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Business

A WOMAN’S FALL FROM GRACE TO ENTREPRENEUR HEAVEN

My journey of becoming an entrepreneur, began with my husband cheating on me. 

He was my idol, my yoga teacher, my guru, and I found out, quite by chance, that he was 

sleeping with half his yoga students, while married to me, as I raised our baby at home.

Suddenly divorced, with no financial support, I had to think fast. I began offering 

massages, (not that I had any qualifications at the time!), to clients at their homes. Since I 

had no money, I massaged clients on the floor. All I really had, was a bottle of oil.

As fate would have it, one of my clients was suffering from severe depression, and was on 

a ton of medication, to block his suicidal thoughts. After six months of my massaging him 

twice a week, he told me that my massages were responsible for him coming off his medication, 

due to no longer being depressed.

He offered to finance a Massage Spa, at a five star hotel, which I would own and manage, 

as a “thank you for saving his life”. 

I thought I must be dreaming, but he went ahead, and next thing, there I was, working in 

the exquisite luxury of a massage center overlooking a massive swimming pool, and the 

ocean!

Over the next ten years, as a single working mom, I studied part-time, and became 

certified as an ITEC qualified Massage and Beauty Therapist. But college knowledge was 

just the start of my journey.

I worked as an Aromatherapist for 6 years, at that five star Hotel, and can honestly say 

that I learned thousands of lessons from my clients’ feedback, some of whom were 

celebrities who gave amazing advice.

My Massage Spa, was so successful, that I had to hire increasing numbers of staff to help 

me with the dozens of massages the clients were booking. 

Later, my staff and I spent many years, giving Aromatherapy Massages and Facials, at the 

Spa within Virgin Active Gym, which I was able to buy, with the money I’d saved from 

thousands of hours of giving massages. 

The Spa within Virgin Active Gym, was owned by the Virgin Group, and I used to joke that 

Richard Branson was my boss, even though I would probably never meet him! 

Opportunity came knocking once again, when I was offered a franchise to open an 

Academy of Health and Beauty. The school would teach students how to massage, and 

offer international certification through ITEC.

As my studies progressed, I was able to teach Swedish Massage, Shiatsu, Reflexology, 

Facial Therapy, and many more subjects, to my students. 

I specifically accepted students with low income, and mental or physical disabilities, and 

personally tutored them to the point where they received their Certificate. I never forgot 

where I had started, with nothing but a little bottle of oil.

My Academy began small, but grew to the point where about a hundred students qualified 

each year. 

Fate decided to pay a visit again, and sent several violent burglars into my home, on 

multiple occasions. Crime had become so bad in my country, that people’s homes and 

businesses were being burned down all around me.

After two years of fearing for my life, I had no choice but to leave my country, and start all 

over again in a foreign country.

Of course, there was no way I could re-create the hundreds of business networks I had 

built over 2 decades, in my home town. So I decided to start an online Etsy store, not only 

selling the miraculous plant remedies I had studied, but also offering advice to my clients, 

for their everyday ailments.

There are thousands of aromatherapy products sold online. But the products I sell on 

Etsy, have been chosen, because they are the safest, have the highest therapeutic benefits, 

and have been personally used by my staff and I, over many years of testing and 

experience. The Moisturizers are safe, because they contain no chemicals, and the Essential Oils 

are the safest that exist, within the safe-to-hazardous spectrum of oils. 

I have a passion for Essential Oils, because they are extracted from the Creator’s flower 

petals, fruit skins, grasses, tree resin, herbs, roots, leaves, tree bark, beans, seeds, twigs, 

fruit kernels, berries and spices.

I am inspired by the fact that the Creator designed an plant extract  for every ailment under the sun. 

Garden of Essences supports small producers/co-ops, of sustainably grown and 

harvested products. Most of our oils are organically crafted.

Garden of Essences ingredients are carefully sourced from all over the world. Our oils 

and butters are obtained by cold pressing, or infusion of organically grown or wild 

harvested plants, and have never been in contact with chemicals.

Our products represent Fair Trade, Sustainability, Vegan, Gluten Free and Cruelty Free. 

There are around two hundred products sold on GardenOfEssences on etsy, and on my 

website gardenofessences.com. 

Each product has been chosen out of thousands of products, because they are the safest, 

have the highest therapeutic benefits, and have been personally used by my staff and I, 

over many years of testing and experience.

I hope you enjoy my Natural Remedies blog, which I am passionate about, because I love 

the idea of people becoming less reliant on unnecessary drugs, steering clear of 

dangerous chemical-laden skincare products, and creating awareness about false 

advertising. I have alphabetized my blog, for your convenience!

But its not all plain sailing. The challenges the Natural Remedies market is facing, is 

overwhelming. As the owner of an online Natural Remedies store,  I am not allowed, by 

law, to state that any of the plant extracts I sell, can help to alleviate or heal ailments such 

as psoriasis, eczema, asthma, or arthritis, to name a few. 

When this law came into effect, I had to remove all sentences from my thousands of pages 

of articles, which said that any of the plant extracts I sell, can alleviate or heal ailments. This 

took months of editing, and has resulted in halving my income.

On a more positive note, the opportunities of the Natural Remedies market is still helpful 

in easing people away from dependance on harmful substances, simply by presenting 

peer-reviewed articles, which detail the facts. So far, this is not against the law.

For example, if you own an online store that offers products that help to heal a wide 

variety of ailments, you can place link to a scholarly article which proves that in a 

double-blind controlled study, Lavender Essential Oil reduced eczema by 70%, but you 

may not state this in your on article. Thank goodness for loopholes!

Article written by Janice Rosenthal.

Monika Wasserman
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