Like so many of my colleagues, I come from an earnest place and share what I believe will be valuable resources, for free, and just like so many of my colleagues, we experience this: those you’ve fed come back to bite you in the hand. Each one of us deal with that in our own ways. For me, this will be my approach.

Here’s why certain posts are under lockdown going forward. People readily acknowledge that they’ve been enriched by the content I provide, take from it freely, exploit it, but then–forget “thank you” that’s just asking too much–they can’t even restrain themselves from hurling ad hominem attacks at me in public forums. How do you acknowledge you’ve benefited greatly from someone’s work and then in the same breath, say that you actually hate that person? It’s okay to hate my personality, but then you should avert your eyes and not keep coming back for second, third, and fourth helpings of my content.

It’s as if you’re standing out in the town square cheerily handing out free cookies and on an ongoing basis, certain folks keep coming back for the free cookies but immediately after enjoying the cookie, punch you in the shoulder. Or, as they walk away with your free cookie, smirk and say to anyone within earshot, “Man, isn’t she such a horrible human being? The rest of you don’t seriously like her, do you? I mean… look at her. Horrors. Plus, her cookies are shit. Munch, munch, munch…” What do you do? Most people call it quits and just stop handing out the free cookies. I didn’t want to go that route, since I enjoy baking, but I was also getting fed up.

So when the third installment of the Tarot Ethics series went password-protected, it wasn’t because I was being silenced as some folks speculated. It’s because I didn’t think certain people deserved access to it, but I still wanted others who’ve never done anything wrong to have access.

(By the way, FYI, the collective body of vitriol hurled at the second installment of that series was absurd. Half the hate was “Third party readings are okay. I can’t believe you said third-party readings are not okay. You are a terrible human being.” and half the hate was “Third party readings are not okay. I can’t believe you said third-party readings are okay. You are a terrible human being.” Clearly none of them read the post all the way through before chiming in. Those came in addition to the steady stream of ongoing remarks such as, “This just goes to further show what I really can’t stand about your personality. You’re so full of shit and full of yourself. Oh, but I love how knowledgeable you are and all the free downloads and resources you provide. I’m working through all your free content and have benefited greatly from it all. Still, you’re full of shit and full of yourself.”)

That incident, by the way, was just the proverbial straw. Before that, as many of my colleagues have griped over, though I’ve mostly remained silently suffering, I’ve experienced the same shit you’ve been hearing many of them talk more openly about.

Online trolls are a funny breed. They are almost always of the same stripe. They secretly love everything about you and all that you do and wish they were your BFF but then in public forums say the vilest things about you.

Another funny thing I’d like to avoid. There will always be those folks who don’t really give a shit about you, would secretly celebrate if you ever failed, who lurk through your content and read everything you’ve written with a tinge of schadenfreude, kind of taking in everything you’re putting out and tainting it with an energy of enmity. A Closed Circuit is my effort at drawing a boundary to block those types of folks out.

The Closed Circuit

Here’s how we’re going to operate from now on. What was unlocked before remains unlocked, I’ll give everyone that. But in the future we’ll have “Closed Circuit” blog posts (it will be one of the blog post categories, so you can always click on that category link and check out all Closed Circuit posts in one swoop) where I share free downloads, crazier content, more personally revealing stuff, or anything that I’d rather limit the eyeballs on.

If you’ve been a longtime reader of this blog and are with me so far and are absolutely certain that you do not fall under the category of a troll, and you haven’t somehow gotten wind of the password yet, then please by all means reach out to me in an e-mail to get the password.

Roster of all Closed Circuit Content

For a consolidated roster of all posts tagged as “Closed Circuit,” click here.

How to Get Password Access to the Closed Circuit

To qualify for Closed Circuit access, you must send your request by email, and not simply by leaving a comment below.

Meet me halfway by making it easy for me to respond to you, so all I need to do is hit “reply” instead of clunkily try to find your email, copy, change into my inbox, new message, paste, etc. Please e-mail to benebellwen@gmail.com your request to me.

Also, in that message, if I don’t know you already, then please introduce yourself. What is your name? Who are you? How did you come by this site? Tell me a bit about your personal spirituality. There’s so much here on this site that gives you a sense of who I am, and here you are reading my stuff while I know absolutely nothing about you. That hardly seems fair. Even the playing field and tell me about yourself. Tell me about your life.

If you’re on social media, please share your social media accounts and link me to your published or publicly posted work.

Please do not send me a link to your website and tell me to read it to get to know more about you, telling me it’d “take too long” to write an email. If you can’t be bothered to take the time to write me, in your own words, to me, who you are, then I probably can’t be bothered to email you back with the password. However, sending me links to your online presence in addition to telling me, in your own words, who you are and what you’re all about is awesome.

There’s also no reason to tell me explicitly that you’re “not a troll.” That’s better shown and demonstrated through your actions than by direct statement.

Terms of Access

Please do not reveal the details and substance of what I talk about in the Closed Circuit posts. That’s for those who have access only. In other words, please do not read a Closed Circuit post and then hop away to some other part of the Internet and write, “Benebell says…” The Comments section are also Closed Circuit, so please discuss the contents in the Comments section.

If you have access to the Closed Circuit and have a close friend who would like access, please direct them to this page, tell them to follow the directions, and to contact me directly, following the directions, to gain access directly from me. Please do not share the Closed Circuit password with anyone.

Access to the Closed Circuit implies your solemn agreement not to share, exploit, or betray your access to the Closed Circuit in any way.

Do not leave a comment asking for the password. Those are going to go ignored. Please try to follow the directions. This is hardly rocket science.

Toward a greater collective,

B.