Oh, a weird thing I don't think I've documented here before.
My #1 synpath is among my strongest connections. To the point where it IS in fact a formative part of my identity! Every bit as much as Blue or H|arrowh|ark, past lives that I know are, in fact, My Identity, and to this day form Who I Am. But I am not Ra\/en. Does that make sense? I suspect anyone with a hearttype or copinglink can understand, but I don't know the words to explain how visceral the shifts are, and yet I'm completely separate From Being Her.
She's my spirit guide, she was my tutor in rare cases, she has taken me to my hearthome and my goddess. The last two were hers, first. But not because I Am Her. Because they Became Mine too, Through Her. Does that make sense, too?
When I'm in a synpath shift for her, I can feel myself "copying" her. I know people on the internet like to joke about empaths, but we are, in fact, both empaths. When I "shift" into her, it's not like a new facet of my identity is sparkling light into my physical/mental self. It's not an inner aspect at the core of my being changing how I present MYSELF.
It's like... I'm a mirror, and my reflection shapes itself more like hers, and what I perceive is different, but because I'm receiving it from her. It's half a step removed, because What She Is brings out What I Am, but it's being BROUGHT OUT, it's reflection in the glass, it's echoes resounding. It resonates with me, but it's not SOURCED from me.
I've never seen anyone talking about how empaths' receptions interact with other empaths, for us it forged a connection across the dimensional boundaries, but it IS in fact straight empathy. It's not me, it's Her, Showing Through Me. Like a shadow cast on deep blue tile. Similarities come into focus, but you can discern where the shadow ends and the tile itself is differently colored.
It's so hard to explain without having seen anyone else explain this before...
(Is there a separate word for a synpath when it's a fictional character? Or does the word synpath inherently carry fictional characters under its umbrella?)
It's Not Me, plain and simple. We have an inordinate amount of similarities, we especially did when I was younger, but we're Very Separate People. She's not intrinsically tied into who I am. She was an external force that acted upon my life to shape certain aspects of it, but it was still an outside force.
She impacted me deeply, and continues to do so.
But it's still, in the end, synpathy, and not my identity.