When people are deeply identified with the ego, you can see the tension in their faces and bodies. You can hear the suffering in their voice and in what they talk about. Energetically, you can feel the negativity that accompanies this state. When we are around someone who is expressing and living out the ego's negativity, we feel drained, bored, repulsed, or bad, since their energy is often contagious. Their negative inner state gets reflected outwardly and is felt energetically, and it doesn't attract support or opportunities from others. Naturally, those in such a state want to manifest or attract love, support, opportunities, and other things, but the inner state of lack and negativity that such people are experiencing actually repels these things. Neediness is not attractive.

From this inner state of lack, many desires are born. The ego creates both the sense of lack and also the desire to manifest something to fill that lack. The solution is not to get the things, experiences, or circumstance that the ego wants to manifest, which it believes will end the lack and discontentment (but which are never enough), but rather to see that the sense of lack is a lie. That anything is lacking or necessary to be happy is the core lie that keeps the ego intact and going after one desire after another.

The antidote is to see that nothing in this moment is lacking, which is the truth. Lack is a story told by the ego, and it tells this story no matter what is happening or how much we have. When we begin to tell another story—the truth, instead of the ego's lies—our internal state changes, and we feel happy, content, loving, grateful, and generous. These feeling states not only feel good, but are also very attractive and attract to us support, love, and opportunities. Focusing on what is here—what you love about life, yourself, and others—rather than on what seems to be lacking is the antidote to the sense of lack and the driving neediness of the ego. It is also the key to being happy.

This positive internal state is the state of alignment with Essence, our true nature. And it brings us the true happiness, peace, and love that we all long for. The experience of our true nature is so full and complete that you won't feel the need to manifest something or make your life turn out a particular way, and yet, life will naturally bring you all the good that it intends for you. What it brings you will be aligned with the Whole, and that is a much more satisfying and fulfilling experience than getting what the me wants.

Find the place within you that is already full, complete, happy, and at peace with life. That fullness will draw to you and allow you to receive exactly what you need, and you will no longer feel that you have to manifest something to be happy. That's freedom, and that's what you really want. To be free of the need to manifest something in order to be happy is true happiness.

In addition to negativity repelling others and opportunities, it also creates a climate that allows, if not invites, those who are negative to be part of your life and environment. "Like attracts like" is the phrase that is often used to describe the tendency for those of a similar energy, vibration, or consciousness to be close or hang out together. The reason for this is that we as human beings like to have our self-images, beliefs, perceptions, and attitudes—our conditioning—reinforced by others. We like to be around others who are like us, even if they are negative, because they support and sustain our self-images and worldview.

Those who are very different from us in vibration or consciousness tend to cause us to question ourselves or bring out our judgments, both of which are uncomfortable. Someone who is more negative unconsciously tries to bring down someone who is more positive, and someone who is more positive unconsciously tries to bring up the other person. Fortunately, we can override any tendency to hang out with negative people once we realize what is going on by choosing otherwise, and that will help shift our consciousness. Then being more positive and being with more positive people will become more comfortable and natural. This is how evolution happens.

Those with a more positive outlook on life naturally gravitate toward those with a similar outlook and move away from those who are negative because it doesn't feel good to be around negative thinking and emotions, although more positive individuals might feel called to help uplift those who are suffering emotionally and spiritually.

Do you feel like those around you keep you down or hold you back? If so, you may be unconsciously colluding with them to keep yourself down because they reinforce your negative conditioning, self-images, and perspectives. Change these, and you will no longer find their negative presence acceptable to you. Change your inner world, and your outer world changes. When we heal our negative self-images, they stop shaping our life and our experience of life. When we stop co-creating with the ego, the false self, we are freed to co-create more with Essence. Then Essence can bring into our life what it intends for our support, happiness, and fulfillment.

If you are experiencing "attracting" negative people, you may be triggering other people's egos and negativity by something in your own attitude, demeanor, or behavior. People are our mirrors, and even people who are generally very loving and positive may mirror back the ego and its negativity to us when we are in ego. So we experience our own negativity coming back to us. When we experience those around us as being negative, we may be drawing out that negativity, just as we, when we are in a positive state, often evoke love and compliance from those around us. Our own negativity triggers negativity in others.

A simple example of this is when you complain about something, that often evokes complaints from others, possibly even aimed at you. Or if you are unfriendly, others are likely to be unfriendly too. You may think they are unfriendly or unpleasant without realizing that you are projecting unfriendliness yourself. Another common example is when you are angry, even generally sweet and nice people will often respond to you in anger. In this way, angry people tend to experience a world full of angry people. They create anger wherever they go.

Having said this, it is important to realize that not all difficulties are created by our negative thoughts and feelings, although many certainly are. Some difficulties are designed by our souls as catalysts for our growth or to steer us in a new direction. Difficulties are part of life. They are built into life, and no one escapes them, no matter how positive our thoughts are or how aligned with Essence we are. Essence, in fact, builds challenges into every life, but also brings us resources for overcoming them and growing from them.

When we are aligned with Essence rather than the ego, we are much better able to be happy in the midst of challenges, move through them more gracefully and wisely, and learn from them. We can come out stronger and more certain that life is meaningful and good. People who are able to do this are models for those who are caught in negativity and fear.

When we are identified with the ego, we experience both the problems caused by our negativity and the normal challenges of life, which aren't accepted by the ego and therefore aren't learned from or moved through as easily. When we are identified with the ego and its negativity, life's challenges feel overwhelming, we feel victimized, and we can't see what to do or how to respond positively, creatively, and effectively to them. Rather than strengthening and empowering us, these challenges often end up increasing our negative feelings and reinforcing any negative self-images. This is the trap that many identified with the ego experience: Their negativity keeps them from their innate wisdom and the joy of overcoming and growing from their challenges. They remain stuck in a place of discontentment, unhappiness, despair, and distrust of life.