Dr Jeff Levin (DNM) on Energy Hooks, repeating life patterns and why awareness is the first step towards freedom.
Most of us have experienced it.
A relationship ends, yet years later we still react emotionally when that person’s name comes up. We leave one difficult workplace only to find ourselves facing the same challenges in the next. Certain patterns seem to repeat, despite our best efforts to move on.
Coincidence? Habit? Or could something deeper be at work?
In Life Alignment, these recurring experiences may sometimes be linked to what are known as Energy Hooks. They are not about blame or giving away our power. Rather, they invite us to become aware of unconscious energetic patterns, release the emotional charge that keeps them active, understand the lessons they carry and reconnect with greater freedom. Because while awareness is an important first step, lasting transformation happens when the underlying emotional programme is also transformed.
For this month’s Life Alignment Journal, we sat down with the founder of Life Alignment, Jeff Levin, to explore one of the modality’s fascinating topics.
Can someone you haven’t thought about for decades still be influencing your life today?
Jeff: Absolutely.
Throughout our lives we create energetic connections with people. Some are loving and supportive. Others carry unresolved emotional charge. An Energy Hook is like an invisible energetic connection between one person’s energy field and another.
It could involve a parent, grandparent, former partner, employer or anyone with whom there is unfinished emotional business.
Sometimes another person is still holding onto us through resentment, possessiveness or control. Sometimes we’re holding onto them. Often it’s both.
What surprises many people is that these connections can remain active for thirty, forty or even fifty years because the emotional story was never fully completed. Most of us are completely unaware it’s happening.
One of the things I love about Life Alignment is that we don’t try to analyse where these patterns come from. During a balance, the body’s innate wisdom shows us the priority that is ready to be addressed. Two people can arrive with the same symptoms and receive completely different balances because the underlying patterns are different.
Why do we keep attracting the same kinds of relationships and challenges?
I don’t think the most important question is, “Why does this person keep doing this to me?”
The better question is, “What keeps repeating?”
Perhaps every relationship eventually feels controlling.
Perhaps every workplace leaves you feeling unseen.
Perhaps you always become the rescuer, the people pleaser or the person carrying everyone else’s emotional burden.
The people change, but the programme often stays the same.
I often compare it to Gulliver’s Travels, where countless tiny cords prevent someone from moving freely. One cord on its own isn’t a problem, but together they quietly drain our energy without us even noticing.
Many people only realise how much energy has been tied up in these invisible patterns after experiencing the sense of lightness that follows a Life Alignment balance.
That awareness is often where lasting change begins. But awareness alone rarely changes a deeply rooted programme. Lasting transformation comes when the underlying emotional pattern is also able to shift.
Could someone else’s unresolved emotions still be affecting you without either of you realising it?
I believe they can.
Resentment, jealousy, rejection and unresolved conflict all carry energetic charge. Whether consciously or unconsciously, people may continue projecting those emotions long after a relationship has ended.
That energetic influence can have an undermining effect on the body and may contribute to imbalance.
Of course, Life Alignment never suggests that illness has one single cause. Physical symptoms usually arise through many interacting layers including structural, nutritional, emotional, environmental and energetic influences. Energy Hooks are simply one possible piece of a much bigger picture.
What I find fascinating is that one priority identified during a Life Alignment balance often represents an entire family of similar experiences. Rather than releasing twenty separate memories, one core emotional pattern may resolve many related experiences carrying the same energetic story.
That’s why we focus on priorities instead of chasing symptoms. When the deeper pattern changes, the effects often ripple through many different areas of life.
Are the relationship patterns we learned as children still shaping our adult lives?
Very often they are.
As children, our deepest need is to be loved, seen and protected. Very early on, we learn which behaviours help us receive that love.
Maybe we become the helper.
Maybe we become invisible.
Maybe we become the peacemaker.
Maybe we become the one who always rescues everyone else.
Those strategies may have served us well as children, but unless they become conscious, they often continue directing our adult relationships.
Partners change.
Friends change.
Workplaces change.
Yet the same emotional programme quietly continues.
For me, the deeper purpose of Life Alignment isn’t simply releasing energetic patterns. It’s helping people become aware of them. Once the emotional charge behind the pattern is released and its deeper lesson understood, life no longer needs to keep presenting it in different forms.
That is where genuine transformation begins.
Can someone who truly loves us also become an Energy Hook?
Yes, and that often surprises people.
One of the biggest misconceptions is that Energy Hooks are only created through conflict. In my experience, they can arise through love just as easily.
I remember balancing a woman whose priority unexpectedly took us back to her primary school years. She immediately assumed the Energy Hook involved the boy she had fallen in love with.
It didn’t.
Instead, it was another boy who had quietly loved her while she unknowingly rejected him. More than forty years later, that unresolved emotional connection was still active.
I’ve seen similar patterns with grandparents whose deep love gradually became possessive, or parents who found it difficult to let go of their children. The love itself was real. The attachment simply remained unresolved.
The purpose of identifying an Energy Hook is never to blame anyone. It’s to understand the lesson hidden within the connection. Once that lesson is recognised, the energetic charge often dissolves naturally, creating greater freedom for everyone involved.
Why do mindful people so often end up emotionally exhausted?
