In its broadest sense, Empathy can be defined as the capacity to literally "put one's self in another's shoes", where a person can feel the emotions, emotional reactions and feelings of another person. Strong empathy can leave many Mentors and spiritual advisors off-balance until they have properly released the "emotional tar" that gathers after sessions with clients. This is all too frequently overlooked when conducting any type of reading and will affect the overall performance, general mood and ability to "see" clearly.
   This actually applies to everyone, not just psychics. We are all susceptible to and affected by others' emotions in some way. From a deeper level we can gauge how another person feels, whether it's from observing body language or facial expressions, or from some deeper energetic, emotional responses. This brings us conveniently onto "Psipathy", which is like an advanced or channeled form of Empathy.

Whereas Empathy is primarily emotion-based and concentrates on energies projected from emotions, Psipathy is more energy-based, with the focus on those energies developing as a result of emotions. A person's biofield (or aura) reflects the continuous flux of emotions, emotional responses from deep inside or outside influences, positive or negative thoughts, reactions to one's environment or other people, or interaction with one's surroundings and the things in it. Not everyone can "see" the biofield, however, but everyone interacts with these projected emotions or energies. (Some would further place Psipathy under Telepathy because it is more a telepathic response to emotions.)

A good Mentor, Spiritual Advisor or psychic can utilize both Empathy and Psipathy in combination to determine a client's emotions, emotional state, the stem or root cause of those emotions, and then can draw on personal experience or insight to offer tools and resolutions. Most of the time, however, these are further combined with other abilities for the "full picture" reading.