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Watch your Mouth because it’s YOU you’re telling the most about. 

Over the weekend I had an email exchange that really made my blood boil.  Someone whom I’ve known professionally for several years questioned my integrity.

Being who I am, I checked my gut after reading her email and thought, “Wow, maybe she’s got a point, I hadn’t really elaborated on what affiliate marketing was when she asked my opinion about someone whose products have helped me a great deal.”

I thanked her for her thoughts and told her I would make a note to make it clear when I’m linking to people I support whether they are or are not people from whom I could receive an affiliate commission.  I pointed out that since she asked me the question on the phone and I told her my honest opinion on the phone, there would have been no way for me to receive a commission from her purchase.

All well and good, but the next part is the doozy.

The following is an excerpt from her response. 

“…but most people aren’t interested in marketing just to make piles of money, as [ ] is. Maybe I’m naïve about people’s core values, but I see NAME REMOVED as more than a little carried away with greed, and willing to amass money no matter how [it] offends people with [their] advertising onslaughts. It has certainly worked for [them] financially, but at what cost to [their] soul? You can see I have no respect for [their] business tactics. Once I saw how [they] operated I was very disappointed to have invested so much money in [the] program.”

 Whew!  That got my inner warrior worked up!  I was all ready to send a pithy response about how I have a hard enough time focusing on my own soul to be worried about someone else’s soul.  Then I sat with it and realized that this person wanted someone to blame for not being where she wants to be financially.  She feels that virtuously “making enough to get by” is more soul-worthy than making millions.   And I realized that she wanted someone to take the responsibility for her current financial place.  I don’t know what spurred the animosity – 6 months AFTER our conversation — but maybe she’s had the product sitting on her desk that long is angry that she hasn’t taken action?

Got me.

Instead of the pithy email response, I replied thanking her for sharing her thoughts and reminding her that the person in question does have an iron-clad money-back gurantee. That if she didn’t like what she had, she should return it.

Her response drove home to me that she was just having a bad day, angry at the world, or what have you and needed someone to vent to.

“Thanks for the reminder about NAME REMOVED guarantee. I didn’t remember it. Don’t get me wrong, I have no quarrel with making money, and lots of it. What I take issue with is abusing others to get it, which in my opinion is what NAME REMOVED does with [their] marketing approach. Amassing money just for the sake of watching it build is a soul-less pursuit. Amassing money while doing good works, enriching others or the environment, or helping those who can’t help themselves – for me that is money well earned and the process of accumulating it enriches my soul as well as my bank account. Different strokes.”

 Okay then, different strokes.

It was one person’s thoughts and it drove home the idea that what we put out there is actually a reflection of how we see ourselves.   For some reason, this person sees limits and parameters to making money.  It’s not a wonder that she has a frustrating relationship with money.  I wanted to point out that the person in question does in fact publicly make a difference in their community and that that alone led me to believe that they’re likely doing a lot more that doesn’t get publicized.

So it shows me, as a spiritual service-preneur, when doing my marketing because I really want to reach people and be of service, I’m going to get some folks that neither “get” or like me.  The more success I have, I will have more people who question my integrity.  I have to solidly okay with who I know I amas a human being and with what I deliver in my business, so that I can read messages like the above as that of someone who is simply mirroring their fear and not someone who can tell affect me at my core.

Different strokes I suppose. 

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