipulate someone that had a strong sense of self and knew their worth, they would bounce off of each other. They'd be like, somebody would be like this, you know, you're manipulative, you're crazy, and I don't wanna be around you. I had a job at one point where I had a manager that was very narcissistic, very similar to my ex-stepmom energy from when I was a kid. And that's why I think I kept attracting it. That kind of person into my life. And I remember everyone in the department was so, in a way, afraid of her 'cause she was protected by upper management and she would get away with everything. She would talk smack about, I mean, she would basically like, if you said anything to HR, you wouldn't get the schedule that you wanted. And she would talk down to people and make them cry. No joke, I've seen people cry with the way she would talk to people. And there was this one guy, his name was Roland. And he got hired. And within 1 week, he's working there and it's a good job where you get paid $30, $40 an hour. So for many people, very happy with that. It was in salon shoes, designer shoes, commission-based job at Nordstrom's in women's shoes. And he comes into work one day and this lady took him in the back. Her name was Julie. Took him in the back and just starts reaming him like she does to everyone. But everyone, can't say anything to upper management or HR 'cause they'll get in trouble. So everyone just kind of allows it to happen. And he starts talking down to this person named Roland. And after a couple minutes, he looks at her and he goes, "Who the hell do you think you are?" And he walked out and quit on the spot because there's a part of him. I was always kind of like encouraging to me. I was like, "Oh, that's just badass." But I also thought, I think that's the example that I'm talking about when I say, a narcissist only has the options of people they know they can manipulate, and who better to manipulate than somebody that can feel other people's energies and get something from validating a narcissist? They get this new project they can do where they can fix the person. They get somebody that has a false sense of self, but also it's like this toxic game they're playing that keeps the energy tethered. Because at the end of the day, when we talk about this whole idea of energy vampire, Think about it. An energy vampire is somebody that wants someone else's energy and feeds on someone else's energy. So what can happen is even though the narcissist is very overtly taking energy from other people, the empath has a different way to get it. Instead of taking and demanding, the empath gives to then get. If I can be the one person, because the narcissist doesn't have as many options 'cause people eventually find out about them, then I can give to them, I can fix them, they'll never leave me, 'cause of the abandonment wound. Don't want anyone to leave. So interestingly enough, that belief will keep them tethered to that kind of energy. And once the empath begins to get into their own center of frame, like I'm in the center of this frame right now, even that frame over there, as I'm in the frame, what happens? I'm in the center of my frame. Then you're in your center of your power and you may then see it from a new perspective. You might be, oh my gosh, this is in my life as a pattern for me to help me learn to set boundaries. That really is a big part of the key. Now let's talk about boundaries for a second. And I'm gonna share something I've never shared before. And it is an extremely powerful part of psychology that is really impacting me right now. And really impacting my teachings in a very powerful way. But boundaries really, what if you attract narcissists because you came here to learn the lesson of boundaries and who better to learn the lesson of boundaries than someone that is constantly testing and gaslighting your boundaries? I know that's like a harsh way to look at it 'cause it's like, well, it really sucks. But sometimes for people to get the lesson, it really freaking sucks to have to learn that hard boundary. So what if, Learning the lesson of that narcissistic energy is here for you to decide you don't want it in your life or for you to be in your own frame and to decide who you are. For you to say no more. I've seen people in my life, and for me, until I became aware of this energy, there was this guilt around setting boundaries. There was this fear that if I set boundaries, I'll get punished. And then I'm an adult and that energy is so outdated. The more I set boundaries, the more I was in my own frame, and then the more I was also able to see, hey, this is an energy I do not want in my life any longer. Now, one of the things I'll also touch back to here in a sec, but let me talk about Alderian psychology for a second 'cause I've been talking about it for a minute now. This type of psychology is called Alderian psychology. So Alfred Adler was that of considered one of the great three grandfathers of psychology. We have that of Carl Jung, we have that of Freud, and we have that of Alfred Adler. He was an Australian psychologist and he's known for his views of psychology that are radically different than a lot of other, the other teachers. Now, one of the main differences is that what Alfred Adler believed is he didn't believe in something that was called etiology. Etiology is the belief that the cause in the past equals the current level effect. Now, he believed in something called teleology. Teleology is that the past does not equal the present, but in fact, we have present level goals that are subconscious, and those present level goals will find evidence in the past to reaffirm the present goal. So the idea is that you may think you wanna attract love. Why can't I attract love? And you may say like, why is that? And it's like, oh, 'cause of my childhood, my parents divorced and this happened, this happened, this