“You attract damaged people because your energy feels like safety in a world that’s starving for it, not because you’re broken, but because you’ve done the work they’re still avoiding.  But ask yourself this: Is it connection or another attempt at rescue?  You keep handing out your spark to people who treat it like a battery pack.  That’s not love, that’s slow self-destruction.  Protecting your peace isn’t selfish, it’s clarity.  Let go of what drains, flow toward what reflects, let them come whole or not at all,” Kristoffer William.  This is a nice addition to moving with intention.  The human creature seeks connection and if we aren’t intentional with our energy we have potential to attract people who will take advantage and manipulate.  This is also next level when it comes to healing.  Once we get to the point where we know we need to shift course and letting go of the crap is the next step, that sets people off.  The people who were only present because we carried the energy they couldn’t (or wouldn’t) manage start to panic because they see they won’t be able to shift their energy onto us anymore.  The ones who were fine as long as you did what they said, as long as you were there for them but never returned your call, the ones who pushed and pushed and ignored when you told them what was wrong and then were shocked when you weren’t there anymore: those are the people who get bothered when we set the boundary.  The ones who come to us because they see we are healed in a way they aren’t, and they aren’t prepared to do that work.

I know the term “damaged” affects people differently because we are all “damaged” on some level.  There is no real way to avoid that, but for our purposes in this piece, damaged includes avoidant, destructive, repetitive patterns that keep them down.  The ones who have options to solve their issues and the tools available yet still refuse to do the work.  There is absolutely no judgement about anyone’s damage—none of us get through life unscathed so we will all have some level of shit to unpack at some point.  And honestly, there is no judgement about those who aren’t ready to unpack it yet.  We know when we’re ready to deal with it in our own time.  But this is about protecting our energy and in order to do that we need to be highly aware of the energy around us and be very clear on what we allow into our lives—we have to set the boundary for what we attract.  If we have intention in our life, the work we must do is clear—and confusion either loves/attracts more confusion, or it clings to clarity whether it’s internal or not—and we know what is and isn’t the right kind of company in our lives.  So perhaps it isn’t about the damaged part.  Perhaps it’s more about those willing to convert the energy into something good.  Perhaps it’s more about finding the people who resonate with the same type of issue we’re trying to resolve and learning to work through it together. 

Aside from intention, we must know that we are worthy of achieving what we set out to.  We are worthy of saying “no” to people who only seek to use our energy for their benefit.  We are worthy of learning and redirecting our own energy as many times as it takes.  We are worthy of the connection we desire and that means there are times we will have to say no to certain connections—and we are worthy of refusing to connect to those who “use us like a battery” or those who refuse to do the work themselves, those who only want us around to serve their purpose.  I’m not saying we need to be singularly focused or selfish in achieving a goal, I will repeat that as well as it’s something we’ve spoken about often—it isn’t selfish to refuse to fulfill someone else’s demands, especially for the work they refuse to do.  We can lead a horse to water so to speak but if it continues to run away or refuses to lower its head, there comes a point we are not responsible for what happens no matter how grim.  Some people are the same and they will opt to not drink every time, saying we didn’t give them what they want to some degree—like it somehow wasn’t the right water.  It is ok to have boundaries around what our goals are and to make choices that support those goals.  There is nothing wrong with that.  We need to have enough self-awareness to know when our actions cause harm to others and we must set the boundary when others cause harm to us.  There is no reason to accept harm for the sake of others and no reason to cause harm so if we recognize that someone is causing more harm/draining (or taking) more than they should, we need to recognize it isn’t up to us to fix them—we must let them go.