Steps You Need to Protect Your ENERGY and Create a Positive Life | The Mel Robbins Podcast
Mel Robbins (host), Veronica (guest), Kay (guest), Celeste (guest)
In this episode of The Mel Robbins Podcast, featuring Mel Robbins and Veronica, Steps You Need to Protect Your ENERGY and Create a Positive Life | The Mel Robbins Podcast explores protect Your Energy: Boundaries, Gossip Detox, And Contagious Positivity Explained Mel Robbins explains how to protect your emotional energy from other people’s moods, especially at work, and how to stay a positive force regardless of what’s happening around you. She introduces practical tools like 4-7-8 breathing and the “snow globe” visualization to prevent others’ stress and entitlement from sticking to you. Robbins differentiates between entitled jerks and emotionally immature tantrum-throwers, outlines how to call out bad behavior or escalate it appropriately, and shows how intentional compliments leverage reciprocity to soften curmudgeons. She closes by addressing the toxicity of gossip, offering a simple rule to stop it, and encouraging listeners to “blow bubbles” of kindness and appreciation as a daily practice.
Protect Your Energy: Boundaries, Gossip Detox, And Contagious Positivity Explained
Mel Robbins explains how to protect your emotional energy from other people’s moods, especially at work, and how to stay a positive force regardless of what’s happening around you. She introduces practical tools like 4-7-8 breathing and the “snow globe” visualization to prevent others’ stress and entitlement from sticking to you. Robbins differentiates between entitled jerks and emotionally immature tantrum-throwers, outlines how to call out bad behavior or escalate it appropriately, and shows how intentional compliments leverage reciprocity to soften curmudgeons. She closes by addressing the toxicity of gossip, offering a simple rule to stop it, and encouraging listeners to “blow bubbles” of kindness and appreciation as a daily practice.
Key Takeaways
Use 4-7-8 breathing to interrupt your stress response in real time.
When you receive an aggressive email, text, or encounter, breathing in for 4 seconds, holding for 7, and exhaling for 8 signals your nervous system to relax, preventing you from absorbing someone else’s panic or anger.
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Visualize difficult people in a “snow globe” to keep their negativity off you.
Imagining the person having their tantrum inside a snow globe—where all their emotional ‘sparkles’ stay contained—creates psychological distance, helps you not take it personally, and preserves your energy.
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Recognize there are two main “jerk” types and respond accordingly.
Some people are habitually entitled and rude; others are emotionally immature and can’t tolerate their own stress so they explode. ...
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Call out disrespectful communication calmly and, if needed, involve HR.
For hostile emails or interactions, you can say, “Is something going on with you? ...
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Melt workplace curmudgeons with consistent, genuine compliments.
Leveraging the law of reciprocity—“you do something nice for me, I feel compelled to do something nice for you”—by praising people’s work or strengths can gradually shift cold, competitive environments into supportive relationships.
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Stop gossip by adopting a simple rule: don’t talk about people who aren’t present.
Refusing to discuss others unless they’re in the room (or you’re sincerely seeking help to support them) instantly cuts most gossip; stating this boundary or walking away disrupts gossip cycles and protects you from being gossiped about as well.
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Be radically generous with appreciation to become a force for good.
Small acts—texting a friend you’re thinking of them, thanking service workers, giving warm greetings, leaving notes for hotel staff—operate like “blowing bubbles” of positive energy that can transform someone’s day, week, or even life trajectory.
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Notable Quotes
“When somebody is in a positive or a nasty mood, it's like a muddy dog shaking, and that energy gets all over you.”
— Mel Robbins
“There are always going to be people and situations in life that are triggering. The world is full of jerks and people who cannot tolerate their own emotional experience.”
— Mel Robbins
“I make it a rule not to talk about people who aren’t present.”
— Mel Robbins
“People who gossip with you will gossip about you when you’re not there.”
— Mel Robbins
“When you become radically generous with your positive energy, with your compliments, with your enthusiasm, with your love, it spreads unbelievable waves of joy and positivity.”
— Mel Robbins
Questions Answered in This Episode
How can I apply the snow globe visualization in ongoing, close relationships where I can’t easily walk away, like family or a long-term boss?
Mel Robbins explains how to protect your emotional energy from other people’s moods, especially at work, and how to stay a positive force regardless of what’s happening around you. ...
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What’s an effective way to call out a manager’s negative tone if I’m afraid of retaliation or being labeled ‘too sensitive’?
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How do I distinguish between unhealthy gossip and necessary venting or problem-solving conversations about someone who isn’t present?
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What daily habits could I build to strengthen my own positive baseline so others’ moods affect me less over time?
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In a deeply toxic workplace culture, how do I decide when to keep trying these strategies versus when it’s healthiest to leave?
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Transcript Preview
Today we are talking about how you can protect yourself from other people's bad moods, how you deal with annoying coworkers, and boy, oh, boy, do we have a juicy question at the end of this conversation today about gossip. One, you're going to learn how to put up an energetic force field. Two, we're going to talk about strategies for how you protect yourself from other people's baloney. And three, I'm going to teach you how to keep yourself in a positive mood, because that means no matter what's going on around you, you can be a force for good. So let's jump right in. Hey, it's your friend Mel, and today, you and I are talking about how to be a force for good. So get ready for a fun and energizing episode of The Mel Robbins Podcast. (laughs) Oh, I'm so excited for today. I'm Mel Robbins. I'm a New York Times bestselling author and one of the world's leading experts on change and motivation and habits, and today, I am bringing it, man, because we have got an important topic. I even put on a blazer, and now I'm starting to overheat, and so I know what we are going to be talking about, so I'm going to get comfortable. You can hear me taking my blazer off 'cause we're not going to be serious today, but we are talking about a serious issue. Today, we are talking about how you can protect yourself from other people's bad moods, how you deal with annoying coworkers, and boy, oh, boy, do we have a juicy question at the end of this conversation today from Celeste about gossip. You are gonna just love her question. And I'm so excited because, you know, we all have stories about dealing with people who are, uh, like energy suckers, and I am bringing some stories today, but I want to make sure that you leave with some tools. And so I not only got some of the fun stories you're going to relate to from my own life, but I've got really visual metaphors and tools that are simple to remember. They're sticky. You can teach 'em to anybody. And so, one, you're going to learn how to put up an energetic force field. Two, we're going to talk about strategies for how you protect yourself from other people's baloney. And three, I'm going to teach you how to keep yourself in a positive mood, because that means no matter what's going on around you, you can be a force for good and you can protect your own energy even when people are testing your patience or trying to suck your energy dry. So let's jump right in with a question from a listener named Veronica.
Hi, Mel. It's Veronica. In the workplace, and I'm sure in other spaces too, I find that there are some people who, whether they're conscious of it or not, project their panic and anger in emails and communications, which more often than not turns my fine day into panic and anger as well. They are people who kind of bring the house down with them. How can you hear what they are saying and not be emotionally affected by it? Thank you.
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