happened. That's why. My past equals my present. Now the freedom of this is you realize the past does not have to equal the present. Now in my teachings, I still like to look at and become aware of the subconscious parts of our past that may, equal to the present moment energy. However, knowing that there's a subconscious goal there, I find very powerful. And also some people get caught up in the past because they're always looking for the childhood dynamic and they just keep going into it, keep recreating it. But the power of teleology is that once you become aware of the subconscious goal, you can then see that you reaffirm that subconscious goal by looking into your past memory. So somebody that says, somebody may have a goal to actually, they think they wanna be in a relationship, but that actually might be safer for them to be single. So they may have a subconscious goal to be single, and they're in a way using it as an excuse that they had this certain type of childhood to keep them safe in their own frame or in their own, you know, alone in a way. This is where you become aware of that. Now let's look at that for the empath, for example. The empath can feel other people's energies, and subconsciously they may not wanna set boundaries subconsciously because they're afraid of what other people, the tension that they'll cause. So they're attracting people into their life that actually reflect back, demanding they continue to set boundaries. But there's a subconscious goal there to feel safe in this frame that is subconscious, this frame that we wanna feel safe by giving to then get. Now, even more powerful than this, that was just one concept I find very powerful. The one that's related to more so this video is something that is called the separation of tasks. And it comes from a book that I'm reading that isn't actually written by Alfred Adler, but it's called "The Courage of Being Disliked." "The Courage of Being Disliked," or "The Courage to Being Disliked." And the idea is you're not really free until you are disliked and you're okay with it. And empaths hear that and they go, "Disliked, being disliked, who would wanna be disliked?" Well, if you want to do anything great in the world, you have to in a way realize that being disliked is a part of it. There are people that love my content and leave very positive comments, and there are also people that do not like my content. Somehow I trigger them. My energy, they say, is what triggers something in them. Whatever. If I just sit in a cave and didn't make videos, I still wouldn't be happy. But I'm not tuned to that. I don't— I understand that to do anything great requires being disliked. But the separation of tasks is this groundbreaking ideology around understanding this. And what it also talks about is how all problems are inter-relational problems. If we were alone in this universe, just us, there wouldn't be many issues. You might say, well, the issue is you're alone. But in between people, that's where the challenges happen. Now we all have our own tasks. Now the separation of tasks is understanding that on one hand, Our task is to be in our own frame, to maybe be ourself most authentically. Someone else's task is for them to do the same. Now, the separation of tasks is important because when people start taking responsibility for other people's tasks, that's where problems arise. Now, think about it. An empath is taking on the task and the responsibility of someone else, even if it's not a narcissist. What you think about me, I wanna manage that because I don't want disapproval because I don't wanna be disliked. I don't wanna not get validation or approval. So I'm gonna merge myself in order to be whatever you want me to be. The challenge is that if you have 10 friends, there's 10 different persons you need to be to get their validation. It's not like you just be one way and all 10 like it. They all have a different expectation of you. But one of the most groundbreaking, most powerful insights you can possibly have as an empath is to become free from what other people think. It's to become free inside of your own body and to understand that if someone doesn't like who you are, that's their task, not yours. It is not your task to manage what other people think and feel about you. It is your task to manage and look at how you feel about you. And notice that the most magnetic people are the ones that own themselves 100% and that give themselves the most permission to be themselves. There's times I'm around people and I could be sometimes, I'm an esoteric person, like an esoteric kind of eccentric person. And I found that the more I just own it, even if people don't like it, they don't agree with it, they respect it because I'm being myself. And sometimes it may even trigger people 'cause maybe they're not giving themselves or there's not that acceptance there or whatever. That's not my task. There's a Mac Drake song called "That's Not My Job." Anything else, it's not my job. That's not my job. And in a similar way, it's like, that's not my task. That's not my task. It's not my task to manage how you think about me. It's not my task for, and it's not your task. It's also, I'm not gonna project your, I'm not gonna project my responsibility onto you to give me what I feel I didn't get growing up. So the power in this is understanding this idea of separation of tasks. Of being inside of your own energetic field, not needing anything from anyone else in the sense that you're trying to draw source from outside in. Now, the power is an understanding that you can draw the power from inside of yourself. And that when you begin doing that, it changes everything. Literally everything in your— will change your life when you begin to have that awareness. Now, one of the other things that will change your life more than anything else is this. When we feel like a leaf in the wind