Barrier invocation

Spent all day reworking my character around the skill barrier invocation just for it not to trigger for absolutely no identifiable reason. I took off all my gear looked over all my passives just to make sure nothing was hindering it but for some reason it will not trigger at all under no circumstances.. can someone please help? This is the third time I've had to change up my class because it wasn't strong or certain limitations like spirt being nerfed when in demon possession form. I'm so frustrated and tired, I just want to use my class but at this point I'm this close to stop playing altogether. I literally had to pay real money to buy ex to fix my build for it not to work, can someone please help give an answer as to why I can't get barrier invocation to trigger ?

I guess you expect it to trigger stuff automatically, but that's not how invocations work. You have to press it manually once sufficient energy is gathered (bind it to the skill bar first).