Psychic Vampires, Empaths and Energy Theft

I've come to believe, experientially  more than conceptually,  that mind is more than the physical body and brain, and that we are far more connected with each other, and our planet,  than we can imagine. We are  very permeable, indeed we have to be so, because we are constantly exchanging life force with the planet and everyone who has ever lived with every breath we take; exchanging energy and information with each step we take and every word we utter. The exchange and negotiation of energy is the fundamental dance of life.

Most people value empathy, the ability to sense and often emotionally experience, or resonate with, what others are feeling.   Empathic individuals are usually compassionate people, sensitives who often become healers, teachers, and profound listeners.  Highly empathic people have excellent "antennas" - if they have experience and discernment, they can scan the emotional and psychic environment  and determine what is going on beneath the surface.  If they don't, they can  absorb energy that is not their own unwittingly.   I believe this skill of discernment takes time to mature, and an empathic child or unskilled person can often become overwhelmed.  Because being empathic can also be detrimental, overwhelming, and even life threatening, and is one of the reasons sensitive people often become alcoholics or recluses in order to "tune out the noise".  Highly empathic people, what Dr. Judith Orloff calls "intuitive empaths", can be like velcro - everything sticks to them.  

People are always discharging emotional energy. Children scream in anger, cry in frustration, and laugh with pleasure when their needs are met, and so do adults, if not always as obviously. Sometimes it's absolutely necessary to tell our stories, to have our pain witnessed by compassionate others in order to change, to "fore-give", to let go of the trauma and move fore-ward in our lives.  But some people have become addicted to dumping negative emotional energy on others, and they can leave an empathic individual drained, or feeling scattered and crazy from absorbing their energy.  This can be true of collective energies as well. 

I don't like the term "psychic vampires" because of its judgemental terminology.  It implies that dreadful, inhuman people are stalking the streets, ready to suck up all of your lifeforce, when the fact is, most of us have at various times in our lives been draining or exhausting.    Sometimes people are energy draining because they are, in Buddhist terms, unskillful in their understanding of how to manage their own energy systems, in how to manage their thoughts and social interactions in other words.  Many people are energetically exhausting because they have become addicted to complaining, or have adopted a "victim" life stance, which can be addictive as well as socially supported.   Carolyn Myss spoke about what she called a "culture of woundology" as a related issue.   

Some people have learned, as children, negative ways of achieving attention, which is a form of energy theft if it's not willingly given.  I had an acquaintance I worked with who could be absolutely relentless in demanding attention, to the point where otherwise calm, poised people would "lose it" around him.  Including me.........one day I found myself screaming at him at the top of my lungs.  It was at that moment I noticed he was smiling blissfully - and I painfully saw, briefly,  a small child who had found the only way he knew to get attention. 

And many people are just plain worn out, ill, grieving, troubled by misfortune,  or elderly, and haven't got a lot of personal energy.  That doesn't make them "vampires".  That often makes them people in need of a little understanding and kindness.

True psychic vampires are rare.  Most of those are people who emotionally or physically can't generate their own energy.  Only a very few are conscious psychic vampires, people who have learned to gather the life energies of others.  These people are addicts.

About 15 years ago, I broke my leg, and was confined to a wheelchair for 4 months.  It happened that I was offered a couch in a friends studio, which was in a lovely complex that had other studios, a few shops, and a chiropractor's office, so people were always coming and going, which I enjoyed.  But because so much of my energy was going into mending my broken bones, and I often felt weak, I became quite sensitive to how interactions with others affected me.  Some people were like bright lights - I felt enlivened when they entered the room.  Most were neutral.

But there was one woman I'll never forget.   Although she was a fascinating woman, who ironically was a practicing psychic, every time she came by to visit  I'd be flat on my back afterwards, sometimes all day.   I don't know if I would have realized her "vampire" effect so clearly, had I not been in a sensitive lowered energy state because of my healing  recovery.   What made her like that?  I can't possibly know, although I would bet it arises from some kind of traumatic childhood.   I have also met, only once, a very rare conscious "psychic vampire", who knew what he was doing and practiced a form of energy theft consciously.  But that is another story.

