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I walked in and quit. And I didn't, it wasn't like, didn't think like, I'm gonna get some maternity leave. Like I didn't, I just kind of reacted. I'm glad that I did because I'm not sure I ever would have had the courage after that to really have walked away from, you know, I was 27 years old making high six figures doing, you know, high in the hundred thousand range, you know, up there, and young and it was, you know, it was just a pivotal moment in my life where I realized I had to choose what was most important for me.
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Today I want to introduce you to a new friend, Crystal Agrestifoy. I had the incredible honor of doing the keynote at Celeste's annual conference a few weeks ago. If you haven't heard of Celeste, they are a relatively new skincare and cosmetics company in the direct sales space. Their products are great and they're growing really fast. So definitely keep an eye on them.
Anyway, Crystal is one of the top leaders and performers there. And I had the pleasure of sitting down and getting to know her a bit. I immediately knew I wanted her to be on the show. Not because of what she has achieved in her multiple careers, which is quite remarkable. But I was fascinated by the number of huge life pivots that she's had to make and how she's been successful at all of them. In my experience, we humans are generally not very good at pivoting. Pivoting sounds good in theory. Conceptually, you probably understand that it's a necessary skill in order to be successful. But in action, it's actually pretty difficult for us to do.
It requires letting go of what we think we know of how we think it should be, and more importantly, letting go of our feelings about the whole thing, all to turn around in a new direction without any evidence or any preparation in the blink of an eye. It's a type of risk that really takes something, and it's easier said than done. So, let's see what Crystal can teach us about that.
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Okay, my love, I'm really excited to talk to you today. One of the things that I'm really fascinated with with the work that I do is transitioning, Like really growing and leaving one phase of your life to another. Usually I'm dealing with entrepreneurs leaving their jobs, their comfort to start businesses, but we're always going through transitions and I don't think human beings are particularly good at that, right? We kind of cling to what we know.
We cling to what's familiar. Our identities often become rooted in jobs or roles or experiences. So it's hard for us to transition from one faith, one career, one thing or another. And you are kind of a badass at this.
You've done, you've gone through a lot of transitions a lot of morphing and I thought it'd be really great to have you on the show to really break that down and share some of your story and get some of your tips because I think that a lot of people struggle with this and this seems to be an area that you're really good at. Thank you. think, know, as, listen, we're humans, no one wants change, right? Like, let's be honest, I feel like everyone resists change.
I don't know, there's just been something about my journey that as I've learned and as I've grown, I actually like change. I always tell people like I thrive in chaos. Like, you know, three kids, four dogs, my kids are in every sport and we're busy. And I feel like one of the things that's been a huge blessing in my life is the ability to pivot when I need to pivot and transition when I need to transition and not being a free to kind of embrace those unknown, weird, you know, parts of our life.
Because let's be honest, that's what happens. And I've always been the kind of person that you could either kind of fall back or you could find a way to pivot and sort of embrace the changes. And I think throughout my entire career, when I started in corporate America to now being in network marketing, I have just tried to kind of go with it.
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I've really tried to pivot and allow myself to grow and embrace change. mean, it's not something that I was, not gonna lie, I wasn't always great at this. I think it was something hard for me. And it's something that as time has gone on, I've realized that the beautiful things that have come in my life have come when I've been able to embrace and accept that maybe the path that I was on wasn't the path I was supposed to be on. And it's funny, because I think most people who knew me
even five years ago would be like, this is not the crystal that I knew. And I think it really has to do with embracing the evolution of kind of where my story has gone. I thought I would be one of those people that had a career in, you know, public relations and investor relations. And that's how I would retire. Like I saw, my dad was a small business owner, but I saw his hustle.
