Signs of a Psychic Vampire and How to Protect Yourself
Updated: April 3, 2023
Do you ever feel unexpectedly drained for no apparent reason? Like the energy and life has been sucked out of the entire atmosphere of a room with no logical explanation.
If so, you might be dealing with a psychic vampire.
If you’ve never heard of such a thing before, you’re probably wondering, “What’s a psychic vampire?” In this guide, we’ll discuss everything you need to know about what energy vampires are, how to spot one, how they affect you, and – most importantly – how you can deal with them.
What Is A Psychic Vampire?
When you hear the term psychic vampire for the first time, you might picture a blood-sucking demon. The reality of what they are is much less exciting and extreme, but they can still affect you just as severely. Also known as energy vampires, psychic vampires are people who quite simply suck the energy out of a room. You’ll know you’ve encountered a psychic vampire or an energy vampire when a warm, lively vibe suddenly goes cold, quiet, and depressing.
You also may begin to feel exhausted for no apparent reason and want to leave the space you are in. This is a natural reaction because your subconscious is trying to remove you from the negative influence.
8 Signs You Might Be An Energy Vampire
1. Your Opinions Are Fact
Energy vampires believe that their opinions matter, and that they are always correct. They may even treat their opinions like fact.
Let’s say your friend is wearing a very hideous dress. What do you do? Energy vampires would usually say something along these lines: “Oh my god, where did you get that dress? That’s so hideous! Get out of here and go change that!” Some may see that as honesty, but there are other (and better) ways to be honest.
Energy vampires don’t think about the consequences of what they say. They think that their honesty is done with good intentions, and they do not stop to think what other people would feel about what they say.
Opinions that hurt other people can be said in a nice way or not said at all, and energy vampires do not understand that.
2. Endlessly complain about problems
Whenever you talk to someone like family members or friends, what do you usually talk about first? Do you share talk about the positive things and good news, and do you ask others to do the same so you can share that happiness, or do you dive right into a sea of complaints and rant about everything? If your friend is nodding politely as you gabber on and on about one bad experience to the next, then you might be an energy vampire.
Take a look at all your relationships with others and recall your latest conversations. Are they always complaint sessions? If this is the case, try to look at the bright side and talk about things that are empowering for both you and your friend.
3. You play with guilt to get what you want
Most of us like to use guilt as a weapon to get what we want. If you do this all the time, people around you may feel as if you are taking away energy from them.
Lines like “Oh look, you’re going out again! Don’t you know that I never even visit my sick and dying mom just so I can spend my time with you?” or “Okay, go ahead and do what you like while I stay here and do all the housework like I always do” are very common lines that evoke feelings of guilt from the receiver.
If you need to make others feel guilty so you can justify what you do, feel good about yourself or achieve a certain goal, then you are using a form of emotional manipulation that takes out energy from other people.
4. You always talk about “poor you”
Do you throw pity parties all the time? Ever get into a fight with your significant other and post less-than vivid details about it on social media, making you appear like the martyr?
Do you regularly talk about unfortunate events in your life and overplay it, waiting for people to jump in and tell you how they feel sorry for you and how everything will be okay? Do you constantly ask for advice about the things going on in your life, only to brush off your friends’ comments because you feel that they don’t know what they’re talking about?
Playing the victim is basically asking other people to lift you up by using their own energy. How long do you think can people continue to do that before they feel drained? It is okay to ask friends for help from time to time, and when they do offer help, you must accept that. If you’re only letting people know about your misery just for the sake of it, then you’re simply looking for a quick fix and it’s not going to make your life any better.
5. You are always the star of everything
Many energy vampires think of themselves as stars of their own show. A sign that you are one is that you always make everything about you.
Conversations with friends always end up with your experience, your life, your dog, your cat, your work. For example, your friend goes “Hey, I went to Las Vegas last week” and then you reply, “Oh yeah, me too. I’ve been there several times (insert long, lengthy speech on your last five trips to Vegas).”
When someone talks about his or her situation or lets you know how they are, you jump right in and say something related to that topic, but that something about is always about you, because you think your experiences are great and they’re worth listening.
You spend countless minutes about what you did, what you would do, what you think is right, without giving the others the chance to share. With this, they end up nodding their heads, finding it difficult to enter your one sided monologues.
6. You like to spread fear
Energy vampires like to spread fear. Conspiracy stories, economic failings, terrorist attacks, the end of the world – these are just a few things that they would talk about. People who do this like to carry fear around and share them to others who are willing to listen.
It’s fine to spread information about a bad or unfortunate event, especially if it helps people prepare for what’s going to happen next. However, you should not spread the feeling of fear like it’s fact. Don’t keep freaking out and cause other people to freak out with you because it wastes energy.
7. You always think you are right
Some people are so stubborn and opinionated that they don’t believe anything you tell them, even when you parade the truth right in front of their eyes. These people don’t like to admit that they are wrong or follow directions from other people.
When you do this, you block the flow of energy between you and your friends, killing the chance of energetic growth. Being wrong doesn’t mean you are weak. It happens to all of us and it’s perfectly fine.
Ever see photos of your friends online and wonder why they never told you they were hanging out? If people don’t invite you to social occasions like parties and celebrations, then there’s definitely a reason for that. They might find you too draining, and people can only take so much before deciding to cut you loose.
Most of us unknowingly slip into these habits from time to time, and that is okay. We can’t all be perfect. However, if this is a constant way in your life and if this is how you deal with your family, friends and relatives, then pretty soon people are going to cut you off. Vampires may be intriguing and mysterious, especially in books and television, but energy vampires are not!
How To Protect Yourself from A Psychic Vampire
So now that you know how to identify and recognize an energy vampire, here are some coping strategies you can use to minimize the effects they have on you.
- Don’t make more eye-contact than necessary: Sometimes, social customs make it impossible to avoid eye contact altogether, and that’s fine. But making prolonged eye contact with the energy vampire in your midst can be one of the biggest ways to lose energy fast. Don’t engage with them and what they are saying more than necessary.
- Set yourself a time limit: Value your time – don’t waste it on an energy vampire who doesn’t deserve it. There’s no reason for you to allow them to zap your energy and numb your brain for several hours. Decide how long you feel obligated to stay in their presence, and then remove yourself from the situation.
- Practice not reacting: It takes time to learn not to give into the effects of a psychic vampire, but it’s important. Your reactions are what the vampire feeds off. Don’t give them a reason to continue interacting. Learn to be neutral and carefully monitor overly negative or positive emotions.
- Don’t contradict or argue: At the end of the day, you can’t change anyone – they can only change themselves. So, the more you are resisting their actions and beliefs, the more they will resist and drain you as a result.
- Be in a group: Being in a group of other grounded people will aid in decreasing how much effort you spend and attention you receive. Of course, these additional people much also not be psychic vampires.
- Lend an ear, not a voice: More often than not, these energy vampires just need someone to listen to them. But by responding to them, you’ll lose more energy. Keeping responses short with things like “How?” “When?” and “Why?” encourages them to keep the conversation running without much effort on your part. This will help to preserve your energy and possibly help them to feel better, too!
- Keep the conversation light: Avoid controversial or draining topics. By keeping the conversation light, you can maintain more of your energy. If the energy vampire is steering the conversation to darker topics, try and change the topic to something simple and light.
