If someone is interfering with your relationship, the goal of spiritual work is never to harm that person. It is to clear the interference and strengthen the bond you already have with your partner — its boundaries, its clarity, its resilience. I want that stated before anything else in this guide, because it is the line I will not cross, and it is the line that separates real spiritual work from the hexing and cursing that too many desperate people go looking for online. In thirty years of practice, I have turned away far more curse requests than I have accepted attraction requests. What follows is the honest, ethical version of removing a third party from your relationship — the version that actually works, and the version that does not put your own spirit in danger doing it.

I am Baba Ali. I am a Senegalese spiritual practitioner, trained from childhood by my grandmother in the Serer and Wolof traditions of ancestral love magic, and I have guided more than 5,000 clients across the United States with a 95% success rate over more than thirty years. Third-party interference is one of the most common reasons people come to me. It is also one of the most misunderstood, because the instinct when you feel threatened is to want the threat gone by any means. I understand that instinct completely. I still will not act on it the way most people ask me to.

The Line I Will Not Cross

Let me be direct about something clients often ask in their first message: no, I will not curse the other woman, the other man, the meddling mother-in-law, or the ex who will not leave you alone. I get this request weekly, sometimes framed gently and sometimes not gently at all, and my answer does not change. Cursing work is not part of my tradition as my grandmother taught it, and I have watched enough of it go wrong in other practitioners’ hands to know it is not a shortcut, it is a trap. Harmful intention sent outward tends to find its way back to the sender, tangled and distorted, and it rarely lands on the intended target in any clean way. That is not superstition on my part. It is thirty years of watching what happens to clients who went elsewhere first, got a curse cast, and arrived at my door months later carrying more damage than they started with.

There is also a simpler reason I refuse this work: it does not solve the actual problem. Even in the rare case where a curse “worked” exactly as intended, the underlying gap in the relationship that let a third party in remains completely unaddressed. Remove one interfering person through harm, and if the bond itself is still brittle, another one arrives eventually, or the same dynamic repeats with a different name attached. The work I do instead treats the relationship itself as the thing that needs strengthening. The third party becomes irrelevant not because they were destroyed, but because there is no longer a gap for them to occupy.

I want to be equally clear that this refusal is not squeamishness or a marketing angle. It comes from the same tradition my grandmother handed to me, one built around restoring balance rather than inflicting it elsewhere. Removing interference and protecting a bond is ancient, well-established work in Senegalese spiritual practice. Cursing a rival is a different tradition entirely, one I was never trained in and do not intend to start practicing now, regardless of how understandable the anger behind the request might be.

What Actually Counts as Third-Party Interference

Third-party interference is a broader category than most people assume when they first come to me. The romantic rival is the obvious one, but it is often not the most damaging. Let me walk through the forms I see most often, because the right response depends heavily on which one you are actually dealing with.

A romantic rival is someone actively pursuing your partner, whether or not your partner is receptive to it. This ranges from an ex who has never fully let go, to a coworker who has started crossing lines, to a stranger your partner met recently who is moving faster than the situation warrants. The key distinguishing feature is romantic or sexual intent directed at your partner, regardless of whether your partner is encouraging it.

A meddling in-law or family member shows up constantly in my practice and gets taken less seriously than it deserves. A parent who cannot accept their adult child’s partner, a sibling who undermines the relationship in every conversation, a family member who inserts themselves into decisions that are not theirs to make — this interference is rarely romantic, but it can do just as much damage over time, because it operates with a kind of permanent access a rival usually does not have.

A toxic friend undermining the relationship is a third category people are often slow to name, because friendship is supposed to be safe. But I have seen friends who are quietly threatened by a client’s happy relationship, who plant doubt in one-on-one conversations, who encourage suspicion or jealousy that did not exist before, or who simply cannot stand to see their friend build a life that does not center them. This is interference, even without romantic motive.

An ex who will not respect boundaries is its own category, distinct from a rival, because the defining problem is not attraction but refusal to accept an ended relationship’s actual end. This shows up as constant contact, guilt-tripping, showing up uninvited, or using shared history — kids, property, mutual friends — as a repeated excuse to stay entangled. If your situation is closer to wanting your own ex back rather than removing one from your current relationship, that is a different kind of work with a different starting point, and I would treat it separately from what this guide covers.

Recognizing which category you are actually in matters, because the practical steps and the spiritual approach differ slightly for each. A meddling parent needs boundary work that a romantic rival does not. A toxic friend needs a direct conversation that an ex who will not leave usually needs to hear as a firm, final one instead.

