Article of the Week: 6 Ways to Stop Being an Energy Sponge in Your Business

For highly sensitive, empathic heart-centered entrepreneurs, it can be easy to unconsciously take on the energy of the people around you, including your clients. That may seem ok if things are going well for those in your world, but can quickly turn detrimental if they are not. Being an energy sponge can create a real emotional rollercoaster that is unpleasant to ride and can greatly affect your business success in negative ways.

Right about now, you may be thinking, “Am I empathic?”

Here are some ways to tell if you are empathic:

• People feel better after talking to you about their problems, but you feel worse. This is the equivalent of unconsciously being a doormat or dumping ground for other peoples’ energy.
• You consciously or unconsciously want to make other people around you feel better and do whatever you can to lift them up so you can feel better, too.
• If you hear about an accident, illness or misfortune, you carry it with you and think about it repeatedly, feeling the pain of the other person and weighed down by the situation.

What can you do to stop being an energy sponge
or dumping ground for other’s people energy?

Here are a few ways to get started:

1. Get out of the other person’s energy field. Each of us has an electromagnetic energy field that surrounds our human body and radiates from us from 6 inches to several feet in all directions. This is also called an aura. When we are empathic, unconsciously we take in and amplify the energy of the people in close proximity to us. In order to stop being an energy sponge, we need to break auric or energetic space. This means physically moving away from the person by at least 10 feet. It’s ideal to move to a different room for 10 minutes or more to discharge the other person’s energy. 
2. With your conscious intention, disconnect your energy with love by saying a prayer of release. 
3. Bring your conscious awareness to clearing your energy field on a regular basis. Learn powerful techniques such as Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) or Meridian Tapping to help you reset your energy. 
4. Work with your Angels and Divine Team (or Ask Archangel Michael) to create energetic shields of protection so other people’s energy bounces off of you, unless it is the energy of love. 
5. When you feel off energetically, ask, “Is this mine?” If you sense, feel or know you have picked up someone else’s energy, then take measures to consciously discharge the energy. (See additional suggestions below). 
6. When you are talking to another person or client, think observe, not absorb. Instead of taking your full awareness into the story or situation they are describing to the point where you feel it as if it were happening to you, imagine it as if you were noticing it on television screen. This will give you the ability to hold your energetic boundaries. If you find yourself getting pulled in energetically where you begin to feel the other person’s emotions, remind yourself that ‘this is theirs, not mine.’ You are able to be of greater service and empower others when you stay in your own energy, instead of taking their energy or issue on as your own. Then you can hold an empowering space in which the other person can step up to be a powerful creator in their own life.

Use Your Empathic Gifts to Benefit You and the World.

As an empath, you feel deeply. You can use this energetic power to create more love and goodness in business and in your world. Here are some specific ways:

• Celebrate positive experiences and accomplishments of others as if they were your own. If you are comparing yourself to someone else who has a success you don’t have or you would like to have, instead of feeling down on yourself, energetically add yourself into that vibration. If that is possible for someone else, then that energy and experience is also available for you. With your empathic abilities, you can amplify that energy to invite and activate it into your own life. Dance with joy about what is possible for you, too. 
• When you feel love or appreciation for someone or something, take a moment to energetically send that energy out of your heart to circle around the world and back into your heart. Know you are a powerful healing force for yourself and the world because of your deep feelings and abilities. Know that rather than being a burden, they are indeed an incredible blessing. 
• Find ways to ground yourself that support you, help you manage your energy and help discharge the excess energy you feel. These may include being in nature, walking, hiking or physical activity, energy techniques to manage your energy, keeping grounding stones and crystals in your pocket, spraying essential oil mists into your environment or rubbing them on the soles of your feet, taking a sea salt bath or incorporating root vegetables into your diet. 
• Learn how to honor your sensitive nature by creating healthy, energy-giving boundaries. Say no to requests of your time and energy when you want to say no, when it feels like a drain on your energy or when you are saying yes out of obligation. As an empathy, it is critical to fill yourself up so you can give from the overflow, rather than sacrificing yourself for the needs of everyone else and ending up depleted and resentful.