Can someone have bad energy?

Bad Energy is a New Age Fallacy

Have you ever said, or heard someone say:

I don’t want to be around [person’s name], S/he/They have bad energy.

I’ve heard it so many times over the years teaching and practicing. I don’t think this is because the world is filled with people with bad energy, I believe it’s because we have a lack of understanding about energy and the Astral/emotional body.

Emotions are. They’re not bad or good.

Is anger a bad thing?

If someone runs into your car while it’s parked and drives away, leaving your car with a big scrape or dent, is anger appropriate? Is it viable? Or would joy and love be better?

Is anxiety or fear awful?

If you’re standing on a high dive about to dive into a swimming pool that looks really, really far away from where you’re standing on the board, is fear or anxiety the wrong way to feel?

What about depression?

Is depression a way of understanding yourself and a clue that you may need to get help to resolve and address what’s underneath the heavy feelings?

Or hatred?

Is it acceptable to hate what someone believes in? For example, is it ok to hate bigotry and prejudice, racism or policies that marginalize or victimize people?

Every emotion exists for a reason

Emotions provide context and meaning to our experience. How would you know how to feel about something without an emotional palette to choose from? And how would you know your preferences, likes and dislikes, even needs and wants without emotions? Short answer? You wouldn’t.

OK, so we’ve established that emotions are important and that they define and shape our perspective and understanding of whatever we experience in our lives.

Resonance, perspective & preference not ‘bad energy’

Now, moving forward. What do emotions have to do with ‘good or bad’ energy? Let’s unpack this a bit with another set of questions:

If someone is anxious, does that make them ‘bad’ or full of ‘bad energy’? What is your tolerance for anxious people?

If someone has anger issues, but doesn’t play them out on you, is that person ‘bad’ or have ‘bad energy’? What is your comfort level with anger in other people?

If someone is a gossip or catty about other people’s experiences, does that person have ‘bad energy’ or do they have a behavioral trait that you don’t appreciate or respect?

Do you see where I’m going here? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we owned our perspective, acknowledged our preferences and operated by what resonates or does not resonate with us?

Wouldn’t things be cleaner and simpler if we acknowledge to ourselves, ‘I’m more suited to working with the over 40-crowd than with young adults ‘. Or, ‘I prefer to be around people who are self-actualizing as opposed to people who seem to get other people to do their work for them’.

Or something even simpler than that:

I find myself feeling anxious when I’m around people who struggle with anxiety. I don’t enjoy matching their mood, and it’s up to me to work on that.

Here’s the thing:

No one has good or bad energy. People have patterns, behaviors, issues, problems as well as a personality, habits and beliefs. A person might resonate with you, because you share patterns, behaviors, issues and problems, or because their personality, habits and beliefs match your worldview, or feel comforting and familiar. Conversely, others might resonate with you because of your differences, inspiring and inciting curiosity.

Or people might not resonate with you because their triggers are your triggers, their issues are your issues. Or their worldview is disharmonious to yours.

Let’s not make it about other people’s good or bad energy

Let’s own our preferences, acknowledge our perspective and biases, and understand that if we don’t resonate with someone, it’s not because of ‘bad energy’. It’s because of a massive gap in vibration. Because that’s perfectly valid, and allows others to be who they are. And you get to be Who You Are.

Having said all of that, if you want to do something about your patterns, behaviors, issues, problems, habits and beliefs, so you elevate your vibration and resonate with different people, consider doing some energy clearing!