A $15k “Learning Experience” – Priceless!

By Anonymous

First off, I am SO happy that I did not receive a dime of another woman’s money in a circle.  Knowing I had gained from someone else’s loss would haunt me much worse than the loss I did take. I don’t like being hurt, but I can’t stand hurting others.

I joined a circle after seeing loads of my ‘friends’ having amazing experiences, not just financially, but really seeming to be transformed and empowered in other areas of their lives.  Initially, my intuition said, “Oh Hell Naw”, however, I was intrigued.. It kept surfacing.  “It’s so amazing!”, they would say.

If you know me, I tend to be quite cynical.  Sure, I am also made of rainbows and unicorns, but I go both ways, pretty far on the spectrum.  I am not afraid of shadows, and have plenty of vulture and bone to complement my sparkles. I have often times ostracized myself by being the one to call bullshit, or for standing against injustice.  People don’t always like the honest ones, I have learned. I had been feeling a little on the outskirts and jaded already after leaving some community endeavors after calling out major holes in integrity.

I began to think that perhaps, something was wrong with me.  Maybe I am too judgmental, perhaps I just do not trust enough, and that’s why I end up in situations where I find others out of integrity… It must be my own reflection, right?  Because I am so untrusting, I must attract untrustworthy people in to my life.  It must be my own fault… was the thinking.

I heard of how these circles revolutionized trust, and were apparently renewing and strengthening trust amongst women in the community.  I really wanted that.  I really wanted to experience full trusting and honoring relations with the women in my community.  I really wanted to break through whatever cynicism, self-doubt, or negative beliefs that were holding me back.  I wanted to transform, and the money, was just a symbol.  It was a symbol of trust.  In order to lay down a chunk of cash like that, you have to muster up some major trust (and yes, naivete, for sure, a dash of stupidity, and one lock of sheep’s hair). I had never done anything like this before, as I would normally watch from the outskirts, and miss out on all the fun. I wanted to experience something different this time. I joined a circle, and began the journey.

I gave my $5,000 to a close friend (at the time), and was glad to help her in her life as a mother. I had another close friend, who wanted to do this with me, but she had already joined a different circle.  She was in deep need of financial help, due to a baby and loss of her home, and I figured, hey, if I back her into my circle, then she could make the money she needs for her new place, and we can share this experience together. I had to join hers as well in order to follow the rules, so I did.  I laid down $15,000.  My second 5K, to join the second circle, went to another woman I knew well, who I never hear from any longer.  The third 5K, to back my friend was given to the current dessert, a woman who  apparently really needed it, was broke and had no idea how she was going to pay her rent.  Apparently this gift “saved her ass”.  This woman went on to write an article, declaring circles as the scam they were.  She also went on to say that the women who received money should pay it back.  She had already made off with over $12,000, (without ever putting any of her own money into it) and never returned a dime of the thousands she received while involved. She promised me she would return half of my “gift, the $2,500 that she kept, but never did, and still ignores my emails when I say that $100 a month, even 50 would be a nice healing step.  The woman who backed her also promised to return her half, but has since said it would have to be in the form of a “gift”.. meaning…? It would not have to put any stress on her budget.  I’m wondering how well off someone has to be for $2,500 to be no big deal.  It seems to me like this was a way to dodge the promise and postpone it for an indefinite amount of time.

So I made a very expensive mistake.  I had just sold a piece of property from my father’s passing, so it wasn’t like I was super struggling, however, I sometimes worry that my dad is rolling in his grave.  Of course, he also lost $15,000 in money market, when the stock market crashed… so.. I guess I got to experience what it feels like to lose $15,000.  One could say I am lucky to even have had that money to lose in the first place. Looking at it this way definitely helps me not feel so incredibly gross.  But in reality, it is gross.  I handed away my inheritance so that a few girls could go to dance retreats, shopping, or vacay on Hawaii.. amongst other things.

Anyways, back to these circles.  They were wonderful at first.  People felt open, honest, supportive, loving, encouraging, triumphant, but then the fire circles started.  Those were exclusively for women who had already made it through dessert.  I found out about this and got very upset.  It was like full on capitalism.  Women who were already loaded were pooling together to make newer faster circles.  Women I had previously respected.  Women I had been previously close to.  Women who said they were doing powerful prayer and priestess work, when I questioned their actions.

