Energy Vampires & How to Avoid Them

Energy Vampires & How to Avoid Them

My favourite monster-type has always been the Vampire. I read Bram Stoker’s Dracula when I was about 10 years old, watched the film of the same name and devoured as much as I could around the myth and legend of the vampire, eventually even buying a tarot deck based on the undead.

I clearly romanticised my idea of what a vampire was based on Bram Stoker’s Dracula and the many imitations based on this that have followed through the years; in Eastern Europe where the legend of the vampire is/was most prevalent, the monster was a far-less charming and attractive creature!

What is an Energy Vampire?

Most people no longer believe in an undead, nocturnal, blood-sucking creature that can only maintain its own existence by feeding off the life-giving blood supply of the living. But an “energy vampire” – be assured – these monsters are very much real and, I’m afraid, living amongst us.

“The blood is the life!”

Renfield, Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Energy vampires are those people in our lives that feed off our energies – be those energies mental, emotional or psychic. They love to latch onto empaths, kind-hearted, compassionate, sensitive souls who tend to be people-pleasers.

“There are darknesses in life and there are lights, and you are one of the lights, the light of all lights.”

Van Helsing, Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Take a moment now to think if there is someone that immediately springs to mind in your own life who, after spending any amount of time in their company, leaves you coming away feeling completely drained, spent and off-balance. This is likely to be your very own Energy Vampire.

“The last I saw of Count Dracula was his kissing his hand to me, with a red light of triumph in his eyes, and with a smile that Judas in hell might be proud of.”

Jonathan Harker, Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Energy Vampire Signs:

• They seem charming on the surface – at first;
• Are they always gossiping about others? Yeah, they’ll be doing that about you to those others when you’re not around!
• They’re never happy/always complain – and it’s always someone else’s fault;
• Constantly competing with others, has to buy the “best” and tell the world about it, show-offs, full of their own self-importance;
• Attention seekers – will make everything about them, your wedding, birth of your child, where you live;
• Complete lack of gratitude, has an attitude of entitlement;
• Insanely jealous of everyone else’s successes and fortunes, cannot be happy for others;
• Master manipulators – they love to cause trouble and drama for others behind the scenes, especially fond of getting others to do their “dirty-work”;
• You’ve never heard them say sorry – not once!
• You’ve only ever heard them give backhanded compliments;
• They downplay and belittle yours and others achievements whilst bigging up their own;
• Masters of emotional blackmail, especially of their own children, love to guilt-trip others, victim-mentality/a martyr;
• Very critical of others, you come away from them feeling bad about yourself;
• Very opinionated and close-minded;
• Will not allow you to set boundaries on how they treat/speak to you;
• Once the charm-offensive stops working, the mask slips and they go on the attack showing their true colours as intimidating bullies;
• Once you’ve seen through their guise, they will turn on you and try to discredit you to others/turn others against you especially if you call them out on their unacceptable behaviour.

How to Deal with an Energy Vampire

Run! All joking aside though, my strongest advice would be to remove these people from your life asap, or, where this is not possible, limit contact with them to the absolute bear minimum.

Obviously, we can all exhibit these traits from time to time but a person becomes an energy drain when they exhibit several of these traits over a sustained period of time and takes no responsibility/makes no effort to stop their behaviour.

You can try being civilised and talking to them about their behaviour but in my experience, everything will be twisted round to blame you and absolve themselves of responsibility. The true energy vampire cannot empathise with others nor understand the pain that they are causing because they believe that they are entitled to drain you/others of whatever it is that they “need”.

What has been most effective for me though is noting how I have allowed these people to drain my energy. An energy vampire can only take from you what you allow them to take. Remember that you are allowed to say no to people without being made to feel guilty regardless of who they are and they can be anyone: partners, friends, family, employers, colleagues, neighbours. So acknowledge the energy vampire, set boundaries for yourself that you honour and be willing to protect your precious personal energies at all costs.

Failing that, start bathing in garlic – that should keep everyone away!

Feel free to share this article with someone you think is being drained by an energy vampire if you think it will help them, or, if you’ve been attacked by an energy vampire yourself, have you any tips you’d like to share to help others?