Empathy
You read people before they speak
Your strongest strand is sensing where other people are. You catch the shift in someone's voice, notice when "I'm fine" is not fine, and can usually see why someone behaved as they did even when you disagree with it.
Where you are strong
- You catch small signals other people miss
- You understand the motives of people you disagree with
- You notice when someone is being left out
- People open up to you easily
Worth watching
- You can absorb other people's feelings until you are drained
- You may guess what someone wants and act on the guess
- You tend to pick up the emotional care of a whole group
Putting it to use
The strand to balance is usually regulating — not of your feelings, but of the boundary between yours and everyone else's. A useful question when things feel heavy: is this mine, or am I carrying it for someone?
Under pressure
When overloaded, strongly empathic people often do not notice they are overloaded, because they are busy tracking everyone else. The sign: you know exactly how everyone around you is doing and cannot answer the same question about yourself.
And you?
Take the test to see your own result.
Take the test to find your ownThe other results
This is self-report, so it measures what you think about yourself rather than your actual behaviour. That is a real limitation and not a small one: the person weakest at a skill is often the person least able to see it. If you can, ask someone close to you how they would answer for you — the gap between the two is usually the most valuable part.