And he really fought and clawed his way to owning his own business and he had a lot of struggles along the way. I never really thought of myself as a small business owner. I pictured myself as the CEO of a company. And so when I've had to pivot so much and where I've ended up, maybe I wasn't always proud of it, but now I kind of look back and I go, wow, each of those chapters and each of those changes that I experienced really paved the way.
for me to be where I am now. And I'm actually for the first time in a long time, proud of that, you know? Yeah, beautiful. Okay, there's so many things to unpack there, but I want to kind of just go back and share some of your stories. you were in corporate America, talk to about the career that you had and what was happening that kind of led you to go, okay, how did you get that call? Right? Like, what was that thing that said, okay, it's time.
Yeah. So I actually don't even know if I shared this with you. I'm the first person in my family to go to college. And so I always tell people like, I am one of those overachievers. I graduated college with a 3 .9. I wanted a 4 .0. I cried like, you know, I've really been someone I know it's so ridiculous. the worst part is, in my whole years, no one's ever asked me for my GPA and no one's ever asked me for my degree. Like I worked so hard for that.
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And no one ever once said, what is your, you know. So it's quite ironic that I put so much into that. So, you know, I grew up in a little background. My parents both grew up in very broken homes. And so, you know, with not a lot. And my dad worked really hard. He was a small business owner to kind of provide us with the life that, you know, we had. And we didn't grow up rich, you know, but we grew up having enough. had anything that we really wanted within reason, we had.
And my dad worked really hard for that and my mom supported him in his business. And so I think he taught me really early on, like you get it, you work for the things that you want. And so I put a lot of energy into school and I ended up graduating early and I actually graduated during the crash. And so my graduation was 2008. And so what happened was,
I had gotten an internship full -time in New York City that January, because I was done with all my classes, and I ended up getting offered a job in March. And so when everyone else in my class was graduating to this crash where you couldn't get a job, I already was hired. so I had worked really hard to prove myself. I spent several years in roles in investor and public relations. I did more of the finance side.
And so it's a male dominated field. And so I was one of the only women I had to wear a business suit, like they didn't want us to wear dresses, like they wanted me in a full suit. And so, you you had to look really sharp, you had to really look the part, but it was also a career where there was no flexibility, right? I was in the office and you got to prove yourself. So I was there every morning at 7am, hour and a half commute each direction.
you know, really working hard and like if you left for six o 'clock at night, you were like, looked down upon, like you weren't working as hard as everyone else was. So I felt this need to just give my entire being to my career and I did and honestly, a lot of the personal relationships in my life really suffered in the early years of my career and I moved up the ladder very quickly because I would work 24 seven and I would hustle and I had that ability.
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But I quickly realized as my husband and I got married and you know, I wanted to be a mom more than anything and I had known that since I was a little kid and I kept thinking like how am I gonna do both and I I don't know I guess I in my dream picture world I thought that there was gonna be this balance where I could still have this great career and have children and I quickly realized that wasn't gonna happen and I honestly
I'm not someone that makes like knee jerk decisions. I actually, when I realized that they were not gonna be flexible and I was pregnant and I was at the end, I walked in and quit. And I didn't, it wasn't like, didn't think like, I'm gonna get some maternity leave. Like I didn't, I just kind of reacted. I'm glad that I did, cause I'm not sure I ever would have had the courage after that to really have walked away from, you know, I was 27 years old making,
six figures doing you know, high in the hundred thousand range, know, up there and young and it was, you know, it was just a pivotal moment in my life where I realized I had to choose what was most important for me. And being a mom in that moment was the most important thing. Little did I know that, you know, nine months into being a stay at home mom, I would be, you know,
running 14 miles a day because I didn't know what to do with myself. you know, I kind of embraced it. I tried to pivot and sort of go into the stay at home mom mode. you okay, so it sounds like that was out of character for you. That's not that. Okay, that's really interesting that that move was so out of character and it just came, you know.