Signs vs. Proof: Don’t Act on Suspicion Alone

This section matters more than almost anything else in this guide, because I have watched more relationships get damaged by unfounded suspicion than by actual third-party interference. Before you act, spiritually or otherwise, you owe it to yourself and your partner to be honest about which side of this line you are standing on.

I ask every client who comes to me convinced of active third-party interference to walk through these four checkpoints honestly before we discuss any working at all. Sometimes the answer that comes back is that the interference is real and serious. Just as often, the honest answer is that the relationship has a trust problem that has nothing to do with anyone else, and that is the work that actually needs doing.

How Spiritual Work Addresses This Ethically

Once real interference is confirmed, or at minimum once the relationship’s own boundaries clearly need reinforcing, spiritual work does three things well, and none of them involve targeting the third party directly. First, it clears attachment residue and confused energy that has built up around the relationship, especially the low-grade anxiety and suspicion that interference tends to generate even in the partner who is not directly involved. Second, it strengthens the existing bond’s own boundaries — think of this less like a wall against an enemy and more like reinforcing a foundation that has been under strain. Third, it restores clarity between the two people in the relationship, so that whatever confusion or doubt the third party introduced has less to hold onto.

The working itself, once begun, is completed within three to seven days, using materials the client covers the cost of and nothing beyond that — there is no fee for the working itself, and the cost is fully refunded if it does not bring results. In broad terms, it involves a cleansing to clear confused or anxious energy from the relationship’s own field, a strengthening working focused entirely on the bond between the two partners, and a sealing that protects the reinforced boundary as it settles over the following days. At no point does a named third party become the target of any part of this process. The person stays in their own life, unaffected by the working, and the couple’s bond becomes less permeable to whatever they were doing.

Clients sometimes push back on this in consultation, wanting something more forceful, wanting the other person to feel consequences. I understand the impulse completely, especially when someone has been actively and knowingly trying to break up a relationship. But strengthening work outperforms harmful work here for a very practical reason: a rival, a meddling relative, or a toxic friend only has power over a relationship because of a gap that already exists. Close the gap, and their efforts, whatever they continue to be, stop landing. That is a more durable outcome than any curse could produce, and it does not carry the spiritual risk that cursing work does.

You do not strengthen a wall by attacking the wind. You strengthen the wall. — Senegalese Proverb

Practical Steps That Matter Just as Much

Spiritual work is not a substitute for the ordinary, unglamorous relationship work this situation also requires. I tell clients this directly, because some arrive hoping a working will replace a conversation they are avoiding. It will not, and I would be doing them a disservice to imply otherwise.

A direct conversation with your partner about what you have observed, framed without accusation, is the single most important step outside of spiritual work. Say what you have noticed. Ask what is happening from their side. Listen to the answer, even if it is not the one you wanted. Most third-party situations resolve or clarify themselves substantially at this stage alone, before any other intervention is needed.

Boundary-setting comes next, and it applies differently depending on who the third party is. With a meddling in-law, this might mean your partner has a direct conversation with their own family member, setting a boundary you cannot set on their behalf. With a toxic friend, it might mean your partner reduces one-on-one contact for a period, or you both agree on what topics are and are not open for that friend to weigh in on. With an ex who will not respect boundaries, it usually means limiting contact to only what shared logistics genuinely require, in writing, without exception.

Rebuilding transparency between you and your partner matters as much as anything you do about the third party directly. Interference thrives in the gaps of a relationship, the things left unsaid, the assumptions never checked. Closing those gaps, through honest conversation and consistent follow-through, does more to remove a third party’s influence than almost anything else available to you, spiritual work included.

When “Interference” Is a Symptom, Not the Cause

I want to name something uncomfortable, because leaving it out of this guide would make it less honest. Sometimes what looks like third-party interference is actually a symptom of problems the relationship already had, ones that made room for a third party to matter in the first place. A rival cannot usually pull a fully secure, fully satisfied partner away from a relationship they are genuinely happy in. When that does happen, it is worth asking, gently and without blame, what was missing before the third party arrived.

This is not the same as blaming yourself for someone else’s choices. Interference is still interference, and the person doing it still bears responsibility for their own behavior. But relationships that are already struggling with emotional distance, unresolved resentment, or a partner who feels unseen create conditions where outside attention becomes more appealing than it would be otherwise. If that is the actual pattern in your situation, spiritual work that only addresses the third party’s influence, without touching the underlying gap, will produce a temporary result at best. The same vulnerability tends to resurface, sometimes with a different person’s name attached.

