002. Avoiding Feeling Overwhelmed by Online OPE (Other People's Energy)

Last night I had a dream in which I was in an office and working a job which required me to be highly technical. In this dream, I faced strong pressure from those around me to apply for open roles in this space, and when I awoke, I had the strong impression that I should move into technology-adjacent consulting again, as I have when I consult as a HubSpot SME or as someone who does marketing automation.

I ultimately resisted the urge, but it brings me to a topic which I haven't seen many people outside of M. Belanger (a physical medium) talk about, and it's that if you're energetically sensitive, it's very very easy to feel influenced by other people's energy and intentions. I call it "swimming in people's energy" because it almost feels like I'm moving through their aura or pulling on threads, but for you it may be different.

Contrary to what many believe, this effect isn't limited to in-person activity and is also very present during online engagement with other humans too.

The Internet as Consciousness Personified

I believe that the internet is nothing more than a physical embodiement of our spiritual reality that as conscious beings, we are all interconnected, all the time. Quantum entanglement means that thoughts move faster than light, and the internet is an amazing physical representation of the psycho-spiritual phenomena.

What this means is that other people's intention, attention, energy, and emotions is also transmitted through the internet in the form of "content", which is why AI slop always feels soulless even when it's produced in a highly "realistic" and "human" way—it lacks the zhuzh of thought, attention, intention, and energy that only a human soul and consciousness can bring.

So when you, an Intuitive Marketer or Intuitive Person, are interacting with the online world, you'll find that it can influence you just as much as being in-person. This can show up in a number of ways for Intuitive Marketers which I want to make sure you're aware of so you can start to engage more deliberately and intentionally so that you can ultimately create the outcomes you want for yourself and your clients.

Online Browsing — aka the Doomscroll

One way this shows up is when you are browsing online social media feeds and feeling some kind of way in response to the doomscroll, such as envy, jealousy, anger, fear, overwhelm, frustration, shame, lack, fear, despair. While addictive, this scroll can influence you in ways you may not realize or recognize, and cause you to act and feel in ways you wouldn't have had you not engaged. This includes both overt influence (ads) and covert influence (energetic/psychic intention).

My Suggestion: Limit the amount of time you are on social media to the absolute necessary and, where possible, engage directly with those people/brands whom you want to form a relationship with. Bookmark their profiles if you have to or better yet, subscribe to their emails and engage with them in a less algorithmic way. This will also help you avoid the dopamine-sucking and time-draining scroll, and help give you back more of your time and attention span.

Webinars & Engaging with Someone's Content

Another way Intuitive Marketers and Intuitive People are influenced online is through engaging with someone's content. This used to mean books, but now it means their YouTube videos, their podcast episodes, webinars by them, articles on Substack, and so forth.

To share a personal example, I resonate highly with thinker and writer Mitch Horowitz so much, that I cannot read Mitch Horowitz' work and then write an article, or I will hear his cadence in my mind and then produce lovely but very much not-me-sounding copy or content. I admire his erudite writing style and the clarity and intellectual prowess he's able to command in his writing, but I can't let my resonance with his work influence my own, or else I muddy the intention I'm hoping to convey.

On the flipside, if I need to "tap into" the voice of my Expert Brand clients more easily, I will watch/listen to a video of theirs until I can feel/hear/see them in my mind. And then I write from that space as needed. You'd be amazed at what kind of ideas come through when you do this vs. when you approach things from whatever random frame of mind you were in before you sat down to produce marketing materials.

How you engage matters, and what you engage with can profoundly influence you in ways you may not yet be aware of... but likely will notice now that it's been pointed out to you. As someone who's sensitive, it's more important for you than for most that you engage with media deliberately.

My Suggestion: As with the doomscroll, be mindful of whose content you are engaging with and at what times of day you are engaging with it, and make sure to ground yourself afterwards. If you are being asked to take action—such as to buy—ask yourself if this person's energy is one you want to spend the next few months with because if you buy a course or a program, you'll be swimming in their energy. Perhaps you do want to do that because they give you confidence and motivation... or maybe not, if they make you second-guess yourself or engage in nasty group processes. You do you, just be mindful. You always retain agency and often online marketers craft things so that you feel like you don't.

Listening to Music

I find that I cannot listen to music without it affecting the intention I'm hoping to convey in my work. It also interferes with my ability to "channel" someone's voice in copy. I tend to listen to binaural beat-based music (such as Brain.fm*) which doesn't have any words.

My Suggestion: Use music with intention. If you need to feel happy to get in the mood to write a certain piece of copy, get dancing! If you are personally facing a rough time but need to write from a frame of confidence, then put that kind of music on. But be very mindful that music is art, and art conveys energy, emotion, and intention... and it's hard to sit in someone else's energetic stream while trying to transmit your own.

Zoom Calls & 1:1 Coaching

A more intimate way this shows up for Intuitive Marketers and Intuitive People is when you are engaging in Zoom/online calls in a 1:1 capacity. Engaging with someone in a 1:1 coaching capacity, and feeling influenced by them in the way you're influenced: catching their emotional mood, thinking like them, channelling their voice, dreaming about them, even changing your career/focus/habits to be like them.

My Suggestion: Limit who you work with! If someone makes you anxious or sick every time you speak with them, or gives you nightmares or physical pains, then they aren't someone you should work with. Part of the reason I am upfront with being Intuitive is so that I can have relationships with clients where I can speak to these elements without being weird, and work in ways which don't go against my innate psychic abilities.

Using Marketing to Grow Your Brand (or that of Your Clients)

As Intuitive Marketer, you like me are probably working for clients. You cannot control how your clients engage online or if they take any of this advice, but you can still advocate for a marketing program which is intentional and deliberate because the alternative being proposed right now is to basically become a media company and clone yourself with AI because God forbid if you can't keep up with posting 100x a day on all the platforms with new, never-before-seen content.

My Suggestion: Encourage your clients to engage in "Minimum Viable Visibility"**. What is the minimum they can with enough quality and consistency in order to generate real conversations with real people who might be their ideal buyer? For your clients, that might mean just having a website and some videos... and spending the rest of the time networking at conferences or at local events. For me, it means having a daily newsletter, posting videos, and building a community of people I know, like, and trust and whose energy I would love to have around me. Everyone's line is different, but the answer can't be "do all the things" because the juice really isn't worth the squeeze.

Wrapping it Up

If you are sensitive in any way, then how you engage online needs to be just as deliberate as how you engage in person. And if you have people around you in your physical space which make you ill... find ways to remove yourself or, if you have to engage, process their energy and emotions so they do not stick around in your system longer than needed.

I'll post on that another day.

Go and do!

—LMS

* This is a referral link which will get you 30 days of brain.fm for free. As far as I know, I get nothing for sharing it with you. https://my.brain.fm/payment?extended_promo=30&utm_source=referafriend

**I first heard this phrase from Nick Richtsmeier of Culture Craft/The Trust Made Guild.