So things started feeling very shady and shaky.  Some of my friends were getting violent and verbally abusive emails and phone calls from a few men, threatening them and their family.  My husband wrote a post about this, because one of those women asked for community support, for she felt like her life and family were in danger.  I thought it was a horrible idea, for him to get caught up in the shit storm, but he really wanted to help them. That was ugly, as he got attacked and his integrity was put to question, just by trying to help someone.  Of course, this person had been through multiple desserts, so I understand why people were pissed, but I do think the violent nature of some were overkill and unnecessarily hateful.

When I began to express my concerns in the circle, and was told that moving forward, I must process my fear based feelings outside of circle because it was too stressful for the dessert and entree to handle.  but… you can’t talk about this outside of circle… remember?  the whole secrecy thing?… There popped the proverbial bubble of sisterly support.  When I joined circle, I was assured that the dessert and entrees were there to support any feelings that may arise throughout one’s circle journey. Well, that wasn’t how it really worked.  And of course, if I got negative, then all of a sudden, it’s my fault the circle is failing, and my fault I didn’t complete it, and my fault that I lost my money.  I asked to be “gifted out” of this circle.  The woman who was supposed to give my 5K back, never did, ran off to Australia, and deleted me as a contact on Skype.  I started seeing the underbelly of many around me.  In my first circle, the dessert ditched suddenly without explaination, leaving me to her position.  I tried to move forward by just backing the positions myself (meaning, they didn’t have to pay anything), because at that point, I didn’t want the other women to lose what they had given, and I didn’t want anyone to gift me and lose later. However, we all knew we were in a dead end.  I patiently waited for a few women to step off, and found another circle for the other women to merge into, who still wanted to ride it out, then closed it off. I successfully captained a sinking ship with grace, and that was actually kind of a cool experience.

Towards the end of my journey, I would call on a few of my friends, who had promised their support, who had made it through several circles.. and there was no real support given.  I just got shirking hippie mumbo jumbo, the common circle talk, that was basically blaming me for any and all failure I was to experience.  I asked one woman, who had been through countless circles, how her conscience feels.  She said she felt fine about it, and she is seen as a spiritual leader in her community. Seems like everyone who made it through dessert multiple times, just got complacent, or so deep in denial, that they seemed numb.  Perhaps the shame was just so much that they felt they had to hide.  One who must have received over 100K told me that she lost a lot of money in these circles.  That is really, really, hard to believe.  I will add that there were a couple of women who had made it through, who were horrified at what was happening and tried their best to fix it, even though it was so far broken, there was no mending.

In the end, I know that there was a risk of never seeing a dime from any of the money that I willingly gave away.  The part that pisses me off, are the women who said that they would give it back, and still avoid their promises.  That deeply saddens me.  It’s like salt in a wound.  I can deal with the wound, but please, spare the salt and lies, ladies.  I think the real gift was getting to see people’s true colors.  I got to see who values friendship over money, and who values money over friendship, the ones who are honest and caring, and the ones who hide behind their lies to save face.  Those who lied to me, or cowardly disappeared, organically culled themselves from my life, and I am ok with it.  Actually, I am happier than ever.  I grieved the loss of these so called friends for a bit, but honestly, I am so glad to learn their moral values now, than later on, at a more critical juncture.  I got to see who could take their losses with grace, maintain honesty, and not let it interfere with their friendships.  Those ladies.. I’m keeping for life.

I think at the root of the matter, is that the women who cashed out, have such an amazing ability to be dishonest with themselves, that they don’t even see the wrong in it.  They brainwashed themselves.  I guess I can see why.  I would feel so horribly guilty and shameful had I received that kind of money from other women who lost so much.  There has been so much shame around this whole thing, and I do feel bad for even participating.  I feel sad that I went against my own intuition, and truly believed there was something wrong with me for being judgmental of it in the first place.  I feel sad that I cheated myself like that, and fell for a huge and horrible joke, told to me by women that I really used to look up to.

I also think a major contributor to people remaining in secrecy was the hostile online environment.  It seemed that if anyone were to come forward, they would be burned at the proverbial stake and even sent to jail.  All of the threats, trolling and downright hatred towards the women involved just made it that much harder to clear it up.  I saw hostility on both sides of the issue.

If I could do it over again, I wouldn’t.  and at the same time, It really cut the wheat from the chaff in my relations, and I am so grateful for that. I no longer spend my energy on people who I know lack integrity. I also got the biggest f*cking lesson in self-forgiveness ever.  It’s true.  Do something super stupid like that, and you’ve got to learn self-forgiveness fast, or else wallow in your own dungeon until you figure it out. It sucked, I lost a lot of sleep, yet there were some beautiful moments, and I learned a lot. I feel like the lessons I learned were priceless.  Well, ok, not priceless…  It cost me $15,000.