Chuck it up to hormonal moms or mom intuition? I think, I don't really know. It was like, I can't explain it to you. And listen, everyone at the office thought I was crazy. mean, my husband was like, you're the primary breadwinner. We can't live the life that we live right now on my salary. He had a good job, but not the money that I was making. And I mean, to be honest, I didn't even really talk to him. I just kind of did it.
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And it was just something inside me told me that I had to pivot and make this move. And I just did it. Yeah. But it's like that sometimes because I feel, you know, I'm a firm believer they were being spoken to all the time. They were getting hints and signals and signs and that there are forces beyond, you know,
trying to help us, but we're like, no, I don't want to do that. no, that's scary. no. And they're like, you know, so I really acknowledge you for just like leaping, but it sounds like part of you knew that if you didn't do this now, like you were just like, yeah, I can't think about this. Cause if I think about it, I'm going to talk myself out of it. That's I kept thinking. And I also, it's funny, like as I'm sitting here and saying this to you, I'm thinking like, you know, after my first network marketing opportunity, I kind of did this.
Same thing again, like I kind of had this feeling and the ironic thing is I was pregnant again. And it was like, it was almost like every time that I was faced with this like big monumental life change, when most of my life I think and I strategize and I'm organized and I'm planned, but in these big moments, I've pivoted so quickly.
And you know, honestly, I never thought about it until talking about it with you that like here I am this person that doesn't very out of character, but in multiple instances, I have just made this decision and I've just kind of followed my heart. Kind of like you said, it almost was like something inside me was telling me this is the right call. Like just do it and see what happens. Yeah, I love it. Okay, so you're home, you have your first kid.
Sounds like by the 14th month, you're already kind of like starting to go, okay, what are we doing here? So what happened next? So I started looking for things. actually ended up as funny as this is, ended up waitressing at the place that I waitress when I was a kid, because I could do it two nights a week.
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When my husband got home from work, I could get out of the house. I could meet people. I could interact. It would bring a little bit of money in, but I wasn't financially driven in this moment. were okay. We had enough. Were we rich? No, but we had what we needed. And I was kind of wanting to embrace being a mom. And one day I'm scrolling on Pinterest and I see these leggings and I'm like, these are cute and I'm pregnant.
And so I'm like, okay, let me buy a pair of these leggings. And I buy a pair of leggings. And I'm like, I say to my husband, like, this is like, it was Lula Rowe. And I said, these leggings are like amazing. And he's like, okay, so buy leggings. Well, I'm like, well, I watched a live, you know, I watched them do this live and they sold every pair of leggings. And so I think he's thinking like, I'm gonna be like, yeah, it's like $500 investment. I'm like.
So it's $5 ,800, I'm gonna charge it on the credit card. And he's looking at me, he's like, we don't have $5 ,800. He's like, and I know you're gonna buy this and it's gonna sit in the closet. And so I said, just let me do this. And like, I'm not someone that ever asked someone for permission, know, but at this point, he was making the money and we didn't have this kind of money. And he goes, all right, he goes, charge it on the credit card, but you've got three months to pay that credit card off. And I'm like, okay, great.
So we get it, I have no idea what I'm doing. I've never sold anything in my life. I've never run a small business. I am like, you know, just trying to like find my way. We do our first sale, sell out of every single piece. So now we've sold every piece of that initial $5 ,800, made double the profit and you know, doubles 50 % markup and my husband's like, but now what? Like, how do we ship this? What do we do with it? And I...
you know, we kind of figured it out. And so we started to pivot into this role in LuLaRoe and it was just an incredible opportunity. it was, when it was good, it was good. And I always tell people like, weird at the end, which is why we left. But while it was good, you know, it was good. And, you know, people have seen the documentaries, we were asked to be in all of the documentaries, we declined because it did really.
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pivot and change our life. And it really helped us transition into the mindset of being small business owners. And I think that's the biggest difference of Lula Rho than some of these other opportunities is we were actually learning real life skills of being an entrepreneur and owning a business. And we were extremely successful, top 10 seller out of 120 ,000 people. I did all of their corporate trainings. I spoke on their crews. I was their main stage speaker.
