How Envy Drains Your Energy And Keeps You Stuck

As a clairvoyant and empath, I don’t just take people at face value. I sense what is happening beneath the surface. I can sense the presence of certain emotions, attachments and energetic cords in a person’s energy field, and how these affect relationships and quietly shape life path and soul growth over time.

Having done psychic readings for people all over the world for many years, I have repeatedly come to the same conclusion about relationships: most conflict is not really about what it appears to be on the surface. When viewed from an energetic and karmic perspective, deeper emotional currents are almost always at play, such as hurt, insecurity, betrayal, resentment or the need to restore balance.

One issue that I repeatedly encounter in these situations is envy.

Conflict can arise from many sources, but envy is one of the common energetic patterns I encounter, but is seldom talked about in everyday life. It often lies just beneath the surface of the tension between people, whether they are siblings, friends, or romantic partners.

First, it is important to distinguish between envy and jealousy, because they are not energetically the same. Jealousy is the fear that someone might take something away from you that you already have, while envy is the desire to have something someone else already has.

Spiritually speaking, the difference goes even deeper than that. Jealousy tends to stem from fear and attachment, often linked to past experiences of loss, rejection or insecurity. Envy, on the other hand, is rooted in comparison and a sense of lack or scarcity. It arises when someone feels disconnected from their own path, gifts or potential.

Both jealousy and envy can pull you out of alignment, but envy in particular scatters your energy and holds you back. Rather than moving forward on your own path, your attention shifts outwards. This causes your energy to drain rather than gather strength, expand, and support your growth and highest good.

Envy, if surrounded on all sides by the brightness of another’s prosperity, like the scorpion confined within a circle of fire, will sting itself to death ~ Charles Caleb Colton

What Life Taught Me About Envy

I’ve seen this not only in readings, but in my own life as well.

I remember a moment very clearly from when I was about 18, in a dance class at college. I was completely focused on my own training and putting all my energy into improving my technique. I never felt the need to compete with anyone else, but I did admire other dancers and paid attention to what they were doing well.

At the time, I was working on kicking up all the way to my head, which takes a lot of strength and control. I had even hurt myself a few times in the process, so I knew it wasn’t something that would come easily. But I was determined.

There was a dancer next to me who became increasingly agitated. I could feel it before I even fully registered what she was doing. She kept getting too close, glaring, and trying to match what I was doing, but without the technique to support it. Her posture was off, her core wasn’t engaged, and instead of focusing on correcting that, all her attention was constantly on me.

What struck me in that moment was how differently our energy was being used. All of my energy was going into my own body and my own progress. All of her energy was going towards me.

If she had taken a step back and really looked at how I was achieving the movement, she could have learned from it. But instead, she was caught up in envious comparison, and it was working against her.

I remember thinking very clearly that it was a complete waste of energy to focus on someone else in that way. My progress came naturally because both my attention and intention were where it needed to be.

I experienced a similar reaction at an even earlier stage in my life, when I was eleven years old. I progressed to pointe shoes after just six months of ballet training. When my promotion was announced, a friend of mine stormed out of the dance studio. She had been dancing for much longer than me and was angry rather than happy for me.

At the time, I didn’t fully understand it. I had simply been practicing a lot at home and putting in the effort. Looking back now, it’s clear that she was focused on the comparison instead of her own path. If she had put that same energy into her training, instead of being envious, her outcome might have been very different.

Over time, I have seen the same thing over and over again: People who focus on their personal achievement and spiritual growth usually find success and fulfillment. But, people who become fixated on what others are doing, or what others have that they don’t, often end up feeling stuck, frustrated, disappointed, or depleted.

From a spiritual perspective, envy is particularly limiting. When your attention is on someone else’s life, you’re not fully present in your own. Your energy isn’t available for your own growth, your own creativity, or manifesting your own opportunities and outcomes. Your focus is continually pulled outward, instead of being directed within for your highest good.

It is never wise to seek or wish for another’s misfortune. If malice or envy were tangible and had a shape, it would be the shape of a boomerang ~ Charley Reese 

Envy Across Spiritual Traditions

Envy is one of the few emotions that is universally warned against in spiritual traditions through the ages. Across cultures, religions and mystical teachings, it is considered to be much more than just a personal emotional issue. It is recognised as a destructive spiritual force capable of poisoning relationships, weakening the spirit and pulling a person out of alignment with their highest path.

