When Your Best Friends are Energy Vampires
by
Julia Melges-Brenner. Copyright Sabrina Scott, Inc. All rights
reserved. Written for and originally published in Kajama.
Dear
Julia:
I don't have many friends,
for I choose them carefully. At the moment, I have two women in my life
who could be described as psychic vampires. One is an internationally
respected healer/teacher. My intuition is growing more and more
refined, and I was shocked when the manipulative, calculating,
dishonest energy I was picking up about this healer was confirmed. I
realized I had given my power away by putting her on a pedestal and
making less of my own gifts. She tried to discredit the healer I
currently see, and suggested one of her students start treating me
while she supervised my case. I've decided to keep my distance from her
and not leave my current healer, who has helped me tremendously. This
is clearly a case of professional jealousy. The other friend is also
very spiritual. I feel she's a little jealous of me, and sees me as
somehow better off than her in many ways. It's like she thinks I have
some secret to the universe and wants a piece of it. Why am I
attracting these energy vampires? I don't have that many friends, and
at this rate, they are dropping like flies! Thanks, Julia!
Sitara
Dear Sitara:
I'm not sure the friends you're describing are really energy vampires.
Energy vampires are people who can't get all their energy needs met
directly from Source, so they try to feed on other people's energy. To
determine if these friends are truly stealing your energy, ask yourself
how you feel when you've been around them for a while.
Do you feel energized and uplifted or down and drained? Do you feel
like there is balance in your relationship in terms of give and take,
or does your friend talk endlessly about herself? Are you doing all the
giving? Do you find yourself constantly feeling like you should do
something to help or save her? Does she make you feel better about
yourself, or does she put you down or compete with you in order to feel
superior?
If none of these really fit, odds are good that you're not dealing with
energy vampires so much as you are ordinary people with egos and human
weaknesses and faults, just like the rest of us.
People who are highly spiritual like we are tend to be very idealistic.
We want to believe in people, see the best in them and love them with
all our hearts. It can be very disillusioning when we meet someone who
seems to be everything we've ever wanted in a friend, and they turn out
to be a mere mortal instead of the demi-god we've been worshiping.
There are a couple of dynamics worth mentioning here, given the
relationships you describe. First, the more we tap into our own
personal power, the more we evoke deep issues in other people. If there
are buried issues that need to be brought to light and healed in our
friends, then our dynamic energy will tend to bring those issues to
life in some way. This is especially true if we're devoted healers and
counselors. In personal relationships, the interactions may not be
overt; instead, they tend to come out in subtle ways through the ever
changing dynamics of our connection. We thus spark things for the
people around us without knowing that we are doing so simply because
our main intention is to help others heal and grow.
Also, as we develop intuitively, we begin to psychically pick up on all
sorts of stuff that people tend to hide. Nearly everyone hides their
shadow side, so it can be shocking to sense these hidden truths, and
difficult to make peace with living at this level of awareness.
Everything is naturally perfect, of course, for once we attain this
level of awareness, we're ready for the deep lessons in unconditional
love that psychic awareness evokes.
Your spiritual teacher friend is clearly insecure about her wisdom and
abilities. The wisest and best teachers always are, by the way, for
they constantly question themselves. Having you see someone else for
healing and that person apparently being able to truly help you has
brought her insecurities up. While her behavior is disappointing, we
must strive not to take anything personally, and simply be the best
person we can be with everyone we know and love. As I see it, if a
friend disappoints us, our job is to reach for a higher, more loving
road in order to nurture good things in that relationship. Maybe right
now, this relationship is not about her meeting your friendship needs,
but about you giving her something important such as an opportunity to
work on her ego issues, learn a lesson, or observe you setting a
shining example of love and wisdom.
I like what you wrote about putting her on a pedestal and discounting
your own wisdom and abilities. I think instead of expecting her to be
the spiritual leader in your relationship, you should step forward and
reach for a higher level of love and wisdom yourself regardless of what
she says or does. Then you can become a source of healing both for her
and your relationship. You might do this by recognizing with compassion
that her ego is kicking up, and she perhaps is worried that she is not
good enough or that she will lose your friendship or respect and
admiration via your experiences with this other healer.
Similarly, instead of viewing your other friend as someone who is
trying to steal something from you, it would be wise to stay in a very
high vibration and view her admiration as a positive thing. The more we
align with a high level of life experience by working with the law of
attraction and cultivating a high vibration, the more we attract people
who want this for themselves like moths to a flame. Sometimes these
people do want to suck our energy, but sometimes they just think we're
wonderful, and they want to study us so they can emulate us.
The higher we go in terms of quality of experience and vibration, the
harder it is to find peers. Then instead of journeying through life
with all our classmates, we naturally become teachers. In a typical
schoolroom setup, there are way more students than teachers, and it's
the same on our spiritual journeys. As you evolve, you will be
surrounded by more people who are in position to learn from you, and
you'll only know a few other teachers, who will often be off in their
own classrooms, doing their thing.
You're wise to ask how and why you are attracting friends like this,
but it's more important to figure out how you can manifest a higher
level of experience. I've had great results with working with the law
of attraction to manifest good friends. For example, years ago I told
the Universe very clearly and with all of my heart that I wanted to
meet a friend who was <q>just like me.</q> I ended up
meeting a friend in a most unusual way who practically IS me! The ways
we are alike are astounding. This experience taught me that we all have
many kindred spirits in the world, and we just need to work with the
law of attraction to draw them into our experience.
In summary, I encourage you to stop expecting your friends to be free
of faults. Our goal is not to find perfect people, but to learn how to
love everyone around us despite their imperfections. We all have our
issues and everyone is doing spiritual battle with their egos every
day. Do keep choosing your friends carefully, and when they disappoint
you, examine your experiences for how you can use them to work on
yourself and become an ever brighter light wherever you go. Also,
remember that we have the power to manifest what we want in our lives,
and we can use the law of attraction to both bring out the best in
people and draw wonderful new friends into our lives.
Julia
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