Not mentioning the financial impact which also hurts those who are always trying to please others not only through personal involvement but through gifts, invitations, etc.
I've 1000% lived this story. I appreciate learning about hyperattunement vs. empathy. As I was reading it, I thought 'maybe this is why I can't work with too many people 1/1....'
I've recently gone from having 3 clients to just 1, and I feel significantly less stressed. I do believe that because I am hyperaware, I exhaust myself easily and need to remember my boundaries. I definitely carry other people's problems with me so I need to carefully guard my energy.
I've done A LOT of cognitive restructuring, journaling, meditating, and grounding. Being out in nature is my #1 therapy, followed by (and often including) music....
This is one of the clearest modern explorations of the “Wounded Healer” archetype in action.
Rachel isn’t just a tired colleague; she’s an unconscious caretaker, shaped by early attachment wounding and unconsciously projecting her worth outward to feel safe. Jung would recognize her pattern as a complex: a psychic knot formed around pain, defense, and adaptation that now runs her social self.
In Jungian terms, hyperattunement is a Persona wound, a false self built to secure love, belonging, or at least, less chaos. It looks like empathy, but it’s survival masquerading as skill. And over time, this Persona becomes brittle, because the cost of playing the role is the quiet burial of the Self.
“The more compulsive the adaptation, the more deeply unconscious the wound.”
Hyperattunement is not empathy, it’s fusion. It's what happens when you’ve never been allowed to have a separate emotional reality. True empathy, as you wisely named, includes differentiation, the capacity to feel another without dissolving yourself in the process.
The somatic consequences are not incidental; they are the body's last resort. Jung said, “The body is the shadow of the soul.” When we don’t allow our inner voice to speak through language, it speaks through symptoms. Sympathetic overload, chronic fatigue, autoimmune spirals, these are the embodied myths of the unintegrated self.
The path forward is individuation.
To differentiate from Persona.
To withdraw projections.
To bring consciousness to the fawn response.
To restore connection with the feeling function, the true compass of the Self.
This isn’t just healing, it’s initiation.
Your final insight is the most powerful: that the body, once the container of survival tension, can become a new home for truth. This is the sacred return, not to who you were told to be, but to who you already are beneath the adaptation.
I love how you balance the practicality and depth here. Having a healed nervous system (and connection with our soul) is the ultimate way to live and enjoy life.
Wow; well written thank you! I’ve approached this subject through spirituality, nature, and music. You’ve explained from a psychological perspective that feels approachable and from the heart.
“Heal yourself physician”. Just got to remember it’s a process, I wish we could jolt ourselves out of survival mode. Love this piece. And definitely needed it. Thank you.
Not mentioning the financial impact which also hurts those who are always trying to please others not only through personal involvement but through gifts, invitations, etc.
I've 1000% lived this story. I appreciate learning about hyperattunement vs. empathy. As I was reading it, I thought 'maybe this is why I can't work with too many people 1/1....'
I've recently gone from having 3 clients to just 1, and I feel significantly less stressed. I do believe that because I am hyperaware, I exhaust myself easily and need to remember my boundaries. I definitely carry other people's problems with me so I need to carefully guard my energy.
Yup, I only know it because I'm the same way. Have you tried any of the healing modalities that I mentioned?
I've done A LOT of cognitive restructuring, journaling, meditating, and grounding. Being out in nature is my #1 therapy, followed by (and often including) music....
This is one of the clearest modern explorations of the “Wounded Healer” archetype in action.
Rachel isn’t just a tired colleague; she’s an unconscious caretaker, shaped by early attachment wounding and unconsciously projecting her worth outward to feel safe. Jung would recognize her pattern as a complex: a psychic knot formed around pain, defense, and adaptation that now runs her social self.
In Jungian terms, hyperattunement is a Persona wound, a false self built to secure love, belonging, or at least, less chaos. It looks like empathy, but it’s survival masquerading as skill. And over time, this Persona becomes brittle, because the cost of playing the role is the quiet burial of the Self.
“The more compulsive the adaptation, the more deeply unconscious the wound.”
Hyperattunement is not empathy, it’s fusion. It's what happens when you’ve never been allowed to have a separate emotional reality. True empathy, as you wisely named, includes differentiation, the capacity to feel another without dissolving yourself in the process.
The somatic consequences are not incidental; they are the body's last resort. Jung said, “The body is the shadow of the soul.” When we don’t allow our inner voice to speak through language, it speaks through symptoms. Sympathetic overload, chronic fatigue, autoimmune spirals, these are the embodied myths of the unintegrated self.
The path forward is individuation.
To differentiate from Persona.
To withdraw projections.
To bring consciousness to the fawn response.
To restore connection with the feeling function, the true compass of the Self.
This isn’t just healing, it’s initiation.
Your final insight is the most powerful: that the body, once the container of survival tension, can become a new home for truth. This is the sacred return, not to who you were told to be, but to who you already are beneath the adaptation.
Thank you for sharing.
Bruh I love your mind
I’m just following your lead, my brother.🤙
I love how you balance the practicality and depth here. Having a healed nervous system (and connection with our soul) is the ultimate way to live and enjoy life.
Amigo thanks for reading!
Wow; well written thank you! I’ve approached this subject through spirituality, nature, and music. You’ve explained from a psychological perspective that feels approachable and from the heart.
Amazing. I'd love to read your work. Gonna check in now.
😀I’ve just barely gotten started here on substack!!! I am Lunea Lynn on music platforms!🩵🩵🩵
“Heal yourself physician”. Just got to remember it’s a process, I wish we could jolt ourselves out of survival mode. Love this piece. And definitely needed it. Thank you.
❤️🙏🏼
Fascinating stuff, thank you