                                            

Excerpted from:   Psychic Vampires by Sarah Biggs

So why is it you keep attracting these soul suckers?

Indigos and Empaths are innate healers and are drawn to those in need.  
Newsflash: Energy Vampires don't want to be healed!! They don't want to be saved.It's the attention you give them when they have a (usually self-created and unnecessary) problem that they crave.  They are survivalists. As long as they have a food source - you, they have no incentive to heal or take care of themselves. The more you try to solve their problems the more problems they are going to have.

Energy Vampires often serve as a mirror to your own self-worth. 

You open the door to Energy Vampires through your insecurities. You may have your own feelings of victim-hood or powerlessness. You may be approval seeking. Co-dependence issues is their golden ticket to ride.  It's possible that you may only feel good about yourself when you help others. You may feel unworthy of love or friendship unless you do something for it. You may feel guilt for having good fortune when so many others seem to be down and out.

You may have an addiction to Energy Vampires. Do you like being needed? Do you have the need to please? Does being around an Energy Vampire make you feel better about yourself?You may be an Energy Vampire yourself. When you allow yourself to be drained by an Energy Vampire do you turn around and drain somebody else? Do you only get attention when something negative is going on?

The truth is, you have to vibrate on the same level as an Energy Vampire in order to attract one into your life. Your thoughts and your core beliefs are what creates your vibration. Your emotions are your indication as to what vibration you hold.

No protection technique is going to save you from an Energy Vampire.

Staking Energy Vampires:

Commit to doing what it takes to be happy. Raise your vibration so high as to not be a tool for an Energy Vampire. Don't live your life based on others expectations of you. Meet your own needs. Set boundaries. Saying NO does not make you an asshole (though they will certainly try to make you feel that way). Being a good person is not determined by how much you self-sacrifice. 

Be a vibrational match to the kind of people you want to be around. If you want to be around respectful, competent, and well adjusted people - you need to project those qualities from within yourself. Root out any negative core beliefs about yourself that attract the people you don't want in your life. Transmute those beliefs into positive ones so that positive people will show up accordingly.

Realize that Source is an infinite energy. We all have our very own stream of Source Energy. So, it is actually impossible to give away your energy or to have it taken from you. It's just that Energy Vampire's actions cause you to have negative thoughts that pinch you off from your own Source. When your Source Energy flow is restricted you start to get physical symptoms of exhaustion, confusion, depressed, etc.

Make feeling good a priority. Get your Source Energy pumping by doing what you love and what energizes you. Love yourself enough not to be liked by those that exhaust and bring you down. You don't owe anyone anything. You are worthy of a reciprocal and respectful relationship without having to serve and provide your life force energy.  

You can hold thoughts that allow Source Energy or thoughts that resist and restrict it. It's up to you. Consider doing Shadow Work to uncover your resistant vibrations. 

Sara Biggs Website is:  https://www.honusapien.com/about.html

http://www.honusapien.com/attracting-energy-vampires.html
                                     

Synchronicities on the road.....

“What might we see, how might we act, if  we saw with a webbed vision? The world seen through a web of relationships…....as delicate as spider’s silk,  yet strong enough to hang a bridge on.”

Catherine Keller,  From a Broken Web 

I've spent so much of my life on the road, in transit to places ........... crossing the country to get to shows,  and often just following the roads of a restless spirit I may have inherited from my father, who moved our family across the country and around the world.   I suppose clinicians would diagnose me (as I think they would many creative types) as having a bad case of ADD (which I have a different perspective on anyway).  But I think, as the poet Bard Robin Williamson said, there are those who "find rest in journeying", and that state of being "in transit" is a special liminal zone where magic can happen, minds can open, and the Great Conversation can be more eloquent.  

So I've been traveling to Los Angeles, doing an exhausting guest artist appearance at the Renaissance Faire, and in the course of that trip some surprising synchronicities have occurred. 

