Sweet Victimhood and Energy Hypochondria
June 20th, 2010 by Rose Rosetree
Energy Hypochondria
Continuing our series about the tricky pleasures of victimhood, let’s consider a related problem. I call it ”Energy Hypochondria.”
Energy Hypochondria means worrying about every twinge of energy, akin to the way a hypochondriac could fret over any proprioceptive experience (i.e., the very subjective, internal feedback system each person has to register information about aches, pains, etc.).
To understand this version of Sweet Victimhood, it can be useful to remember the three stages of energetic literacy. So here we go:
Stage 1 Energetic Literacy
A person begins to understand that energy is flowing through the body, moving around or being stuck. Many kinds of energy affect a person’s aura, including earth energy, spiritual energy, masculine energy, feminine energy, and various forms of STUFF.
Clairvoyant experiences could be involved, or clairaudience or clairsentience of any of the dozen gifts described in my how-to on aura reading, Aura Reading Through All Your Senses. (Insistence that “Auras are colours” is the real mark of a beginner at energetic literacy, incidentally.)
Kundalini experiences can jump-start a person to begin noticing what happens with energy. Or energy awareness can be woken up by reading mind-body-spirit books, studying Reiki or Energy Medicine, etc. Meditation and prayer can open up a deeper experience of energy, until the person realizes, “Yes, there is a kind of energy I deal with all the time. It is within me and outside me. I am way more than my physical body.”
In terms of reading auras, this is akin to a kid who is looking at a simple picture book. Suddenly, the child realizes that shapes and colors in the picture are meant to corespond to real-life things, like a cat, a chair, a ball of wool. Aura Reading has begun.
Stage 2 Energetic Literacy
In terms of interpreting the information in energy, there is a tendency to use other people’s interpretations. Some Stage 2 practitioners depend on an authority who expects every student to share her or his “correct reading” and “only possible interpretation.” Or a person can simply pick up an aura photo, read the set meanings for different colors provided in the accompanying handout, and think, “Now I know everything.”
This color-by-number version of aura reading is most definitely Stage 2 Energetic Literacy. So is the tendency to generalize about chakras as “open” or “closed.”
A typical sample of Stage 2 Energetic Literacy came recently from a Blog-Buddy who was sharing his perceptions about what pot does to an aura. (See Comment 13.)
He wrote: “ i do not know much about it but i can feel when people are really messed up… for some people [pot] can be detrimental while others might even have a very good aura with their drug use. take pot for example, used on moderate doses it can actually open up the third eye better than naturally alone.” (Incidentally, if the topic of weed interests you, I responded with a somewhat detailed comment about why there is no such thing as a “moderate dose of pot.” Scroll down to Comment 14.)
In terms of our literacy analogy, Stage 2 Energetic Literacy is like reading a complex picture book. A great start, but hardly the ability to read novels by
Dostoyevski!
Stage 3 Energetic Literacy
- You can, for instance, locate a particular cord of attachment. As part of the process of healing, you can read in detail what was stuck in that cord, recycling in your client’s aura and subconsious mind 24/7.
- You can read any chakra databank you choose.
- You can read auras from screen shots on the Internet, or regular photos.
- You have one or more techniques that works for you, just as kids learning reading in school might learn phonics or word recognition or some other method to get going.
Having full energetic literacy does not mean certain things, of course.
- You do not become omniscient. (Sorry.)
- You do not predict the future. (That is a separate gift set and set of skills to master. And acquiring this skill set may not interest you in the least, any more than learning how to read books means that automatically you will become really good at ping pong.)
- You do not automatically develop skill sets of healing. (A reading is not a healing.)
Victimhood via Spiritual Hypochondria
Sometimes a person has developed Stage 1 Energetic Literacy or Stage 2 Energetic Literacy. In addition, the person is carrying quite a lot of STUFF in his/her aura. It’s not terribly hard to lose one’s sense of proportion, under the circumstances. Any internal twinge of discomfort is equated with “energy” or “bad energy.” And then the source must be found.
All too conveniently, that source is found outside oneself. The process could be called “projection” or “having perception of reality distorted by your shadow self,” although my favorite term for it is “Spiritual Hypochondria + Stage 1 Energetic Literacy or Stage 2 Energetic Literacy.”
And what source of victimhood will be found?
- Energy vampires?
- Psychic vampires?
- Psychic attack?
- All those witches in Salem, who must be burned?
