Energy vampire

For electrical devices that consume energy on standby mode, see Standby power.

An energy vampire or psychic vampire is a being said to have the ability to feed off the "life force" (often also called qi, prana, energy or vitality) of other living creatures. Alternative terms for these persons are pranic vampire, empathic vampire, energy predator (see below), psy/psi-vamp, energy parasite, or psionic vampire.

Legends

The legends and spiritual teachings of some cultures refer to people, often given priestly attributes, who manipulate or remove (feed from) the energy of others. The tiger-women spoken of across Asia (as well as the fox-women of Japan) and the Jiang Shi of China may be noted, as can the incubus and succubus of Judaeo-Christian mythology. This concept is purported to be represented in the myths of a number of cultures, just as blood-drinking vampires are.

In the oral tradition of the Hopi, a powaqa is a sorcerer who comes to a victim pretending to help and then feeds off the victim's life force (see Powaqqatsi).

'Modern' interpretations

Dion Fortune wrote of psychic parasitism in relation to vampirism as early as 1930 (considering it a combination of psychic and psychological pathology) in "Psychic Self-Defense". The term "psychic vampire" first gained attention in the 1960s with the publication of Anton LaVey's Satanic Bible. LaVey, who claimed to have coined the term, used it to mean a spiritually or emotionally weak person who drains vital energy from other people. Adam Parfrey likewise attributed the term to LaVey in an introduction to The Devil's Notebook.
The term is also used by Luis Marques in his work on vampirism and spirituality, entitled the Asetian Bible, where the definition of a psychic vampire goes beyond his ability to drain energy, but is portrayed as a definitive condition of the individual's soul and a secret mark of a connection to a shared past. This polemic view of the energy predator is based on an esoteric tradition known as Asetianism, which relies on predatory spirituality and the extensive use of Ancient Egyptian symbolism, who's teachings are strictly and thoroughly maintained by the occultist Order of Aset Ka.

The theme of the psychic vampire has been a focus within modern Vampire subculture. The way that the subculture has manipulated the image of the psychic vampire has been investigated by researchers such as Mark Benecke and A. Asbjorn Jon. Jon has noted that, like the traditional psychic vampires, those of Vampyre subculture 'prey[s] upon life-force or 'pranic' energy'. Jon also noted that the group has been loosely linked to the Goth subculture. Unfortunately, psychic vampires are forced to feel the emotions of those who they steal energy from, sometimes without consciously doing it. This condition is also called empathy.

In popular fiction

Energy vampires are not as common in literature, comics and movies compared to the more traditional vampires, but the concept nonetheless makes an appearance in a number of popular works. The 1968 Star Trek episode Day of the Dove featured an alien life force that intended to live off the psychic energy of anger by imprisoning Klingon and United Federation of Planets combatants forever in violent circumstances. In Lifeforce, a movie from 1985, most of London's population are turned into zombies after their lifeforce has been drained from them by three psychic vampires. The Wraith of the Stargate universe and the Atavus from Earth: Final Conflict feed on the "lifeforce" of humans. For an example in video games, see the Metroids from the video game Metroid.

In the anime and manga series Sailor Moon, the Dark Kingdom/Negaverse collects the life energy of humans in order to make Queen Metallia (The Negaforce) grow stronger.

The White Court Vampires in Jim Butcher's Dresden novels are another example.

In World of Warcraft, the Nathrezim (Dreadlords) are vampyric in nature, draining Life Energy from their victims and devouring their souls [1].

In the ZBS serialized audio drama "The Fourth Tower of Inverness" the Madonna Vampira is an energy vampire.

Energy vampires can also be referred to in modern pop-culture as "soul eaters," and can refer to people who are very quiet and/or shy, often exhibiting a personality that others find disturbing. Those who especially exhibit these characteristics can be referred to as the "leaders" of the soul-eater culture in a given area. These leaders are most often identified simply by the placement of a title of nobility as a prefix to their name. For example: "Queen Jessica and King Max were both trying to steal my soul earlier today."

Several of Stephen King's villains are energy or empathetic vampires: Pennywise from It, Dandelo from The Dark Tower series, Tak from The Regulators and Desperation, and Ardelia Lortz from the short story 'The Library Policeman' from Four Past Midnight. The concept also appears in Sleepwalkers, a 1992 film based on an unpublished novel by King.

L. J. Smith has a young adult fiction trilogy called Dark Visions which deals with energy vampires (called psychic vampires in the work). In this story, special crystals can store psychic energy. Contact with an impure one will increase psychic powers but will have the side effect of increasing one's life energy metabolism, causing the person to become an energy vampire. In the story, the energy vampires may acquire their needed energy from either a person, or one of the special crystals.

See also

• Obake
• Odic force
• Vampire lifestyle
• Pranayama

Sources

• Belanger, Michelle: The Psychic Vampire Codex: A Manual of Magick and Energy Work. Weiser Books, 2004. ISBN 1-57863-321-4
• Bernstein, Albert J.: Emotional Vampires: Dealing With People Who Drain You Dry. McGraw-Hill, 2002. ISBN 0-07-138167-8
• Fortune, Dion: Psychic Self-Defense. Weiser Books Publishing, 2001. ISBN 1-57863-151-3
• Harbour, Dorothy: Energy Vampires: A Practical Guide for Psychic Self-protection. Destiny Books, 2002. ISBN 0-89281-910-3
• Hort, Barbara E.: Unholy Hungers: Encountering the Psychic Vampire in Ourselves & Others. Shambhala, 1996. ISBN 1-57062-181-0
• Kaldera, Raven: The Ethical Psychic Vampire. Xlibris Corporation, 2005. ISBN 1-4134-6198-0
• Konstantinos: Vampires: The Occult Truth. Llewellyn Publications, 1996. ISBN 1-56718-380-8
• ^ LaVey, Anton Szandor: The Satanic Bible (Avon, 1969, ISBN 0-380-01539-0)
• Nyarlathotep, Frater & Jesse Lindsay: Ardeth - The Made Vampire. Lulu Press, 2006. ISBN 978-1-84728-516-4
• Slate, Joe H.: Psychic Vampires: Protection from Energy Predators & Parasites. Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd., 2002. ISBN 0-7387-0191-2
• Marques, Luis: Asetian Bible. Aset Ka, 2007. ISBN 978-9899569409