"Changing Woman" (2014)

Since my mother passed away not yet 3 months ago, I feel much is changing , within and without.  I no longer am a caretaker, and see that role slipping away from me gradually like a skin peeling off - what's underneath feels rather brittle and hyper sensitive.  

I find I am impatient, and expressing anger in ways that I would not have done in the past - hence, for good or ill, various relationships have ended.  I think, perhaps, that with the passing of my mother, and really the end of my family (there is no extended family) I'm trying to change the "family karma", the roles and patterns, that have gone forward in me.  The dis-functional ones - along with this maturation process is genuine gratitude for all that my mother, my family, gave me as well. 

 The previous article I posted  reflects, perhaps,  some of the darker aspects of that self-examination.

I find that I am also trying to re-connect with, and evaluate, the projects, themes, and inspirations that  were so important to me in the past - apart from and before I became so involved with the concerns of caretaking.  My "Hands of Spider Woman Project", the Masks of the Goddess Collection.............what is authentic still, what is not?  What do I love? How must I simplify my life now to regain that passion, that excitement about my art?
Where are my "power leaks", how am I "vamped", my time and energy drained away so that what I love to do...........I don't do.    What am I doing that I think I "should" do, but don't really want to do anymore, and what "should" I be doing that genuinely gives me happiness.  In other words, it may also be time to stop being a sad saint, and be a happy camper instead.  

So my syncros.............

The Renfair is in Santa Fe Dam in Los Angeles, a beautiful park with an impressive view of the mountains that ring the city.  On the other side of the park  from the Faire is a nature walk, and an area I always return to when the show is not on.  It has beautiful indigenous plants, and a sandy area with a stone circle.   I walked into the circle, made some offerings, and created a circle and cross with some stones in the center, representing the 5 directions - a kind of prayer, a way of centering myself.


When the show opened the next day, my booth opened onto a sandy path, and in the heat and the hum of voices passing by, it can get rather hypnotic, unless I'm working with a customer. Sitting in the back of the booth, I noticed there was a man with a carved staff of some kind in front of my booth.  Right in front of my booth, in the sand, he made a circle with a cross in it with his staff in the sand!  I watched him do it, then he walked off and disappeared in the crowd.  

It was not only the symbol I had created the previous day, the symbol of the 4 directions, but this is also a Native American motif called "Spider Woman's Cross".

It occurs on prehistoric Mississippian amulets, in Pueblo pottery, and is woven into Navajo (Dine) rugs as a sacred motif representing Grandmother Spider Woman.  It is an ubiquitous symbol of balance, wholeness, unity. It's also a symbol I've explored in my own humble way with my projects exploring the mythologies of Spider Woman - because I feel She is very important for our time.  

So it gets better.  On Monday, after the Faire closed, I was leaving  L.A. via I-10.  Leaving L.A. is no small feat, as L.A. is huge, with many suburbs that go on for a good 50 miles.   I saw, near the exits for Fontana, a banner that caught my attention - I didn't have time to see the building it was attached to, but I'm assuming it was over a park of some kind.  It read:

SPIDER WOMAN'S LEGACY

Navajo Rugs (.............)

I couldn't read what else was on the banner, but SPIDER WOMAN'S LEGACY was in big letters, right there on the side of the freeway! Not only was it there, but rather amazing that I happened to be looking over to the other side of the freeway and saw it.

I see, according to Google, that there is an exhibit in San Bernardino country called "Spider Woman's Legacy: Navajo Rugs and Textiles,” 

In my experience, this is one of Spider Woman's favorite ways to communicate.......with synchronicities!

My last syncro occurred once I crossed the Arizona border, travelling east on I-10.  I had been thinking as I drove about the article I posted last on this Blog, about the meaning of Psychic Vampires.  And about, also, my personal efforts to grow out of a "victim stance" in my own life.  How I've missed so many opportunities, devalued my work,  sustained a great deal of loss because that sensibility is so deeply rooted in my family of origin.  How I've been kind of my own "vampire" by having that sensibility, and how it has to end now and here.