Each case is different, of course. What I have found, without exception, is that clients who fear being victimized by other people sending them bad energy… that person always has a lot of STUFF. As that STUFF is healed, one session at a time, the need for victimhood grows less.
Any of you Blog-Buddies have a success story to share about this?
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Hi Rose
I’m a success story, at least I think so
)
A year and a half ago I was full of anger, victimhood, and most importantly I believed all of my negative thoughts.. I was genuinely identified with them, and some of them were truly crazy. I was ‘healing’ everyone else around me by taking on their stuff too. Not a happy bunny!
Now, after a year and a half of healing and learning to heal others (I like give and take best) I’ve let go of a huge amount of stuff, am calm for much of the time, able to recognise and dismiss my victimhood thoughts when they arise, and am learning how beautiful it is to love and let be. I can’t even get dismissive about other people’s victimhood, it’s just OK and how things are!
Still lots of work to do on the empathy front, I fall into other peoples’ experience all the time, not even focusing on them – in the swimming pool today I suddenly felt scared out of nowhere then the woman I was walking past said ‘I’m really shaking’ to her husband – but I managed to pull myself back into myself within ten minutes – which is a big achievement for me
)
And Rose, you cut my cord to my ex husband a few weeks ago. He came to visit the kids yesterday, and in my experience he was an honoured guest in my house. THANK YOU!!
Amanda
AMANDA, you’re doing great!
I especially want to call attention to the way removing major STUFF, as in having me facilitate cutting the cord of attachment to your ex-husband, helps make it easier for you to use the skills of Empath Empowerment.
Both of my how-to books for empaths contain a First Aid technique to help in situations like the one that happened at your swimming pool. Time it takes? About 2 minutes, although your workaround with 10 minutes is a huge achievement, too.
Being practical further, Amanda, I’d recommend that, besides doing sessions with me (or any other way you find effective to permanently move out major STUFF), your next step would be to use either of my how-to books for empaths to upgrade your skills.
These days I am recommending BECOME THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN THE ROOM as a first choice, because it’s a bit easier. But EMPOWERED BY EMPATHY will get you there, too.
Do every exercise. Be sloppy about it, not a perfectionist. Your results will be cumulative.
You’re already well on your way to Empath Empowerment, for sure, Amanda. Definitely a success story!
BONNIEBE asked: “Is suffering necessary for our soul’s growth?”
Yes, Blog-Buddies, I’m finally addressing questions some of you have asked recently about “Sweet Victimhood.”
Rather than making a new blog post, I thought it would be helpful to put each Blog-Buddy question as a separate comment. That way YOU can give your opinions as separate comments, as well.
I’ll give a response to each question on this thread at this part of Deeper Perception Made Practical.
BONNIEBE, many people believe that suffering is necessary for soul-level growth. I am not one of those people.
Sometimes suffering can’t be avoided. Often, however, we have choices. For instance, we can choose to learn the hard way or the easy way.
Above, AMANDA was mentioning her ex-husband. She could have gone through certain kinds of suffering for the rest of her life. Or she could find a healer with the skill set to facilitate permanent healing.
One reason my 12 Steps to Cut Cords of Attachment can bring about permanent healing is that the process includes detailed validation about what you were going through while you had the cord of attachment.
You consider the implication of living without those particular patterns. You receive custom-designed homework to start reconfiguring your subconscious mind and aura in a new direction. In short, you learn something.
Soul growth takes learning. Suffering is one way to learn. But for emotional and spiritual healing, often we can gain conscious insight plus supplementing that with change at the level of auras. Personally, that’s the kind of learning I prefer. How about you?
BONNIEBE asked: “Do we suffer because that is part of being human?”
BONNIEBE, religion is going to make a big difference about how you answer that question, isn’t it?
Certain forms of Buddhism, Christianity, etc. wring every possible drop of benefit possible out of the soggy, smelly cloth of human suffering.
I’m still recoving from the holiday decorations of some of my neighbors across the street. Even though this particular Christmas decoration incident happened some 10 years ago.
In my neighborhood in Sterling, Virginia, some folks are really into decorating during December. We’ve had perpetual Christmas carols. Twinkling lights in a Winter Wonderland theme. A 12-foot high plastic inflatable Frosty the Snowman… who jingled.
One family, however, chose to proclaim Christian values by stringing one very large cross onto the rooftop. That was a statement, right?
