CJ Butler

I have read a few articles recently which have identified empaths as people who put others first, and emotional martyrs.  While these can be traits of an empath, they are not the defining characteristics. These traits can be seen as admirable and also as a weakness, and it is important for an empath to guard against those who will use them and take advantage of their giving nature – if they are not to sacrifice all their personal power. My focus is always to feel better, heal from any hurt, dump emotional baggage which may hold you back, in order to go forward positively and allow yourself to live well and to enjoy life.  With this in mind this article is about identifying where empaths often go wrong, self-protection and registering those behaviours in others which weigh an empath down. I didn’t know I was an empath, for many years.  What I did know was that I didn’t do well in big gatherings of people; I’d find myself clamming up – despite the fact I am not a...

“Flake!” I mocked, at one of my friends (as she laughed at me, knowing my hang-up).  “You’re being a damned flake!  You’re quitting on this when you said you’d do it!” In fact she had a great reason, and these days most of my friends are my friends as they are solid; their word is their bond, and they don’t leave me in the lurch arbitrarily.  It’s taken a while to have these people in my life though, and there was a time when I didn’t feel I could expect anything of, or rely on anyone… So to explain my hang-up, the thing I was struggling with around this time last year as I thought about what had to change in the New Year ahead;  Inconsistency…Flakiness.  One of the things which bugs me in people is deviation and being fickle.  One minute they're bought into this, then they're trashing it.  They're coming to your party and then they're not.  They're a Buddhist and then suddenly they're not.  They've got a wheat allergy and can't ...

Narcissism is an easy thing to get obsessed with if you’ve been a victim of it.  It’s something which happens quietly, encroaching all around you gradually; victims can be blind to it at first – often for a long time.  The push-pull of a narcissistic regime can have a person addicted and confused, often even protective of their abuser, simply not recognizing it for what it is.  Probably you had no idea he or she was a narcissist, and they certainly don’t know it – infact they will vehemently deny it.  Narcissists are clever; their behaviours are compulsive, to extract what they need from those around them to feed the hole within themselves, sadly for them, a hole which will never be filled by anyone.  They will criticize and belittle you, and then appear to love and adore you, before knocking you from the pedestal once again and deriding you afresh, and all the while making it feel like it’s your fault, and you’re the one who’s being difficult, eating awa...

" It’s that connection we all yearn for, in the  lonesomeness of the duality of this life " What is your experience of loneliness?  It can be fleeting; maybe just the occasional unaccompanied evening, or it can be intense and drawn out, triggered by events like a relationship break-up, moving to a new city, or as children fly the nest.  It can be felt alone or when surrounded by people.  For some, loneliness is a default position, a protective state created by the ego – our thoughts and beliefs - to protect us from the hurts of the world.  In my first blog, I wanted to introduce The Japson Club’s lead character, and long-established loner; Anna.  Emotionally withdrawn, she doesn’t share much of herself with anyone, her passage through life is with a sense of necessary isolation from those around her.           " She was a lone vessel and always had been " And just through from a relationship break up, Ann...