Seriously...........I was meditating at the wheel  on all of this and looked up to see an elaborately painted van in front of me.  It read:

KUNG FU VAMPIRE

www.kungfuvampire.com*

Well Damn!  What more affirmation do I need!  Just to make sure though, when I pulled up at a rest area an hour later, there was the van, right in front of me, again.

**

Kung Fu Vampire is apparently a gothic/punk rapper from San Jose, currently touring.  I looked up the site, which was pretty awful and dark not to mention misogynist.  Not my aesthetic, but I don't really need to listen to the music to get the message from the syncro.............

Empaths and Energy Theft Revisited

Synchronistically, I received a comment from someone (below) addressed to a post I wrote back in 2011 about Empaths and Energy protection. It moved me to re-post the article, realizing that I need to read it again myself.  I'm looking forward to the chance to be alone this summer, and to replenish my energies and revive my creativity.  I have always pretty much known I'm an empath.  

"How do you deal with those who are energetically parasitic? It seems like you and a couple other sources, seem to defend people who make choices to take on a victim mentality, and use manipulative tactics to steal energy and attention. I agree these people obviously lack love, but to some extent they need to realize that and take necessary steps towards healing, and emotional maturity...like people like us chose to do. Hard to support their habits...hard to understand why we support their victim mentality drain....please explain. Much love to you."

May 4, 2015 

I don't feel I defend people who take on a victim mentality or exhaust the life force of others by  any means.........when I can, I try to avoid them.  That's not always possible - in family situations, caretaker situations, and many other circumstances we are often thrown into contact with people who drain the life out of you.  I have  a family member who is a drug addict, for example.   Our society in general may have aspects to it that actively support "psychic vampirism"........ certainly rampant capitalism and consumerism is about exploitation, opportunism, addiction and manipulation.  All forms, in my opinion, of "vampirism".

But  I do believe that most people are unconscious of their motives, drives, attractions, or even needs.   Self-awareness requires work, breaking old familial patterns requires effort, and sometimes to break those patterns requires a fair amount of education and the help of good therapy, as well as seeing through social patterns that often support negative behavior in order to come to terms with one's "shadow side".  No one wants to admit that they are draining others, that they are dependant on others attention and energy, that they don't care about the well being of another as long as they are being "fed", that they are manipulating others, that they are destructive because of jealousy, addiction, etc.

The ability to change, to mature into real conscience and self sufficiency.........is actually something only exceptional people are able to do. 

I know that sounds harsh, but I am tending to feel that the drift of our culture is increasingly away from self-examination, conscience, and empathy.  The "disposibility" of our world has made that so.  How else can such a vast population be uninterested in climate change, in the loss of endless species, in the destruction that future generations much live with?  This is true in social relations as well.

As far as the energy draining "victim stance", I think also that is also often  socially condoned.  And of course it's necessary to make a distinction between people who are genuinely victimized by circumstances and in genuine  need of healing and empowerment.

I'm talking about people who are  "vampires" because of their unconcious dedication to seeing themselves as "victims".  Which can not only be a ploy for exploiting the energy reserves of others, but  is also somewhat socially accepted.  If you are a "victim" you don't need to take responsibility for what you do or what happens to you, because it's "not your fault".  Such people remain dependant children, unable to move forward - but they rarely are able to understand that process.  You can get a lot of mileage from others by being a "victim", and you can also belong to victim social clubs that reinforce the sanctity of your eternally wounded position.  If someone rejects you, it's because they are "unkind" and lack empathy.........and empaths are the best source of energy!

http://threadsofspiderwoman.blogspot.com/2011/10/intuitive-empaths-energy-theft.html

Friday, October 28, 2011

Intuitive Empaths and Energy Theft

 I've come to believe, experientially  more than conceptually,  that mind is more than the physical body and brain, and that we are far more connected with each other, and our planet,  than we can personally imagine. We are  very permeable, indeed we have to be so, because we are constantly exchanging life force with the planet and everyone who has ever lived with every breath we take; exchanging energy and information with each step we take and every word we utter. The exchange and negotiation of energy is the fundamental dance of life. 