I interpreted that as, “Don’t you’all waste a minute celebrating the birth of Jesus. Get to the point, Easter. Jesus died for our sins. Suffering, that was the whole purpose of his life. So don’t bother with the happy times.”
Fortunately, your religion is none of the neighbors’ business. You can choose a belief system that emphasizes free will, growth, etc.
Your reality will shape up nicely, depending.
Incidentally, BONNIEBE, one of the fun parts of full energetic literacy is that you can check out the repercussions of religious and/or spiritual belief in many parts of a person’s aura.
For instance, you can reading the Third Eye Chakra Databank about Spiritual Path. It’s fascinating how beautifully some people DO evolve through suffering. Others evolve through joy.
Someone committed to suffering can really, really do suffering — physically, emotionally, intellectually.
Other times, a person isn’t committed to suffering and it is happening because there is STUFF or karma causing the suffering. When the karma is complete and/or the STUFF is healed, bliss comes back right away.
One of my favorite sayings from my late, former, guru Maharishi Mahesh Yogi goes: “Life is either bliss or lessons.”
CIVICMINDED asked this question about innocent victims:
“What about abused children, or that one kid everyone picks on at school. Or Jesus, for that matter?”
CIVICMINDED, believing in the alleged suffering of Jesus is optional.
To me, he was a great teacher. His message was love. He taught by example. He healed and taught others how to heal.
IMHO, his message was never about suffering. He didn’t take away anyone’s sins. Too many Christians treat Jesus like the guy who works in the circus, following elephants to clean up their poop.
Jesus doesn’t take away anyone’s karma. There will always be a reaction to every action, thought, word. Earth School works that way. Jesus didn’t take away gravity, either.
CIVICMINDED also asked, “Aren’t most victims (or people on the receiving end of perpetrators’ yucky energy) targeted because they’re the most vulnerable, or different (and thus vulnerable), easy targets (least likely to have repercussions when mistreating them)?”
Before you start railing against the “yucky energy” of those perpetrators, I’ve got a question for you.
Who are those perpetrators, CIVIC MINDED? In other lifetimes, they were us.
At least, I know for sure that I have been there and done that (thanks to many sessions of Regression Therapy as a client).
Also, I know about others’ perpetrator lifetimes (because I have facilitated Energy Release Regression Therapy for them).
I know enough to refuse to generalize about why someone does ANYTHING during a perpetrator lifetime. It’s personal. It’s situational. It’s complicated.
The only comment I can make for sure is that souls learn just as much by going through a perpetrator lifetime as by going through a normal one, or even a saintly one. In some ways, we learn the most from going through a perpetrator lifetime, not that I’d especially recommend doing it.
The price paid for huge learning in a perpetrator lifetime is that, for sure, you’re going to have to pay back every bit of karma generated. You know, be a victim. In every way that you have hurt others, you (not Jesus, not some guy in the circus) is going to have to pay it back.
CIVICMINDED asked, following up on the question in Comment #10:
“Plus isn’t there also an element of insecurity in the perpetrators, why else enjoy tormenting easy prey to gain a sense of empowerment?
“Aren’t those that abuse the weak just taking advantage of the less powerful, much like a lion goes after a baby elephant?
CIVIC MINDED, given the passion in these questions, I would encourage you to stop thinking in generalizations and start thinking in terms of specifics. Especially specifics in your life.
* Did someone in school ever pick on you?
* Did a former sweetheart treat you badly?
* Was there physical or emotional or sexual abuse in your family?
Generalizations won’t bring healing. I recommend cutting cords of attachment (as you can learn to do from my how-to book, CUT CORDS OF ATTACHMENT: HEAL YOURSELF AND OTHERS WITH ENERGY SPIRITUALITY).
Or have a session with me of Aura Healing or even come out to Sterling (or to Tokyo, while I’m here for a month) and do Energy Release Regression Therapy.
Use any method of healing that really works for you. Then you’ll have less need to generalize about those who abuse the weak.
Maybe you’re a professional philosopher and this is the reason for your many questions. However, more could be going on than intellectual curiosity.
“Sweet Victimhood” — either feeling that way or needing to generalize about why there are victims — is often fueled by STUFF carried in a suffering person’s aura.
In other words, the more a person suffers, the more tempting it is to watch victimey movies, spend hours in front of TV checking out disasters, speculating about why there are so many sad victims and wicked perpetrators, etc.
None of this helps anyone and only brings a kind of superficial comfort to the one who suffers. As in “Misery loves company.”