I ask clients directly, as part of consultation, whether the relationship was fully healthy before the interference began. It is not always a comfortable question, and some clients need time to answer it honestly rather than defensively. But the answer changes what kind of working actually serves them. Protective work on a fundamentally strong bond looks different from protective work on a bond that also needs its own repair alongside the boundary reinforcement. Understanding the real difference between binding work and general love work helps here too, since clients sometimes ask for one when the honest situation calls for the other.

Privacy Considerations When Discussing This With a Practitioner

Third-party situations involve at least three people’s lives, sometimes more once family and mutual friends are counted, and clients are often understandably careful about how much detail to share and with whom. A few things are worth knowing before your first consultation.

I do not need a third party’s name to help you. What I need is an honest account of the situation from your side: what you have observed, what you suspect, what your partner has said, and what outcome you are actually hoping for. Naming a specific rival is sometimes relevant to a reading, but it is never required, and I do not ask for identifying details about someone who has no part in the working itself, since the working is never aimed at them.

Consultations are confidential. What you tell me about your relationship, your partner, or the person you believe is interfering stays between us. This matters especially in situations involving family interference, where clients sometimes fear that seeking outside help will be seen as disloyalty if it becomes known within the family. It will not become known through me.

Be thoughtful, separately, about how much you discuss the situation with mutual friends or family while it is unfolding. Wide discussion of a suspected rival or a meddling relative tends to escalate a situation faster than it resolves it, and it can make an eventual boundary conversation with your partner harder rather than easier, since they may hear about your suspicions secondhand before you have had the direct conversation yourself.

A Client Story: Marcus and Dana

I want to give one concrete example, with identifying details changed at the clients’ request. Marcus came to me convinced his fiancée Dana’s college friend was actively trying to pull her away from him, based on late-night messages Dana had mentioned casually and a growing sense that this friend disapproved of the engagement. His first request, in almost the same breath as describing the situation, was to have something done to the friend directly. I declined that part of the request immediately and asked him to walk through the signs-versus-proof checkpoints described earlier in this guide.

What emerged was more complicated than a simple rival situation. The friend was not romantically interested in Dana at all. She was, however, going through her own difficult divorce and had been leaning hard on Dana for emotional support at a volume that was crowding out time and energy Dana would otherwise have had for her relationship with Marcus. Dana had not fully noticed how much space this had taken up, and Marcus had never directly told her how it was affecting him, choosing instead to grow quietly resentful.

We did protective and strengthening work on the relationship itself rather than anything targeting the friend, alongside a direct conversation Marcus finally had with Dana about how he had been feeling. Dana was not defensive about it once it was raised plainly. She set a clearer limit with her friend, the friend eventually found other support as her divorce settled, and the underlying strain between Marcus and Dana closed on its own once it had somewhere honest to go. Nothing about the friend needed to change through spiritual means. The relationship needed reinforcing, and it needed a conversation that had been avoided for months.

What to Expect From Protective Work

Clients often ask what changes they should look for after a protective and strengthening working, since the goal here is not a single dramatic event but a shift in the relationship’s own resilience. In the days following the working, most clients report a noticeable settling: less anxious checking, less rumination about the third party’s actions, and a partner who seems more present and less distracted, even if nothing external has visibly changed yet. Conversations that felt loaded before tend to get easier. Boundaries that felt impossible to hold suddenly feel more natural to enforce.

What clients should not expect is the third party disappearing overnight, or dramatic evidence that the working “did something” to them. That is not the design of this work, and any practitioner promising visible harm or forced retreat from a named person is not doing the kind of work I do or recommend. What you are watching for instead is your own relationship holding steadier under pressure that used to shake it. That is a quieter result than people sometimes expect walking in, and it is also the more honest, more durable one. If you are weighing any kind of spiritual work and want to understand the real risks and safety considerations first, that is worth reading before moving forward with anything, protective work included.

Frequently Asked Questions

A Final Word From Baba Ali

People come to me in this situation carrying real fear, and sometimes real anger, and I take both seriously. What I will not do is let that fear or anger turn into harm directed at another person, because it does not solve the actual problem and it carries its own spiritual cost. What solves the problem, almost every time I have seen it play out over thirty years, is a relationship strong enough and honest enough that outside interference has nowhere left to take hold. That is what protective work is built to do, alongside the harder, more human work of an honest conversation with the person you are actually trying to keep.

If you are dealing with a rival, a meddling relative, a toxic friend, or an ex who will not respect a boundary, start with clarity about what is actually happening before you start with any kind of intervention, spiritual or otherwise. If you reach a point where you want support alongside that clarity, I am here, and the first conversation costs nothing but your honesty.