Most people value empathy, the ability to sense and often emotionally experience, or resonate with, what others are feeling.   Empathic individuals are usually compassionate people, sensitives who often become healers, teachers, and profound listeners.  Highly empathic people have excellent "antennas" - if they have experience and discernment, they can scan the emotional and psychic environment  and determine what is going on beneath the surface.  If they don't, they can  absorb energy that is not their own unwittingly.   

I believe this skill of discernment takes time to mature, and an empathic child or unskilled person can often become overwhelmed.  Because being empathic can also be detrimental, overwhelming, and even life threatening, and is one of the reasons sensitive people often become alcoholics or recluses in order to "tune out the noise".  Highly empathic people, what Dr. Judith Orloff calls "intuitive empaths", can be like velcro - everything sticks to them.  

People are always discharging emotional energy. Children scream in anger, cry in frustration, and laugh with pleasure when their needs are met, and so do adults, if not always as obviously. Sometimes it's absolutely necessary to tell our stories, to have our pain witnessed by compassionate others in order to change, to "fore-give", to let go of the trauma and move fore-ward in our lives.  But some people have become addicted to dumping negative emotional energy on others, and they can leave an empathic individual drained, or feeling scattered and crazy from absorbing their energy.  This can be true of collective energies as well. 

I don't like the term "psychic vampires" because of its judgemental terminology.  It implies that dreadful, inhuman people are stalking the streets, ready to suck up all of your lifeforce, when the fact is, most of us have at various times in our lives been draining or exhausting.    Sometimes people are energy draining because they are, in Buddhist terms, unskillful in their understanding of how to manage their own energy systems, in how to manage their thoughts and social interactions in other words.  Many people are energetically exhausting because they have become addicted to complaining, or have adopted a "victim" life stance, which can be addictive as well as socially supported.   Carolyn Myss spoke about what she called a "culture of woundology" as a related issue.   

Some people have learned, as children, negative ways of achieving attention, which is a form of energy theft if it's not willingly given.  I had an acquaintance I worked with who could be absolutely relentless in demanding attention, to the point where otherwise calm, poised people would "lose it" around him.  Including me.........one day I found myself screaming at him at the top of my lungs.  It was at that moment I noticed he was smiling blissfully - and I painfully saw, briefly,  a small child who had found the only way he knew to get attention. 

And many people are just plain worn out, ill, grieving, troubled by misfortune,  or elderly, and haven't got a lot of personal energy.  That doesn't make them "vampires".  That often makes them people in need of a little understanding and kindness.

True psychic vampires, I believe, are rare.  About 10 years ago, I broke my leg, and was confined to a wheelchair for 4 months.  It happened that I was offered a couch in a friends studio, which was in a lovely complex that had other studios, a few shops, and a chiropractor's office, so people were always coming and going, which I enjoyed.  But because so much of my energy was going into mending my broken bones, and I often felt weak, I became quite sensitive to how interactions with others affected me.  Some people were like bright lights - I felt enlivened when they entered the room.  Most were neutral.  But there was one woman I'll never forget.   Although she was a fascinating woman, who ironically was a practicing psychic, every time she came by  I'd be flat on my back afterwards, sometimes all day.   I don't know if I would have realized her "vampire" effect so clearly, had I not been in a sensitive lowered energy state because of my recovery.   What made her like that?  I can't possibly know, although I would bet it arises from some kind of traumatic childhood. 

So once again thanks to my friend Charlie Spillar for a great video by Dr. Judith Orloff.

Judith Orloff MD, an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA and intuition expert, is author of the New York Times Bestseller Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself From Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life (Three Rivers Press, 2011) Her other bestsellers are Positive Energy, Intuitive Healing, and Second Sight. Dr. Orloff synthesizes traditional medicine with cutting edge  energy medicine.  Her website is:  www.drjudithorloff.com

https://youtu.be/Oyap0KBouP0

Intuitive Empaths & Energy Theft

 I've come to believe, experientially  more than conceptually,  that mind is more than the physical body and brain, and that we are far more connected with each other, and our planet,  than we can personally imagine. We are  very permeable, indeed we have to be so, because we are constantly exchanging life force with the planet and everyone who has ever lived with every breath we take; exchanging energy and information with each step we take and every word we utter. The exchange and negotiation of energy is the fundamental dance of life.