I flew all over the country with them kind of training and teaching people like the art of live selling and how to sell on social media because really at that time there were not a lot of people kind of in this social media selling. Lula Ro was one of the first groups to kind of do it. Why do you think had you be so successful in that venture when you had no experience prior at all?
I think it's that obsessive, I have that obsessive mindset, I guess you could say. I just, you know, if I see something and I know that I can do it or I can figure it out, I'm the kind of person that doesn't stop learning, trying to understand, trying to grow, trying to perfect it. And we, I mean, I'm gonna be honest, we were working probably 12 to 14 hours a day.
on the Lularoe business and my husband would come home from work and he would help me and we would sell and package and ship and have live sales. And then we manually invoiced and we would sit in bed and we'd manually invoice till two in the morning. And I would nap, you know, when my son and I will also at this point about seven months pregnant when we had first started. And I think it was our second. Yeah. And I think it was just this. I wanted to.
I wanted to succeed in this and I could see it. I'm gonna be honest, I'm a competitive person and Lula Rowe was really good at motivating people. We earned cruises based on our sales and the top sellers got the best rooms. so truthfully, I was driven by being recognized and I was driven by that success. And at this point, we didn't have a team. We had a small team, but we just...
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Really, I put one foot in front of the other every day and just try to work as hard as we could. And I think it's just that I don't I guess I have that mindset of like, yeah, I can do anything if I just get into the nitty gritty and work really hard at it. Yeah. How do you ever doubt yourself? Do you? Definitely. I've I doubted myself a lot, especially in leadership. I also.
you know, honestly, I'm very affected by other people's opinions of me, which is something that I really like, I hate to admit, but it's the truth. I want people to like me and I want to be helpful and I, you know, I want to be these things. you know, in, Lula Rho, we had some resistance, but I think because I spent so much of my time giving to other people, we didn't have so much of a resistance. Whereas like, you know, in coming to Celeste,
I've had some resistance and I think a lot of it has to do with when you see someone that is successful really quick, which I have been blessed to be at Celeste, you don't maybe understand them and I think maybe people didn't take the time to get to know me and so that was hard for me. Not so much doubting myself, but like, am I good enough for this? Am I good enough to be a leader? Am I good enough to run a team of this size? Because again, I've always focused on personal sales.
Because I can control me, I can't control other people. And so, you know, I was nervous for sure jumping into this opportunity, but I also had years of running a boutique. You know, after we had left Lula Rowe, we had started a boutique. And, you know, it's just interesting how it kind of all segued together. Yeah. So I want to segue into the boutique. but before that, I think I want to just point something out really interesting because
What I think is so interesting about you is this dichotomy between being super competitive, high achiever and going for a goal, right? And that takes something. That takes real gumption. And then you also deal with wanting to be like your humanity, right? Your humanity. Because people often feel like, when I'm talking to people, it's like, yes.
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I'm the same way. I'm a big people pleaser. It doesn't have to control us. It doesn't have to run the show. You can still be an imperfect person and push and go and fall and, you know, and do all the mistakes and all the things, you know, I'll ask you about some of those later. But there is this way that people feel like they have to fix something about themselves before they get on the court to...
to do the work, to go for what they want. And it's such bull, right? Because here you are saying, no, I went for it, I gave it all. And I still struggled with my security, I still struggled with my, you know, with people's opinions of me and all of that stuff. So beautiful, beautiful. Okay, so you at some point transitioned from Lulu into an actual boutique. And is that because the...
So I'm actually, know that things got weird in the company, but I don't know all the details and we don't have to make it that if you want to hear about it, there's a really exciting documentary that a lot of people have watched. But if you left because the company was just getting weird, right? Things were not, is that really what happened or? They made, they were making.
