You can’t help but notice the recent ‘vamp-boom’ of the last few years, Twilight, True Blood and Vampire Diaries have all contributed a vast amount to this sanguinarian trend – I’ve even seen that all black, pseudo-goth fashion is coming into TopShop!
I saw an article in the latest issue of Paranormal magazine on ‘Psychic Vampires’ which led me to want to throw my own two cents into the bowl based on my experience and actually growing up in a community of people, some of whom believed themselves to be psychic or non-sanguinarius vampires!
So, what is a psychic vampire, how does it differ from a regular (sanguinarius) vampire? Simply, rather than drinking blood from a victim (or consenting adult, as the black veil advises – google it!) a psi-vamp will drink the energy from a person’s aura, direct from their chakras, or simply soaking up a smile or burst of positive emotion. (re the article’s title!)
It’s basically an easy step into the fang-club for the squeamish.
Now, for the reality of the situation; the original form of psi-vamp came to be in the medieval ages, the Christian church happily pushed the thought of a ‘demon’ which fed on the soul of the living and attached sexuality to the beasts, calling them Incubi and Sucubi. (male and female forms) Whoever had a sexual dream was said to have been visited by one of these entities. They fed on the sexual energy of a victim.
This thought then evolved further into a demon which simply fed upon the energy of a victim, if someone back then began to feel overly tired, lethargic or dizzy regularly, the only explanation in those times to these ailments was that some kind of parasitic spirit which had begun feeding on said victim. These days, we’d most likely diagnose the person as having ME, stress or an iron deficiency!
The myth of these creatures carried on through the years however, taking several forms, from demons, to possessed humans, aliens and finally people who had ‘un-locked’ their psychic potential. In modern day times, psychic vampires are considerably more popular than blood drinking vampires, based on a study in 2005, 17% of vamps drink blood, whereas 31% consume energy through psychic means.
It is noted that many self-confessed (as if there was any other kind!) psychic vamps have illnesses like asthma or panic. Asthma being an illness in which the victim finds breathing difficult, often in times of mental or physical stress. An illness that’s quite psychophysiological, not to say psychosomatic, but something that is often brought on when the person feels in the position that an attack should come on.
There is no proof to say that psi-vamps do or do not exist, in my eyes, having known psi-vamps in the past and having being made victim to their powers (as an impressionable young teen!) I can put the feeling great after a feeding down to a placebo effect, and the lethargic symptoms when ‘thirsty’ to placebo’s evil twin, the nocebo effect.
Even with ‘real’ psychics, there are ways to prove or disprove powers, with psi-vamps we’ll never really know either way.
Think you’re (or a friend or child) a psi-vamp? Check out Sanguinarius.org for help, tips and a handy ‘parents section.’
DC
