Empathy



Empathy is the magical ability to experience the emotions of others without direct contact with them, as if they were actually feeling what one was feeling and for the same reasons. Empathy can drive anyone crazy if they were not meant to receive or control it.

Season 3
The power is first seen in the Season 3 episode "Primrose Empath". In that episode Prue took the power of empathy from a demon called Vinceres through the use of a spell. Although she was OK with it at first eventually, as its range expanded, she was unable to control it developing to the point where she was constantly taking in the emotions of the surrounding San Francisco area. With the help of the Father Thomas, Prue was able to get a grip on the incoming emotions, channelling them into her other powers in order to help her battle the demon Vinceres.

Emotions
All powers throughout Charmed are based on the characters emotions. With her empathy power Prue effectively had the entire rainbow of human emotion under her belt and to extreme degrees. With this exceedingly high inflow of emotion she received a massive power boost to the point where she became even stronger than vinceres. Her telekinesis developed to the point where she could temporarily defy gravity and highly increased her agility and flexibilty. Her Astral Projection power developed into Cloning and by projecting into his body, carrying all the emotions of San Francisco with her, she ripped Vinceres apart.

Phoebe's third power
In "Valhalley of the Dolls Part 1, Phoebe Halliwell develops this as her third and last power. This remains so until she loses her active powers (premonition, levitation, empathy) for abusing her abilities. Phoebe says that it must have grown from her power of premonition. In one of the Charmed Novels, Tickery Treat, Phoebe gains her Empathy power back. Eventually, she was able to control the flow of the emotions and could actively block the emotions that others were subconsciously sending to her but she never went through the struggle Prue did as she was always meant to have it. Phoebe soon learned how to use her Empathy in both offensive and defensive ways. Because powers are emotion based, Phoebe learned that she could channel powers aswell as emotion. This developed so that she could shield herself against attacks, redirect and mimic powers.

List of users

 * Father Thomas
 * Vinceres under the influence of a real empath's power
 * Prue under the influence of a spell
 * Phoebe Halliwell
 * Mitzy Stillman with Phoebe's powers
 * Cupids
 * Some Whitelighters
 * Chris Halliwell

To Release an Empath from his Gift

 * Free the Empath,
 * Release his gift,
 * Let his pain be cast adrift.


 * It is important that when casting the spell there is no physical contact with the Empath as the power will transfer in the caster of the spell ("Primrose Empath").