and when there's this label of an empath and also the shame, I wanna say that when we're talking about empaths and energy vampires, the one thing I don't wanna do is for you to believe that this is something that you need to feel shame about. I'm just trying to help you become aware of the subconscious energy because when I became aware of that, I saw that this is something that you can transform just by the awareness. Now I remember when I was told growing up, growing up from, I'm not gonna go the whole story if you've been watching my channel for a while, but from 7 to 17, having a controlling ex-stepmom in my life, she left. I wasn't able to really have friends. I wasn't able to go to school. I had to like earn going to school activities and stuff. After that, I worked at Nordstrom Rack and then eventually Nordstrom's for like 5, 6 years. And when I worked there, that was when my personality started coming out. I started to become much more loud 'cause I wasn't allowed to really have friends or anything back then. So all of a sudden I'm being loud. And one thing people would tell me a lot is they'd say, "What's wrong with you? Why do you have so much energy?" 'Cause I had so much energy. "What's wrong with you? What's wrong with you? Why do you have so much energy?" And I would say, "There must be something wrong with me." And then I go to a doctor and they say, "Oh, you can't focus. Here's some Adderall." And then I was like, "There's something wrong with me. Shame, shame. There's something wrong with me. I need to fix this." And a huge part of the healing was when I realized there's nothing wrong with me, I just have a lot of energy. And then I learned meditation and I balanced out my own energy. When it comes to being an empath and we're talking about energy vampires, my intention isn't for you to go, there's something wrong with me, I'm some energetic vampire that I need to feel shame about. It's more so about just becoming aware that you can begin to become aware of this pattern And to realize in a certain way also though, sometimes people say, well, it's a superpower. You can tune to other people, it's a superpower. That sometimes also falls under what's called a grandiose side of perspective. Grandiose is like feeling special. It's like I'm a starseed, Pleiadian starfish empath that can feel other people's energy. The challenge with that is that then sometimes there's like, I'm special. And it's a way of justifying it, which keeps you locked in the pattern. It keeps you sometimes locked in the toxic energy. So what I recommend is to have neither perspective really. It's not bad, it's not good. It's just a pattern you're becoming aware of. This is where a lot of transformation also happens because you may think thoughts, but you are not your thoughts. You may feel emotions, but you're not your emotions. You may become aware of patterns, but you're not even your patterns. I used to be labeled as ADHD and I took Adderall in order to focus. Now I just meditate. I don't consider myself to have ADHD. This is just my experience. I'm not a doctor or anything. I'm just, I don't, this is like, this is something that for me, I was able to redefine and not feel shame about. And then some people say, oh, I have ADHD, I'm special. But there is a, to be able to reframe it was powerful for me though for a while. I'm like, I just have a lot of energy. Not like I'm better than everyone, but someone's aware of anyways. Let's get back to this thing. So we're going deep. We're going pretty deep in this video. Like here's one of the core things of all my teachings that I teach at live events that helps a lot of people. And it's understanding when we're kids, what we do many times is as kids, our mom and our dad to us are gigantic beasts in a way. I don't mean beasts in a negative way necessarily. I'm just saying they're huge. We're this big, they're this big. We see them as authority. So whatever they say and whatever they do, we think of as law as kids. Now what happens is if you were criticized as a kid, you might find yourself critical of yourself. But one of the things that happens is if mom or dad were to divorce when you were a kid, for example, instead of thinking that mom and dad maybe didn't have their stuff figured out or maybe they weren't good for each other as kids, We think everything is our fault. Mom and dad divorced because I'm not worthy. If I was enough, maybe I could merge myself and be exactly who mom and dad want me to be. And then they would stay together and the family would stay together and it'd be awesome. The challenge is we don't wanna see them as flawed because they're our source of survival. They're our source of survival. So we internalize it. And we carry the shame. We carry these mechanisms that we have of who we're trying to project our mom and dad stuff on. And sometimes I think people do this in different ways. Some people may be trying to prove themselves. And then their YouTube channel is this thing or this is just, you know, I make YouTube videos. So I could tell at a certain point that I was making videos, it was like I was trying to prove people wrong. I was trying to make my dad proud. This energy that was like projecting into my business, into who I am or into what I do. But a huge part of this process was realizing the shame, the belief I was broken was something that I internalized due to something that happened in the past. And a huge part of the healing is when you move from the victim of this happened to me to realizing this happened for you. You get to choose what things mean. So if you're an empath and you can feel other people's energies and you've always been an empath and that story has always been on autopilot, maybe it was like either I'm a special snowflake starseed or these things just keep happening to me and it sucks 'cause I keep attracting narcissists. You get to be the one that