Personal decisions that benefited their family financially over making decisions that benefited the consultants that were selling and I will never talk bad about them and I know you know that just because they I I Think they lost their way. I think that fame and money changed them a little bit I don't think they're bad people, but I think they made some bad business decisions because they had to pivot
You know, it takes a long time for a lot of people to grow a billion dollar business and they did it in like two years. And so, you know, I give them a lot of grace. I know some people don't because they have a lot on their plates and you know, but again, I was at their convention and it was October of 2018. I was at their convention. We were talking about, you know, we had all these out of stocks. We had all of these issues. And now, now remember,
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We're not just regular consultants for a company. We're business owners. And so we're in the top income earners meeting and there's about 50 of us and we're raising our hand. How much inventory is coming for the holidays? What does this look like? How does this work? And they wouldn't answer us. the owner kept saying, it's none of your business. And I'm like, I was furious. It was the weird, that's why I said it gets weird. was definitely weird.
They had done a lot of things. They like yelled at people on a call that was recorded. It was like a series of things, right? And so we get to this moment and while I'm at this conference in Atlanta, the irony of this is they're having their convention in Atlanta while Atlanta's market is going on for fashion. And again, this is why I'm laughing before I make another split second decision and I walk out of the income earners meeting. I walk out in the middle of conference. I call my husband.
I said, we're done, transfer money to the bank account. I'm going to America's bar and we're starting a boutique. And he's like, wait, stop. No, no, no, no, no. We are not doing, know, he's like panicking now. He's already retired working at home full time with me. And this is the first time he didn't go to a conference. went, you know, by myself. Turns out I find out I'm pregnant a week later, but the irony, have no.
I'm freak out and I'm like, I'm out of here. So yeah, so I just I literally walked out and and now mind you the conference is happening. So it's public there, you know, one of their top income earners, one of their top sellers is just bounced and I'm over at market and I get to market and there's probably like 10 other
Lula Rowe retailers all their shopping secretly. And so we see each other, we're kind of like cheering each other on. Like, and so I just I pivoted. And it was hard. It was a big transition trying to pivot and but we did it. And we actually just really officially closed the boutique in June. So we operated it for another five years after leaving Lula Rowe. You know, we had the the rush of COVID.
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Online sales were insane. I mean, we grew so fast. We bought a building. We moved into the building within six weeks during COVID. We had already outgrown the building, had to pivot and move to another warehouse. Yeah. I mean, we, our biggest year was during COVID and we sold 12 million. So we were really, yeah, we were really like churning it. But you know, I, again, I kind of felt this, I gave up all of these things to be a mom, right?
And here I am pregnant again, hustled through my pregnancy, both of my second and third, I had C -sections, I was back at work within 48 hours live selling. And so I kinda had this like overwhelming feeling of like, I don't wanna know if it's remorse, regret, a little bit of both, thinking to myself like you left this career because you wanted to be a mom and then built something beyond what I ever imagined.
And I wasn't really being a mom, you know, I was working 80 90 hours a week and I kept saying, you know one of the things that was really monumental for me was when my son was like all you ever say is one second mom and it was like it like hit me like a ton of bricks and I was like, yeah And so we had opened a brick and mortar. We had done a lot of things. It was very exciting, but it was also
It was this gut -wrenching feeling of like, I'm not gonna work my life away. Like again, I go back to that. Like I have this, I don't know when to stop. Like I don't know how to not hustle. Like my mind is always, what's the next goal? What's the next ring? What's the next It's so funny, cause one of the questions that I was prepping for you is, do you ever get still? Like do you ever, do you know how to take a break? This is the first time in my life.
that I have ever gotten still. And I would say it's probably been in the last six weeks, something really, I don't, I think it was, you know, some of the, the, the feelings of people judging me, the feelings of, know, some of the resistance that you get when you join a new business. when you're in network marketing, a lot of the people are the same, right?
