How to Deal With People Who Drain Your Energy...

Yolande Author

How to stay loving, set boundaries, and stop carrying everyone’s emotions.

Some people energize you.

And some people…
                                   ...feel like a slow leak. 

Not dramatic. But enough to leave you drained.
You know them.

The 'quick vent' colleague.
The friend with one more crisis.
The person who somehow makes every conversation about
them.

And you?

You stay kind.
You listen. You care. You hold space. (Of course you do.
You’re not cold.). But something starts to feel off:

'How can I give so much... and still feel this empty?'.

You’re not too sensitive (you’re just wide open)

Let’s correct something.

The issue isn’t that you feel too much. It’s that you never
learned to filter. So everything gets in. Emotions. Tension.
Subtext. (All the unspoken stuff? You pick that up too.)

And people feel that. Not consciously. But they lean on it.

Until you become:
'the emotional buffer of your environment'.


No application. Still hired.

You want to be loving. But you’re losing yourself.

Here’s your tension:

'I want to be there for people.'
'I don’t want to feel drained anymore.'

And somewhere you learned those don’t go together.

Like you have to choose:

• kindness
  or
• boundaries

But that’s not true.

What you’ve been doing is: 'love without limits'. And that 
usually turns into exhaustion with good intentions.

The work doesn’t start with them (annoying, I know)

You can’t change them. (Yes, that would be easier.)

But you can change: 'how you show up'.

And that starts with honesty:

• Where do you say yes when you’re already full?
• Where do you step in when no one asked you to?
• Where are you carrying something that isn’t yours?

Not to judge yourself. But to finally take yourself seriously.

Boundaries are not sentences. They’re behavior.

Most people think: 'I just need to say it better.'

But boundaries live in:

• picking up or not
• how long you stay
• how often you engage
• when you stop

Your behavior already tells the truth. Even when your
words don’t.

Staying soft (without absorbing everything)

You don’t need to become harder. Not colder.

It can sound like:

• 'I hear this is a lot. Can we look at it tomorrow?'
• 'I want to give this attention, but now isn’t the moment.'
• 'What have you already tried?'

Simple. Not easy. 
Because your old pattern says: fix it, hold it, carry it.

And you’re learning:
'I stay present, but I don’t take it over'.

That’s mature love.

The shift that changes everything

You don’t have to stop giving. 
You can stop carrying.

Those are not the same thing.

• Giving = connection
• Carrying = taking over

And you’ve been mixing the two. 
(Not your fault. It’s a very well-rewarded pattern.)

'What if they don’t like it?'

They might not.

Some will push back. Some will guilt you. Some will say:
'you’ve changed.'

You have.

You’re becoming someone who no longer abandons herself
to keep things comfortable for everyone else.

And honestly?

If a relationship only works when you overextend yourself…
that’s not a safe dynamic. That’s dependency.

One small shift (for today)

Try this: Let one thing be.

• Don’t fix it.
• Don’t absorb it.
• Don’t respond immediately.

Just… leave it.

And notice what happens. (Yes, including your discomfort.)
That’s where change starts.

Your energy is not public access

Let this land:

'Not everyone gets unlimited access to you'.

Not because you’re harsh. 
But because you’re human.

You don’t have to figure this out alone

If this feels familiar - staying kind while quietly draining
yourself - you’re not the only one. 

And it’s not something you fix with one
sentence or one 'better boundary'.

Inside the HELD bundle 'Dealing lovingly with difficult people' 
you learn how to:

• stay open without absorbing everything
• set clear limits without guilt
• and stop carrying what was never yours to begin with

Not by becoming harder.
But by becoming clearer.

👉 Open in your HELD

Categories: : Recovery Anchor