Quite unrelated to the Covid19 contagion, Vampire Diaries or Twilight, here we are taking a look at Emotional Contagions and Energy Vampires.
Emotional contagion is the phenomenon that we humans tend to express and feel emotions that are similar to those of others. For example, if someone tells you some wonderful news they’ve received with a big smile, you’ll smile too. If someone tells you that someone close to them has died, you automatically pull a sad or serious face and feel feelings of sadness. Even though you might not have known the person who has passed away yourself, you feel the feeling and mirror the expression, because the person telling the story feels sad and you pick that energy up.
Emotional contagion is a form of social influence, it occurs from person to person and it can occur en masse via news feeds and social media platforms.
Is it the same as empathy?
Well, it’s all energy. Emotions are feelings and feelings are energy.
Mirroring facial expressions and body language is a natural instinct that begins in infancy. Studies have found that when we mirror someone’s expression, it triggers a reaction in the brain that causes us to feel the same feelings.
Let’s take that up a notch. Enter the Empath.
Empaths tend to be highly intuitive and super sensitive to other people’s emotions, absorbing them like a sponge and to such a degree, that it can lead to overwhelming emotional instability.
Empaths are easy targets for “Energy Vampires”.
Energy Vampires feed on the empaths willingness to listen and care for them, leaving them feeling exhausted and overwhelmed. Energy vampires can be anywhere and anyone. They can be your partner or your best friend, they can be narcissists, drama queens (no need to call the pc brigade) chronic talkers, moaners and complainers or people who are always playing the part of “victim”.
Now, absorbing positive energy is a wonderful thing. Good vibes make you feel happy, uplift you, keep you physically and emotional healthy and give you more energy, but absorbing negative energy produces, as you would expect, entirely the opposite.
You can’t just stop being empathetic or super sensitive overnight, and let’s face it, having some empathy is a nice quality, but if you feel as though you are absorbing too much of other people’s “stuff” and being drained of your life’s blood (so to speak) then you need to gain control over it.
Here are a few tips:
- Set healthy boundaries. Say no when you don’t want to do something and yes when you do. And don’t apologise for being true to yourself!
- Practice mindfulness. Practising mindfulness can give you an insight into your own emotions, improving your relationship with yourself and with others.
- Meditation. The ultimate goal of meditation to absorb feelings of calm and inner peace
- Clinical Hypnotherapy. Your brain is like a computer. It likes to repeat the same program over and over unless it’s told (or re-programmed) to think otherwise. Change your thoughts, change your world!
- Journaling. Less writing about what happens to you, but more about getting your feelings down onto a page. Rather than writing in a lovely journal, use a sheet of paper that you can happily tear up or shred after you’re unleased your feelings!
For more information about Clinical Hypnotherapy or to schedule an appointment, get in touch today