In many indigenous and folk traditions, envy is not viewed as a purely internal emotion. It is believed to have real energetic consequences. The concept of the “Evil Eye,” found in Latin American, Mediterranean, and Middle Eastern cultures, is rooted in the idea that concentrated envy can project harmful energy onto others. This is why protective rituals, cleansing practices, and amulets have long been used to guard against the effects of being envied.

But there is another side to the “Evil Eye” that is just as important, and far less often understood: the person directing that envious energy outward is always doing the greatest harm to themselves. Rather than serving their own highest good, they are wasting and draining their energy in an attempt to harm someone else. Instead of moving forward on their own path, they are hurling their energy outward in the hope of disturbing another person’s life. Yet in the end, it is the envier who pays the deeper karmic price.

Similarly, in West African and Afro-diasporic traditions such as Ifá and Candomblé, envy is considered deeply disruptive. It is believed to interfere with a person’s spiritual path or destiny, creating blockages that require cleansing and realignment. In many Native American traditions, envy is not just understood as a personal issue, but also as a rupture in the balance of the community. Practices of generosity and redistribution are traditionally employed to prevent envy from taking root and causing harm.

Shamanic traditions go even further, identifying envy as a possible cause of energetic fragmentation, or ‘soul loss’, whereby a person’s vitality is weakened or scattered. In these wisdom traditions, healing involves restoring what has been energetically disturbed or displaced.

The major world religions all echo similar teachings about envy. For example, Christianity describes envy as corrosive to the soul and Catholicism known as one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Islamic teachings warn that it cancels out one’s good deeds. Buddhism portrays envy as a source of suffering based on illusion and suggests rejoicing in others’ success as a remedy. Hindu teachings identify envy as one of the inner obstacles to spiritual clarity, while Jewish ethics view it as a rejection of one’s own path.

Within Western esoteric traditions, envy is often perceived as a contraction of energy, a state that distorts perception and weakens the connection to one’s purpose. Focusing on another’s path in this way is seen as a misalignment that can carry karmic consequences.

Across all these metaphysical perspectives, one consistent theme emerges: envy diminishes, it does not elevate! Ultimately, it pulls us away from our own path rather than guiding us towards it.

Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well ~ Theodore Roosevelt

Overcoming The Comparison Mindset

I always encourage my clients and students to think differently. When you see someone who has achieved something you admire, don’t try to compete with them or take anything away from their achievement. Instead, become curious! Pay attention to what they’re doing and, if possible, ask them how they did it. Try to understand their process so that you can apply it in your own way for your own benefit.

That kind of mindset keeps your energy moving forward instead of tying it up in comparison.

I’ve seen the opposite dynamic play out in families as well, especially between siblings. One sibling puts their energy into their goals and naturally progresses, while another becomes focused on resentment or comparison. Over time, that difference in focus creates very different outcomes, even if they started from the same place.

What I’ve learned, both through experience and through my work with clients, is that these patterns are not just emotional. They are often karmic. They can repeat themselves in different relationships and different areas of life until the underlying soul lesson is learned and understood.

At its core, the lesson is about where you place your energy and about stepping into your power as the creator of your own path and the master of your destiny.

Every day, you’re making choices, whether you realize it or not. You can put your energy into comparing yourself to others, or you can put it into your own development. You can focus on what you feel you lack, or you can focus on what you’re building.

When you put your attention on someone else in a negative or competitive way, it doesn’t bring you closer to what you want. If anything, it creates more distance. It’s like pouring energy into something that can never give anything back.

But when you bring your focus back to yourself and your own path and soul growth is when things begin to shift. That’s when you start to see progress, and that’s where manifestation really begins.

From a spiritual point of view, envy is not just a feeling to suppress or ignore. It is a signal from your higher self telling you that your energy is being pulled off course and that you need to  redirect it.

The more quickly you can recognize that and bring your attention back to yourself, the more aligned, and ultimately more fulfilled you become.