You gotta have faith

In the Business of Woo, one must ask: "What would Indiana Jones do?"

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” -Theodore Roosevelt

---

It’s been a rough week here at TOTEM.

Without getting into all of the details, suffice it to say that it was a perfect storm. A widow-maker. My own, personal Moby Dick.

And this great white whale’s still got me.

The timing of the release of our “New Levels, New Devils” solo podcast hitting right in the eye of this metaphorical storm is *chef’s kiss* hilarious. Or, I should say, will be hilarious— when I’m finally done navigating it and can crack a smile!

So what happened? And, more importantly, why should it matter to you lovely people? And, perhaps most importantly, what does any of this have to do with shamanism?

Long story very short: when on the spiritual path, one will encounter “the enemy”— and how we navigate this encounter determines our fate.

My recommendation? Hold. The. Line.

They new ways of the New Age

Indiana Jones punching a Nazi in the face.

A bit of backstory: a nameless, faceless woman who is a fellow seller of organic, herbal goods on Etsy started messaging me several months ago, asking me a series of strange and uncomfortable questions. Etsy requires that you respond to all such messages within 24 hours or you lose your “Star Seller” status, greatly impeding your ability to conduct business on their platform.

So, naturally, this obligated me to continue to respond to her increasingly strange questions promptly or suffer the very real business consequences. Each time, I essentially told her I couldn’t offer medical advice for humans or pets (yes, she was asking about whether or not dogs can take my flower essences), and I continued to refer her to the item ingredients/ details and our shop policies, which include a no refunds/ returns policy. I suggested she consult with a medical professional before buying any of our items, since it seemed to be a topic of genuine (if not neurotic) concern.

So, she buys like $100 worth of flower essences during a sale. Because, why start with one product to test it out when you’re concerned about allergies and weird medical shit and generally overthink everything, right?

Unless….*GASP*…. the goal was to take out or extort or defame a competitor.

See what I just did there?

Soon enough after her order arrived, I was yet again messaging with her and answering various strange and elaborate (and dubious) medical-type questions, repeating myself and directing her to our no refunds/ no replacements policy. I was kind and patient but consistent and firm within the parameters of my business and our shop policies.

So, naturally, she thanked me (in writing) and promptly filed a formal false claim with Etsy suggesting that what she received was different from what I have listed— a claim that, for the record, suggests fraud on my part and puts my business into a precarious position just as I make a $13K cash investment into the TOTEM Flower Essence Deck that we hope to sell on that very platform. Pretty cool. My adrenal glands were ecstatic with this latest bit of excitement around TOTEM.

That last bit was sarcasm. My adrenal glands are a hellscape.

I’ve been in a full crab swirl panic ever since:

Crab swirls, as depicted in SpongeBob Squarepants.

Etsy hasn’t closed out our “case” yet— and has escalated it for review— but she did admit in writing to them (and me) that she marked the “not as described” option because they didn’t offer the category that actually applied to her. So, she lied. And she admitted she lied.

*le sigh*

Plot twist: it appears that, for some reason, Etsy has shut down her shop and her ability to sell on their platform. I was told (in vague, gypsy curse words) by Etsy customer service that this business closure wasn’t “her choice” (whatever that means)— but, beyond that, I have no details.

But it gets better.

Seemingly on her way out, she lobbed a hell of a grenade into my life— writing five nasty, one-star, defamatory reviews claiming that I am “harassing” her on Etsy— all under an anonymous name because, wait for it, she can’t sell on Etsy anymore and doesn’t have a profile or a screen name.

The irony.

Bear in mind: I’ve simply been responding to her claims in a shared message forum with Etsy regarding a complaint that she filed against me— I haven't called her, emailed her, or otherwise messaged her directly at all. I didn’t initiate any of this.

So, she’s asserting that providing Etsy screenshots of past communication to prove that she’s a lying liar is tantamount to “harassment”. And she put that bundle of bullsh*t in five, public-facing reviews.