Most people value empathy, the ability to sense and often emotionally experience, or resonate with, what others are feeling.   Empathic individuals are usually compassionate people, sensitives who often become healers, teachers, and profound listeners.  Highly empathic people have excellent "antennas" - if they have experience and discernment, they can scan the emotional and psychic environment  and determine what is going on beneath the surface.  If they don't, they can  absorb energy that is not their own unwittingly.   I believe this skill of discernment takes time to mature, and an empathic child or unskilled person can often become overwhelmed.  Because being empathic can also be detrimental, overwhelming, and even life threatening, and is one of the reasons sensitive people often become alcoholics or recluses in order to "tune out the noise".  Highly empathic people, what Dr. Judith Orloff calls "intuitive empaths", can be like velcro - everything sticks to them.  

People are always discharging emotional energy. Children scream in anger, cry in frustration, and laugh with pleasure when their needs are met, and so do adults, if not always as obviously. Sometimes it's absolutely necessary to tell our stories, to have our pain witnessed by compassionate others in order to change, to "fore-give", to let go of the trauma and move fore-ward in our lives.  But some people have become addicted to dumping negative emotional energy on others, and they can leave an empathic individual drained, or feeling scattered and crazy from absorbing their energy.  This can be true of collective energies as well. 

I don't like the term "psychic vampires" because of its judgemental terminology.  It implies that dreadful, inhuman people are stalking the streets, ready to suck up all of your lifeforce, when the fact is, most of us have at various times in our lives been draining or exhausting.    Sometimes people are energy draining because they are, in Buddhist terms, unskillful in their understanding of how to manage their own energy systems, in how to manage their thoughts and social interactions in other words.  Many people are energetically exhausting because they have become addicted to complaining, or have adopted a "victim" life stance, which can be addictive as well as socially supported.   Carolyn Myss spoke about what she called a "culture of woundology" as a related issue.   

Some people have learned, as children, negative ways of achieving attention, which is a form of energy theft if it's not willingly given.  I had an acquaintance I worked with who could be absolutely relentless in demanding attention, to the point where otherwise calm, poised people would "lose it" around him.  Including me.........one day I found myself screaming at him at the top of my lungs.  It was at that moment I noticed he was smiling blissfully - and I painfully saw, briefly,  a small child who had found the only way he knew to get attention. 

And many people are just plain worn out, ill, grieving, troubled by misfortune,  or elderly, and haven't got a lot of personal energy.  That doesn't make them "vampires".  That often makes them people in need of a little understanding and kindness.

True psychic vampires, I believe, are rare.  About 10 years ago, I broke my leg, and was confined to a wheelchair for 4 months.  It happened that I was offered a couch in a friends studio, which was in a lovely complex that had other studios, a few shops, and a chiropractor's office, so people were always coming and going, which I enjoyed.  But because so much of my energy was going into mending my broken bones, and I often felt weak, I became quite sensitive to how interactions with others affected me.  Some people were like bright lights - I felt enlivened when they entered the room.  Most were neutral.  But there was one woman I'll never forget.   Although she was a fascinating woman, who ironically was a practicing psychic, every time she came by  I'd be flat on my back afterwards, sometimes all day.   I don't know if I would have realized her "vampire" effect so clearly, had I not been in a sensitive lowered energy state because of my recovery.   What made her like that?  I can't possibly know, although I would bet it arises from some kind of traumatic childhood. 

So once again thanks to my friend Charlie Spillar for a great video by Dr. Judith Orloff.

Judith Orloff MD, an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA and intuition expert, is author of the New York Times Bestseller Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself From Negative Emotions and Transform Your Life (Three Rivers Press, 2011) Her other bestsellers are Positive Energy, Intuitive Healing, and Second Sight. Dr. Orloff synthesizes traditional medicine with cutting edge  energy medicine.  Her website is:  www.drjudithorloff.com