makes a new choice about who you are. But in order to do that, you have to move out of victimization and you have to move into empowerment. One of the ways you move into empowerment is you start bringing the energy inside of your body. I know it sounds simple, but this is also, think of the separation of tasks. It's similar to this idea of subject versus object. I had a shadow work integration coach. He was a Carl Jung fanatic, double PhD, and he taught me what is called the frame technique. And it was all around understanding what is called subject versus object. So you have subject and you could think of self versus other, let's say that, self versus other. And basically what this process is, is you stare at a candle flame and you think of the candle, the flame as the self, and you feel the separation between you and the candle flame. And then the separation between you and the candle flame, that represents self. And then on the outside and around the candle flame, you don't look at it with your eyes, you just look in your peripheral, What you do is you imagine that everything else is other, and then you relax the separation that you're feeling between the flame. You then become one with everything around you. So it's like self versus becoming one with everything around you, but you're looking at it with your peripheral. You're keeping your eyes on the candle, the candle flame. But what happens as you do that is you start to feel emotions come up. You may start to feel this energy, and then you realize this subject-object energy, what could be called individuation eventually, where you start to individuate. You understand it is okay that you think differently. It is okay that you feel differently. It's okay for you to express who you really are. But you start to feel safe inside your own body. And when you start to feel safe inside of your own body, you will be more magnetic. You will have more energy. And when people do things or you start to become aware of patterns, But when people do things, you then see that some of their stuff's their stuff to deal with. The separation of tasks. You don't have to take on the responsibility like you did when you were a kid. It's not your job. It's not my task. It's not my task. I'm gonna come out with a spiritual rap video soon. You better be ready for it. That's not my task. That was so cheesy. But when you think about this, Empaths, narcissists, they have the same core wound. And the healing is gonna come from finding a healthy sense of self and feeling inside your own body and recognizing when other things happen, what is your responsibility? What is their responsibility? And it is not your job to manage other people. It is not your job to get people to like you, to approve of you. And tension isn't bad. In fact, the more successful you become, the more tension you're gonna lean into. But the tension can also be good. Think about tension of going to the gym. First time people go to the gym, this sucks for them. Remember I took a friend for the gym for like the first time and we did a big workout and he's like, this sucks. He's like, I'm sore everywhere, blah, blah, blah. But what happens? You go to the gym and it becomes a habit. You do it for 2 or 3 weeks. That tension you feel, you start to enjoy. Get this endorphin rush. You start getting results. You start looking bigger in the gym or you trim down and you look more lean and toned. Guess what? You become almost like you love the process. There may come a point, I'm not saying that you need to become like some raging overt narcissist or anything, but there may become a time when you set boundaries and maybe someone doesn't really like it, but you just feel empowered inside of yourself. Not like the tension that they feel, you just understand is their stuff to deal with. And sometimes someone else getting tension may be the lesson they need. It may be the lesson they need to receive that tension so that they have something to actually look at. Like if you're going out with friends or something and you always say yes to your friends and you've always said yes, but you always abandon yourself to do so. And then all of a sudden you feel like I need to focus on something else and you say it and they get mad or angry. That might be good for them. Maybe they need to codependently not rely and try to control you or manipulate you. 'Cause in truth, we may come here to learn the lesson of boundaries. We may come here to learn the lesson of unconditional love. And if you're afraid of being yourself because you might not get the love from other people, understand that is conditional love and it is not real love. Stop enabling other people. Let them learn their lesson by you being the most powerful empowered part of yourself. Now I'm gonna be doing a frame technique workshop in my brand new community called the High Vibe Tribe. It's completely free to join. You go and click the link below and join that group. I'll be doing live meditations, live workshops. There's a community in there. There's meditations in there. I'm gonna be doing a live workshop on this coming up soon. You can check that out if you're interested. And other than that, if you want a video, one of my most popular videos of a live event where I talk about the deeper core of what's called the still face experiment and how This will completely change the way you view your own energy. It was at a live event that I did. I'm gonna go ahead and link this video right here. For empaths, people that can feel other people's energy, this is both a superpower and sometimes a curse on the other side of the spectrum because you gain out of survival this amazing ability to tune to everybody else. You know when you walk into a room how people feel about you. You know how the friends in your life feel when you say you don't wanna do something.
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