Plainly speaking, this is extortion. Etsy defines this as:

“Extortion is prohibited on Etsy, as outlined in our Buyer Policy and Seller Policy.

The following actions are examples of extortion:

• A buyer leaves a negative review in an attempt to force the seller into providing additional items that were not agreed upon in the original transaction.

• A buyer leaves a negative review in an attempt to force the seller into providing a refund, regardless of whether or not a refund is warranted.

• A seller offers a buyer additional goods, services, or compensation in exchange for a positive review.”

So, I’ve managed to message Etsy a screenshot of her reviews and of their Extortion policy, and all I can do now is continue to await their decision.

All of this may seem like petty, negative minutia, and in many ways it is. Sorry about that.

But it also isn’t just that— and the part that isn’t represents a very real phenomenon taking hold in the World of Woo in the last year or so. And this strange shift is not just happening to me— in just the last two weeks, friends, clients and collaborators have reached out to get my help or advice across similar experiences:

• A chiropractor friend of mine had their Google listing (and all of their hundreds of five star reviews) taken down after someone (a competitor) reported them to Google. Google is denying my friend’s protests to losing this invaluable business tool, and she’s exhausted their appeal process.

• An Ayurvedic practitioner friend of mine had a supposed “friend” (and competitor)— in another state on the other side of the country— report her business to her state’s medical board. She now has to go before this board in a state that doesn’t fall within the “Medical Freedom” edicts of other states, like Texas. She could lose her ability to work with clients and make a living— and all of this after she moved across the country to start her business again from the ground up.

• A published author friend of mine had to tackle false, defamatory reviews on her Amazon page that were all generated by the same person (at the same IP address). Spoiler: it was a competitor writing them all. Thankfully, this friend has a publisher and some resources, but it was an exhausting effort to remediate, taking her away from time- and business-critical actions.

This past winter, a competitor tried to have my Google profile (and reviews) taken down as well. She also complained to Amazon about a TOTEM Tarot Deck she never ordered which, thankfully, went nowhere except to her calling me 18+ times late at night drunk to yell about it.

How do I know it was her and she was a competitor? Google Voice number search.

It’s like an endless game of psychotic “whack-a-mole”, and let me tell you: no small business owner, let alone Woo-based business owner, has the time or resources to deal with this trend at scale without showing the signs of wear and tear. And you can’t just let the waves of this f*ckery wash over you unanswered— otherwise it will literally destroy your ability to make a living.

I’ve been calling this phenomenon the “unavoidable death by a thousand paper cuts”.

And it’s very, very real.

The Russian Roulette of Woo-based businesses

A young Indiana Jones, played by River Phoenix (RIP)

Collectively, experiences like this create a kind of Russian Roulette effect to your workday as a psychic practitioner, herbalist, healer, or author. You start to wonder when the next crazy person with extraordinary amounts of free time and misery is going to pop up to make you— and your Woo-based business— an unfortunate, obsessive hobby of theirs:

Think the plot of the movie “Single White Female” but at scale and in a business context and in real life.

And there is no Bridget Fonda in this real life version.

With the internet and social media being what they are, literal strangers can actually ruin your 20 or 30+ year-old business— regardless of the preponderance of good you’ve measurably done over the years or how provably fictional their claims are! Getting someone in customer service to evaluate the complexities of these situations is IMPOSSIBLE as companies like Yelp, Google and Etsy rely increasingly on AI and algorithms to make these decisions at a systems level.

Fairness, objective reality, and nuance are utterly lost in a jungle of binary 0’s and 1’s.

Just this past week, I spoke with another friend and practitioner that is closing up their Chicago brick and mortar business to move and change their business model— all because they can’t tolerate the daily trauma of working with the general public in this strange, spontaneously abusive time. When we spoke, her voice quivered as she said, “I just don’t know who is going to become the daily monster. Who’s going to yell at me or threaten me or my business if I don’t give them exactly what they want. I’m being extorted and abused everyday. And I can’t go into these healing sessions with that pressing on my mind all day every day, while also being worried about whether or not I’m going to get mugged or car-jacked on my way home!”