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A lot of the people run in the same circles and like a lot of the people that, you know, at Celeste knew a lot of, you know, knew each other and here I come out of nowhere. Nobody knows me. You know, I kind of use my boutique again. I pivoted, I used my boutique experience and realized Celeste was this new opportunity for me to take this culture community I'd built and kind of pivot, not just selling, but in opening a retailer pathway. And so again, I, I,
close the boutique to hustle and my husband's like, wait a minute, you just collect to do this to slow down. you know, it's that innate, like, I don't know when to stop. And so this summer has been my my youngest is going to kindergarten this year. So I don't have any more babies at home. You know, they're in school all day after you know, starting in September. And so I think it hit me like a ton of bricks like
Wow, you kept trying to pivot to be a mom, but getting caught in the hustle and not understanding that. And this summer is the first summer, like I've wiped my goals away. You know, like I haven't been pushing myself to hit sales goals. I'm not pushing myself to recruit. I'm not pushing myself to hit another rank. I'm kind of stepping back and going, gosh, Crystal, like for one second, can you enjoy like the moment, the ride, the, you know, the, you built and like just take a second to just.
Chill, you know? Yeah. I mean, that's such a pitfall that so many entrepreneurs fall into. know, and it's hard because when you're an entrepreneur, you typically love what you do, right? It's the reason you're an entrepreneur. It just allows you to really dive into a passion. And so you love what you do. It's yours. Yeah, you're working how many hours, but it's yours. know, you, you, every, every
blood, sweat, and tear is like building your dream. So it's really easy to get lost in that and keep going and not like stop to take care of yourself and make sure that all the other things, mean, notoriously bad at taking care of ourselves. So you're in really good company. Story of my life. So, you know, I think it'd be a good time to talk about
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direct sales a little bit because it's interesting that you came from a corporate background and you went into direct sales. That's not very common, I think. you know, and direct sales has like a stigma. People, you know, has a bad rap. People talk a lot of crap about it. Lulu for sure has a big, you know, stain on his name and you were, you were there as well. So I'm curious about
How did you end up like what like how did you get through that? Because I'm sure you had some of that yourself when you were transitioning over and and what's your what if you have any thoughts about that and and what's been your experience on that subject? So it's funny because I feel like so many people know a lot of people that were in direct sales like I really didn't know a lot of people in direct sales when I actually made the jump to Lula Rowe and the irony that you're gonna probably laugh is
I actually didn't tell anyone I was doing Lula Rowe for about a year into doing Lula Rowe because I felt weird sharing that. A lot of people knew that I had this really big high profile successful career and then I was like, and now I'm just selling leggings. It took me a long time to actually share it and I think that the thing that really got me to share it was realizing that I could propel my business a little bit more if I could be more open. And to be honest,
even until January of this year, my profiles have been private. So I've never allowed customers to friend request me. I've been very guarded about my personal life. And I haven't even, most people didn't even know I owned a boutique, which is interesting. I don't know what held me back from sharing. It probably was the stigma of, again, I've said this a lot, I don't like the judgment of others. And I struggle with, what are people gonna think that she's selling?
you know, clothing from a boutique. No one knew how successful I was really at it that or Lula Rowe even. And it was hard to kind of kind of share that because I was always feeling this, like people were going to judge me for the decisions that I made because who goes from corporate America to this, you know, and I, took me a long time to really accept and embrace that and kind of share that this is who you know, this is who I am. And I think that people
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don't realize how successful people in direct sales can be or are. And I think that maybe I was in my own head about it thinking like, I don't want people to know that this is what I'm doing. Now looking back, I feel like probably would have had a very different kind of journey had I been a little bit more open, but now I am, and now I really shout it from the rooftops because people are, there's this, like.
judgment around direct sales and around team building and MLMs and people have this negativity. Back to the Lularoe thing, I don't know if you know this, there was like an anti -Lularoe group and it was a hate group. I think I've heard about that. I'm sure you have because it was like hardcore. I think that's where the stigma started for me. Even most recently, I was in that group being posted about
for leaving the boutique to do Celeste. And I think I always cared again about people judging me. And now it's like, I have created this beautiful life for myself, for my children. My husband and I work together every day. Yeah, some days I kinda wanna kick them under the table, but for the most part, we get to go golfing on a Tuesday afternoon if that's how we build our schedule. I don't miss a soccer game. I don't miss a field trip.