Because compassion without healthy boundaries can quietly become unhealthy.
Many naturally caring people become the person everyone turns to. Friends share their problems, family members seek advice and colleagues rely on them for emotional support.
At first it feels like kindness.
Over time it can become an energetic imbalance.
Sometimes another person becomes dependent on being rescued.
Sometimes we become dependent on being needed.
Both can create Energy Hooks.
One of the lessons that frequently comes up during Life Alignment balances is detachment.
Detachment isn’t about becoming cold or uncaring. It’s about remaining loving without carrying another person’s emotional burden or making their healing our responsibility.
I often see that the energetic pattern and the life lesson appear together. Releasing the energetic charge creates space, but understanding the lesson is what helps prevent the pattern from repeating.
Whether someone experiences this through an individual Life Alignment balance or explores it further in one of our online workshops, awareness is always the key that creates lasting change.
Healthy boundaries don’t reduce love.
They allow love to flow more freely.
When an Energy Hook is released, what actually changes?
Most people expect me to say they feel relief, and very often they do.
The emotional pull softens.
Old resentment loses its grip.
Mental loops become quieter.
People often tell me they feel lighter, clearer and more present.
But for me, the greatest gift isn’t simply relief.
It’s awareness.
Releasing an Energy Hook is only one part of the process. Real transformation comes through both releasing the emotional charge and understanding the deeper lesson it carried.
Very often, one priority identified during a Life Alignment balance represents many similar experiences throughout a person’s life. As that core pattern shifts, countless smaller repetitions begin losing their influence as well.
Instead of continually reacting to life, we begin responding consciously.
That’s where genuine freedom begins.
If no relationship can completely fulfil us, where does lasting peace come from?
I believe this is one of life’s deepest lessons.
As children, we naturally look to our parents or caregivers for love, attention and security. As adults, we often continue searching for those same needs through partners, friendships, work or achievement.
Sooner or later, every human relationship disappoints us.
Not because people have failed us.
But because they were never meant to become our ultimate source of fulfilment.
Our Higher Selves are constantly inviting us to connect with something deeper.
One of the deepest purposes of Life Alignment is helping people reconnect with that inner source of unconditional love. As that connection strengthens, the need for constant external validation gradually softens. Victimhood gives way to personal responsibility. Fear slowly gives way to trust.
Ironically, our relationships become healthier because we stop expecting them to provide what only our own connection with Source can truly offer.
Perhaps that is the greatest invitation behind every Energy Hook.
Not simply to ask,
“Who is still holding on to me?”
But rather,
“What is life inviting me to learn, release and become?”
Whether someone begins with a personal Life Alignment balance, joins one of our online workshops or continues into the Foundation Course, the journey is always the same: greater awareness, greater balance and greater freedom to live as the person they were always meant to be.
A Question to Reflect On
Is there a relationship, memory or recurring pattern that still carries emotional weight in your life?
Instead of asking,
“Why does this keep happening to me?”
perhaps try asking,
“What is this experience trying to teach me?”
Sometimes healing doesn’t begin when another person changes.
Sometimes it begins when we recognise the invisible patterns that have quietly been shaping our lives all along.
If this month’s journal has sparked your curiosity, consider signing up for Jeff’s upcoming Energy Hooks online open workshop.
Because every Energy Hook carries an invitation: not only to understand what has been holding us back, but to transform it. This is where real freedom begins.
VORTEX CARD OF THE MONTH
OCTAGON VORTEX CARD | DETOXIFICATION
Just as Energy Hooks can hold emotional patterns and energetic connections in place, there are times when we may benefit from consciously creating space for what no longer serves us to be released.
The Octagon Vortex Card is designed to support this process by creating an energetic flow that encourages the release of negative thoughts, emotions and unwanted energetic influences. In this way, it can be seen as a supportive tool for clearing and creating a greater sense of balance and freedom.
Whether used on the body or within a space, the Octagon Card offers a simple way to support the movement from holding on to letting go – creating space for greater clarity, balance and flow.
Events & More
OPEN WORKSHOP: ENERGY HOOKS: RECLAIM YOUR ENERGY
In this one-day online workshop, Jeff Levin will explore the Life Alignment approach to Energy Hooks – those often-unconscious energetic connections that can keep us emotionally tied to people, memories and recurring patterns long after the original experience has passed.
Rather than focusing on blame or trying to analyse the past, the workshop offers an opportunity to become more aware of what is still influencing you, release emotional charge, and understand the deeper lesson within the pattern.
Through Life Alignment group balances and Vortex technology, Jeff will guide you through a structured exploration of Energy Hooks, boundaries and detachment – helping you reconnect with greater clarity, self-awareness and freedom.
📍 Live on Zoom
🌍 Open to everyone — no prior experience needed
🗓️ 15 November 2026 | 10:00–18:00 SAST
💰 ZAR 3,750
BOOK HERE
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FREE Chat with Jeff on:
🟢 Tuesday, 29 September (19:00 SA time)
Theme: Understanding the Vagus Nerve Pathway
🟢 Tuesday, 3 November (19:00 SA time)
Theme: Understanding Energy Hooks.
Reach out to Margarete@life-alignment.com with your WhatsApp number to be added to the LA Announcements Group to receive the Zoom-links to these Free Chats with Jeff.