Yah. It’s not great out there these days, guys. But I’m not complaining. Or, at least, I’m not just complaining. As per usual with shamanism, there is a silver lining— and it’s a profound one.

Hell, I’m getting pumped up just thinking about it!

Indie knows what to do

Indiana Jones, being a badass that saves the world.

So, what is this silver lining, you might be asking?

It’s that you, me, we— all of us trying to do this stuff and shift the paradigm in a positive direction are making a difference.

If we weren't making a difference, do you really think the forces of evil would be conspiring, seemingly all at once in a coordinated effort, to stifle our work?

Sure, this may seem at first blush to be grandiose or delusional, if not psychotic or downright narcissistic, but as someone that supports fellow Woo-based entrepreneurs, let me tell you: it’s a thing.

Or, as I usually put it when comforting other ethical practitioners and coaching clients in similar situations: “This means you’re over the target. They’re sweating you.”

Think about it: if you and the work you were doing was so insignificant and didn’t generate a net positive effect for humanity or “the good guys”, why would these individuals work so hard to take you down, often at their own expense?

I mean, my bully just lost her Etsy shop starting this whole thing up. And that’s not a small thing.

The timing of these events is always the key to unlocking this understanding.

For instance, literally ALL OF THIS (gestures around at wreckage) exploded within the same 12 hours we were trying to print our new deck and get it out into the world.

It’s the undeniable timing of this “new levels, new devils” phenomenon that guides me back to the undeniable power of the work itself.

I mean, coincidence? I think not.

If you look at all of this “chaos” in the heady (and admittedly very paranoid-sounding) context of a spiritual war, it actually makes a lot of sense. After all, in a military campaign you try to take pieces off the game board before they can be used to harm “your side”. This is the basis of the game of Chess— a race to take out each others’ kings via a “checkmate” before the other guy.

And, today, several of my clients (who noticed the reviews or got a vibe to call to check in) said this to me about what I’m dealing with on Etsy, too. Yes, it sounds crazy. Yes, it sounds spectacular. Yes, it sounds like a HARD COPE.

I get it.

But if we believe in the existence of negative entities and of benevolent entities and negative and positive energy, we must also acknowledge the impact— seen and unseen— of these same forces on us and the world around us.

It only makes logical sense.

So, what do we do with all of this? What’s the solution? I propose that we endure.

It’s my opinion— and that of C.S. Lewis, author of The Screwtape Letters— that “the enemy” can only do so much here in the material plane. He (or they or them or whatever) rely on us to GIVE UP HOPE. To LOSE FAITH. To opt out and take ourselves off of the game board. To obsess over how it’s not fair and how we don’t deserve this and let the crab swirls kick in full time all the time, resulting in a permanent pity party and a closed-up paranormal business.

If we’re going to win and do the work we came here to do, we’ve got to have faith.

We have to believe in what we do, and we have to believe that our struggles in bringing it into fruition are worth enduring. Like Indiana Jones in the video at the top of this post, we can’t always see the path forward. But that doesn’t mean the path isn’t there— or that it’s not worth taking a leap of faith to find it.

To this end, right here and now, I’m making a commitment to all of you:

• I’m here if you need my help navigating this kind of situation with your own Woo-based business: I may not have all of the answers and I may not be able to undo damage done, but I’ll absolutely tell you what I do know and have learned (often painfully) over the years. If nothing else, I’ll be here to hear you and understand what you’re going through. You’re not crazy. The world has gone crazy.

• I’m more than happy to write a positive review (or two, or three) for you: If I’ve used your products or benefitted from your services, do not hesitate to reach out to me via email to ask me to share a testimonial or help in another way: rachel@totemreadings.com. Just let me know your preferred platform and any other notes to bear in mind, and I’ll get this up asap!