Obviously I'm embracing now more than ever really enjoying that time with my children. You know, maybe a little bit too late, but direct sales and network marketing gave this to my family. You know, it gave us this, it gave us what we have here. And we wouldn't have any of this if we didn't take a chance. And I think so many people are afraid to take that jump. And that's where I've been successful is making that jump.
Because to be honest, I'm sure you may or may not know this, boutiques are struggling right now. And we actually got out right before the struggle really started because we started transitioning last November. And so now a lot of our friends are in these terrible places. They're falling into debt because there's a lot of overhead running a business like that. so again, I feel like I was pulled to do this and kind of transition back into direct sales.
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said after the little row, I'll never do direct sales again. I said that and I that and then again, I pivoted back because I think for me, it's not even just the opportunity for my family. Now it's seeing what I can do to help other people and seeing how I can change other people's lives. And you know, you don't realize the impact that you can have and what a hundred, two hundred, five hundred dollars means a lot of money to people, especially with our economy today. You know, yeah.
Why do you think direct sales have such a bad rap? What do you think is the thing that people are not understanding or don't, what do you think is happening? I don't, you know, I think it's probably some of the poor tactics that people use. You know, I'm sure some of the cold messaging, you know, I still get that. I think it's, you know, some of those things, but I also think it's a lot of unknown. And I also think people don't realize the opportunity. I mean, let's be honest, we go to school every day from eight to three.
They teach you to go to college, to get a job, to get a pension, to get these things. They don't teach you, they don't want us to be entrepreneurs. You know what I mean? They want us punching a clock. And so I think that a lot of people are resistant to the idea because it goes against the norm of what people think they should be doing. They think that they should get a job and spend 40 years, probably more our parents' generation than our generation, but you get a job.
You stay there for 40 years, you get a pension, you retire. And I think that those days are kind of starting to go behind us, or at least I like to believe. You know, if I teach my kids anything, I hope I teach them that through hard work, you can do anything. You don't have to work for someone else. You can work for yourself. You know, for me, the biggest thing that I've gotten out of network marketing and direct sales is freedom. And that freedom looks different for everyone. Maybe it's time, maybe it's financial, whatever freedom, but
I don't think anyone realizes the freedom that you have when you can do an opportunity like this. Yeah. You know, I, you know, I want to answer my own question. think, you know, two things come to mind. Number one is to your point, there have been some bad players in the game. And so there's been people that have had some questionable business practices and so they burn people and it's messed up because, know, you, you, when you sign up, you're trusting Ray, you're
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putting all your faith in this. And so there is that, that's in the water, right? But what I've mostly have seen is companies who really are trying to do great work, who are really trying to do, you may have the Lululemon stories pop up in there. You may have the, I don't wanna start getting in trouble by naming companies, but just Google.
There's been a few, but you know, in this questionable practices as well that just come up, I think of Avon, who everybody was a customer, who was a distributor. So yeah, it ends up being a pyramid because you don't really have any customers. Everybody's just, the people buying the product are their own distributors.
But there's actually regulations against this stuff now. There's a lot of attention. There's like the government has agencies. So the industry as a whole is actually one of the most regulated industries, you know, other than like finance, I think the Rexel is actually one of the most heavily regulated industries. And that's because there's been stuff. And so now the government has stepped in to protect companies, you know, the distributors. So I think that's in the water.