CIVICMINDED also asked:
“Are you saying it’s unfair to say that the more violent, aggressive, abusive among us are less evolved than the rest of us who have no need to do this and are aware and care how we affect others?
“Surely in this life there are innocents.”
For this last one I’m addressing here, CIVIC MINDED, let’s start by simplifying your question. If I’m understanding you, the gist is this.
You believe that violent, aggressive, abusive people are are less evolved than others. While evolved people have no need to hurt others and care how they affect others.
If I got this wrong, comment away. (We know you’re not shy about commenting.)
Meanwhile, I’ll respond to this version of your question in the next comment.
Okay, responding to revised CIVIC MINDED Comment #15 — phew! Here goes.
The main implication in what you wrote, to me, is that apparently you are connecting soul age with whether or not a person acts in a violent or aggressive manner. Not sure about that one!
But it’s an interesting way to think, because then victims would be the most evolved people. Which goes back to some of the mythology about Jesus. Instead of a wildly individual, loving, resourceful, powerful, magnificent spiritual teacher, Jesus can be adored just because of how he died.
The suffering saint ideal can definitely be appealing, as part of “Sweet Victimhood.”
As for the part of Comment 14, CIVIC MINDED, where you wrote, “Surely in this life there are innocents.” I’m not convinced of that one, either.
Surely in this life, there is sentimentality — that part I’m sure of. Could sentimentality often be at the core of “Sweet Victimhood”?
Certainly it’s a lovely feeling. A person can wallow in Sweet Victimhood as long as desired. Undoubtedly, each wallower has good reason to want to wallow.
However, once any person decides “Enough is enough,” it is possible to become empowered, kiss “Sweet Victimhood” goodbye, and change the whole quality of one’s life adventure.
I have helped clients do that. And wow! That’s an entirely different kind of lovely feeling.
This has been very interesting to read, Rose, thank you.
I did a healing with one of my practice clients yesterday and really felt the sweetness and softness that is evoked by certain kinds of enabling behaviours. Although it was clear to me that mother-baby blissy clouds are inappropriate between adults who don’t want to come to earth, they can have a very strong pull. But they also seem to invite all sorts of problems.
It left me slightly confused actually because I ended up thinking there was nothing actually wrong with it, it was just in an inappropriate place or time or something! But it felt also like an insight into the dangers of misdirected empathy – ‘like a bridge over troubled waters’ type of feeling.
Could it be true that just because something feels nice and feels like love doesn’t mean it’s actually good for you?
once again, my path has got me all confused, lol!!
Amanda
AMANDA, fascinating point. I don’t think your path has got you confused, funny one. Instead, you are still learning the new language of Energetic Literacy (a.k.a. aura reading).
You can use that to research one person at a time, one choice at a time. Generalizing is what may have you confused. Why not use Deeper Perception instead?
AMANDA, also about your Comment #17, sounds like you’re really getting ready to explore Empath Empowerment at greater depth.
Absolutely, turning your empath gift(s) ON can result in a lovely warm feeling, but then you pick up STUFF that stays with your aura indefinitely.
Find out how your life feels when you use techniques to turn your empath gift(s) OFF. I think you will find that life as a Skilled Empath is very much simpler and less confusing than life with those circuits stuck in the ON position.
Thank you Rose, I’m really focusing on learning empath empowerment but am still struggling a little, there’s a real block around ‘not knowing what’s going on’ (control) and ‘no longer being important to people’ (power). These complaints are taking a long while to shift but I’m just keeping on keeping on.
I think clearing out my cords will make a big difference to that area of my psyche. gosh I’m glad I found your techniques!
Thank you for your point about not generalising! That’s really useful.
Amanda
Thanks so much for taking the time to answer our questions Rose!
Not long after I posted my question, I started to read James Crabtree’s “The 7 Windows to Wholeness” and and came across a passage on happiness. His book says the more you are able to see the big picture, the less upset and more humor you can bring to events that are less than comfortable.
As for (some)religions that seem to validate suffering, you are right. I have an intelligent (in most respects) friend who converted to a certain sect in which suffering is highly thought of.
She is a kind and honest person, but always has a laundry list of misfortunes of herself or people she knows in response to “How are you these days?”
I think that she believes that being happy is somehow disrespectful of the troubles and sorrows of other people.
In regards to the perpetrator lifetimes which were mentioned earlier in the comments, is it possible for us to do anything now to prevent us from having perpetrator lifetimes in any of our future lifetimes?