• I’m going to stand my ground and fight: as small business owners, we put up with a lot of bullsh*t. We give away a lot of freebies and refunds and have to “understand” a lot that negatively impacts our bottom lines and quality of life for the sake of customer service in this social media-weaponized extortion racket. So, moving forward, when someone is overtly lying or trying to shake me down, I’m going to fight them, professionally and politely, on the objective merits. You can only eat so many sh*t sandwiches before you get full of sh*t, and I’ve officially reached my dietary limit. Sure, I may not win all of these fights, but the other guys are at least going to feel like they’ve been in one for a change.

The less of this nonsense we tolerate, collectively, the harder and longer the perpetrators of this bad behavior are going to have to think about taking these unethical, extraordinary actions. Bad guys should be afraid of getting exposed or suffering the consequences of their bad behavior, and this shift has the potential to help all of us on the whole.

So, f*ck it. Time to fight back.

I mean, you must be tired of playing whack-a-mole too, right? So let’s do something about it. Start a little movement.

And together, we can stop tolerating the intolerable.

I’m not f*cking leaving

I’m also going to answer this negative energy by expanding and expressing gratitude.

Right as I was initially handling this on the phone with Etsy customer support, I opened a letter I received in the mail. This letter was from the wonderful

Theresa Reed | The Tarot Lady

, expressing gratitude for our friendship. This simple, seemingly “random” gesture on her part brought a tear to my eye, and I took it as a positive sign from the “good guys” in my moment of darkness.

Again, the timing of this stuff is always worth noting!

When

Theresa Reed | The Tarot Lady

wrote this little, simple note, there was no way she could have known about what was going on with me or how this note would have such a precise, timely and positive impact on me.

This is the power of simple gestures of kindness, expansion and gratitude, and I’m incredibly grateful for her influence in my life.

Not only did this handwritten note remind me of why I need to keep on keeping on, but it inspired me to also express gratitude to the overwhelming majority of friends and clients that make my life a fulfilling, mission-driven adventure.

So, I’m sitting down tonight to write thank you cards, too. I’m going to expand and pay forward what Theresa did for me and, in doing so, can hopefully take the edge off of whatever negativity is whirling around out there.

In the end, here’s the upshot: I’m not f*cking leaving.

I will be fighting this Etsy charlatan until my last appeal with them is exhausted.

I’m going to push back on liars and grifters and nefarious actors at every turn.

I’m going to print our new deck and self-publish it on Etsy and Amazon. And likely my own website, now that I don’t trust Etsy’s platform to protect me against these issues.

I’m going to continue to see new clients, record new podcast episodes and grow my Woo-based business.

I’m going to say what I think and push back against what I disagree with.

I’m going to support my clients and friends in their work, and will rush to their sides in their moment of need.

I’m going to continue to take leaps of faith in my business, my spiritual practice and my life.

I’m going to smile when I look at these negative, retaliatory reviews when I’m on the other side of this situation, knowing that it was a desperate woman’s last, nihilistic act before her Etsy shop was closed down.

And I invite you to join me in this work.

As Indiana Jones learned, it really is a leap of faith. We have to believe if we’re going to endure, and our enduring matters to others in ways we may never fully know.

If you feel called to help TOTEM with this issue, consider writing an honest review of our products or services and entering our Review Raffle to win a big prize. Your positive reviews positively impact our averages, and take the edge off of the damage done by those intent on destruction.

We can’t control other people. We can’t control what they do or how they do it.

But we can control ourselves and our actions and reactions.

And we can have faith in ourselves and our work.

It’s a hard thing to do when you don’t feel like it, but it’s worth doing nonetheless.

Hang in there, kitties. And please feel free to share your own stories of f*ckery in the comments below. If nothing else, we can have a little cathartic therapy sesh— and make each other feel a bit less crazy.

And that, my friends, is worth its weight in gold.

As are music videos from the 80’s. Just pure magic.

-Rachel

---

Update! I won the “case” with Etsy, who decided that she lied and the items I sent were as described:

Now, we’re onto getting those now-anonymous (because her shop was closed) reviews intended to extort me taken down. Fingers crossed. We’re making progress!