Meet Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele below.

Hi Paulina Stevens and Jezmina Von Thiele, so happy you were able to devote some time to sharing your thoughts and wisdom with our community. So, we’ve always admired how you have seemingly never let nay-sayers or haters keep you down. Can you talk to us about how to persist despite the negative energy that so often is thrown at folks trying to do something special with their lives?
How do you persist despite the haters?

We are both Romani fortune tellers working in our family traditions. Roma are a diasporic ethnic group originally from India circa the 10th century, and when Roma arrived in Europe around the 15th century they were met with discrimination, forced deportation, genocide, and 500 years of slavery. The persecution of Roma still continues today worldwide. Roma are also known as Gypsies, which is a racial slur so we prefer that non-Roma do not appropriate it. However, both of us reclaim the word Gypsy personally, which is our right to do. Roma have been persisting despite the haters as a culture, for centuries, and we’re not about to stop.

Paulina Stevens– I’m very understanding of people, so the first thing I do when people are coming at me with hatred is assume that they’re ignorant on the subject and not take it personally. I try to listen to the haters and hear them out, and assess the situation. What do they hate? What’s going on? Then I make one attempt to educate them if I have the energy to do it. After that one attempt, I just have to accept their view, and keep pushing and moving forward with what I need to do. With the kind of work I do, there are so many haters. I’m a traditional Romani fortune teller, and I co-host a podcast about Romani culture called Romanistan, so I deal with racist people, and people who are just uncultured. But for me, my own family were also the haters. Sometimes even your blood is against you. You can hear them out, but that doesn’t mean that you need to stop what you’re doing. I knew I needed to leave my arranged teen marriage, and pursue an education and a better life for my daughters, even though my family did not support me. When I shared my story for the LA Times podcast Foretold, I felt like I needed to see the bigger purpose, so if that meant sacrificing some relationships, then that’s what I had to do. My bigger purpose was to reach other girls in my same situation, and other people in closed communities who felt like they didn’t fit in, and show them that they can leave just to live a life of their own choosing.

Jezmina Von Thiele– I am like Paulina in that I like to meet people with compassion as much as possible, but you can tell when folks are just trying to drag you down and will not meet you halfway. In those cases, when I can’t talk it out to reach a resolution, I remember how complex and strange the human condition is, and how people behave in extreme ways for reasons that have nothing to do with me, my fortune telling, Romanistan podcast, or Roma in general. Sometimes when people hate, it’s just a reflection of something they don’t like about themselves. Sometimes jealousy can make people hate what looks like success to them, even if it doesn’t feel like success to me. I constantly remind myself that I am not on this earth to please everybody, and it cannot be done anyway. It was scary at first to decide to host Romanistan with Paulina and be more visible, and more susceptible to harassment, which both of us already dealt with. But Romanistan is our love letter to Romani culture, and our way to spotlight and uplift members of our community who do great things. I was also scared when Paulina and I had the opportunity to write our book, The Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling: Thriving in a Tough World, coming out with Weiser in October 2024. Ultimately though, my desire to preserve and share our family traditions of fortune telling, a survival trade that fed our families for centuries, outweighed my fear of vulnerability.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
Paulina Stevens– I am a holistic practitioner, which encompasses everything from fortune telling (tarot and Turkish coffee readings), meditation, using spices and herbs for health, and life coaching. My Romani traditions are the root of all the services I offer, and my business is called Romani Holistic Healing in Newport Beach, CA. I’m also the co-host of Romanistan podcast, activist, consultant, and writer.

Jezmina Von Thiele– I am a fortune teller (tarot, tea leaf reading, and palmistry), reading independently and with Deadwick’s Ethereal Emporium in Portsmouth, NH. I am also a writer specializing in poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, as well as an editor and consultant. I teach classes about fortune telling, spiritual wellness, literature, writing, and creativity in person, online, and on Patreon. I am a performer independently and with Poetry Brothel Boston, and an artist. I am also co-host of Romanistan podcast.

To sum it up, we are storytellers and entrepreneurs with a focus on uplifting our cultural community. Look for our first book, The Secrets of Romani Fortune Telling: Thriving in a Tough World, (Weiser, October 2024).

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Paulina– Resilience, Hunger, People Skills

Have a hunger to do better, and a drive to thrive. I have a feeling of being consumed by hustle culture, which can be bad, but it has also really helped me. You need to know when to stop and have good boundaries so you don’t get burned out. People skills are also so important because you can be authentic and genuine without having to people-please or just ‘be nice.’ People can tell when you are being fake. In a society, most of the time, we depend on other people, whether it’s for business, friendship, or companionship. That’s not always the case, but for the life that I wanted, I needed this interdependent skill, and my love for community has taught me how to truly connect with people.

Jezmina– Resilience, Compassion, Curiosity

I have survived a lot, and my advice is that no matter what you go through, constantly orient yourself toward growth, like a plant searching for sunlight. My love for others, and my practice of nurturing love for myself, has gotten me through a lot of hardship, and kept me grounded and understanding of others and myself. Compassion for myself and others also allows me to make boundaries from a place of honesty, and be patient. Compassion makes Paulina and me better fortune tellers, interviewers, writers, editors, consultants, and activists because we genuinely care about where other people are coming from, what they want to express or accomplish, and how we can best assist them. My curiosity about the world and my own abilities allows for my creativity to flourish, and makes me a better listener and learner. I love to learn.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?
We are always looking to collaborate with other Roma who are doing good things in the world, and other Romani creators who we can interview or work on new projects with. We are dreaming up an animated dark dramedy TV show with touches of magic, which will be fiction, but loosely inspired by our lives as fortune tellers and all we survived. So we are looking to connect with folks who can help us make that happen. We also love offering cultural consulting for creators who are not Romani but want to mindfully and accurately represent Romani culture or characters. And we’re always up to collaborate with Roma for the ongoing fight for Romani rights worldwide.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
Jezmina Cards photo credit to Aurora Rose DeCrosta Romanistan logo by Elijah Vardo

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