I think I have too much empathy

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I always thought that empathy had not much to do with emotion itself. Rather the emotion (sad or angry) is a product of the empathy.

See someone in a situation > put yourself in their shoes (this is the empathy part) > feel sad/angry/happy for them (emotion part)

What are your beliefs about the afterlife, if I may ask?

The empathy/sympathy issue is a strange one. Objectively, I have somewhat trained myself to try and understand what people are feeling and thinking, however this is not an intuitive response, rather an intellectual one.

The best way I can frame it in words, for me, is that I feel what I think other people feel and think. On my part this manifests in severe repression of how I behave and what I say, leading to fatigue and brain fog.

In other words; because I'm (over?)sensitive to certain things, I assume everyone else is and act accordingly. The only problem is where I see others interacting and there's banter and teasing, something I can't quite pull off (even with close friends and family) because I am too worried about offending someone, and I can't deal with anyone being angry with me. Although this has improved slightly with age, I'm better at it now than I was at, say 15 when the tricksier aspects of human verbal communication come into play more prominently.

Another offshoot of this is that I 'feel for' inanimate objects (I think I talked about this in another thread too) in the sense of it's very hard to throw anything away because I feel 'sorry' for it. If it's got a 'face' then there's no chance!

I just thought I'd throw my experience into the ring.

I believe in the universalist concept; All people go to heaven. Whatever may happen (such as punishment) I cannot be sure about, but regardless, I don't believe in hell.

And I still have the gall to consider myself a Christian. My parents on the other hand believe in the mainstream doctrine of hell; People who don't accept Christ go to hell, those who do go to heaven, yadda yadda.

Had a pretty significant event happen recently when I decided to "come out" to them about this belief; they proclaimed their beliefs to be reality, that "reality" (uncountable peoples burning in hell for eternity) and their proclamation and acceptance of it made me emotionally unstable, just narrowly dodging severe depression from coming back up, and feeling in fear of my own thoughts and my own life, wishing I had never been born as opposed to offing myself because the latter wouldn't change the "reality".

Certainly fun. If the event can be likened to "coming out of the closet", then metaphorically, I went right back in and am lying to them just as it has been that way for the past few years.

Sorry for nagging on.

You're not nagging on. I'm sorry about your terrible experience sharing your beliefs with your parents. I think it is wrong of them to not allow you to have your own beliefs. Differences are what makes the world go round. Unfortunately, there are people who are so invested in their beliefs that they feel threatened by anything contrary. Your parents don't have to accept your religious beliefs for them to be what works for you.

I don't believe in hell either, although I do believe you can live in "hell on Earth," so to speak. You should check out "Conversations with God" by Neale Donald Walsch. Not that I believe everything in it (or the premise, for that matter), but it is very thought provoking (and he doesn't believe in hell either!).

When you're feeling down, remember that we each have our own "reality," and your parents' reality about religion doesn't have to be your reality.