I also think there's something interesting about direct sales. Direct sales is the, I always say, it's the easiest and the hardest business. Easy because you know this, let's use your example. When you set up your boutique, you had to get inventory, you had to get a location, you had to get staff, you had to get branding, you had to put up signs, you had to do a build out, you had to get computers, you had to do a credit card, you had to set up a website, you had to like...
There is so much work you have to do before you can even charge a dollar. And it also, it puts you at stake. Cause you're not, you're putting in a lot of money to build this thing out. The level of commitment is just different. And so with direct sales, all of that has been figured out for you and put in a little box. And for, I don't know, you know.
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50, $100, 169, whatever it is, you get products that have been tested, that have the packages, passive regulation, you have website, you have your credit card to charge, you have your pricing figured out, you have your branding, your marketing, all of that is figured out, easy.
But immediately what happens is you get smacked in the face with the most difficult part, with the most confronting part of being an entrepreneur, which is sales. So I think a lot of what happens is people go in with these high expectations, high ambitions, easy entry points, so commitment level is very low, right? And they immediately, you know, like I always tell the story, like the first time, like when I first started my coaching business back in 2008,
Same. I spent the first year doing nothing but like getting my bank account, working on my website, setting up my LLC, like literally a year just doing, I mean, I was working full time, but I spent a year setting all that up. So I almost had like a year to warm up. You know what I mean? Like by the time I had to go have a sales conversations, I had a little bit like, you know, okay, in direct sales, you don't get that. Like you literally go, there's nothing to warm up to, go sell.
Go share. And so people get confronted and they get like really, know, all their stuff comes up and sales is the one area of business that brings up all the things, you know? And if you don't have the kind of tenacity that you're talking about, the kind of gumshoe, the kind of like, okay, I'm gonna figure this out. I'm gonna sit here and learn. I'm gonna, you know.
Mostly we squirrel, we get intimidated, we start avoiding, we start, you know, and then we start spiraling. And so this thing that became this opportunity all of a sudden becomes this thing that's eating up your money, stressing you out, you know, not making you happy. And then you make that the direct sales company's fault. When, if you look and get honest, there's probably some things that you're not doing that you said you were gonna do.
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There's probably things that you're avoiding. And some people may not like what I'm saying, but I've seen this so many times, not just before. I worked in a direct sales company for five years myself, but even before that, I was coaching entrepreneurs for years and I saw it and I see it now. And it's just this human thing that happens when you get confronted with sales right away that I think just makes people squirrely. But I also see a lot of people
in that industry doing amazing things, trying to really be an integrity. The other thing that happens, I think, in that industry is that because the entry point is so low, you get people from any kind of background. And that's beautiful because it gives everybody the opportunity, but not everybody's coming to it with a college degree, the corporate experience, the professionalism that you had, the experience of managing.
large sums of money, the mindset around that, know, so you're you not everybody has that. So they end up doing weird things, right? They end up doing the cold calling. They end up doing the the hey, I just met you. Do you want to sign up, which is crazy? Like, no, they don't want to sign up. They just met. No, but I think you're right. I think it's also like most.
Listen, let's be honest, most people work room to not be entrepreneurs. I don't think most people have that in them. And let's be honest, you're not, no one's coming to your door every day or your desk every morning and saying, these are the things you have to do today with some kind of organizational structure. And like you're forced to be able to figure out like, what do I do?
And again, we're so easy to blame other people. My sponsor doesn't help me enough. This person hasn't given me enough guidance. And I think sometimes people can have every tool in the world, but if they don't have it in them to go after it or to be an entrepreneur or to be able to wake up and be disciplined and committed, that's where I think it's hard. Most people wanna be told, do this, do this, do this, do this, go home at the end of the day.
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They don't wanna wake up and have to figure out how do I manage this? How do I do this? How do you pivot and how do you kinda make this work around your life and commit the time that you need to? And again, you're right with the low barrier to entry. A lot of times I think the opportunities that are the most affordable are the ones where you see most people fail. Like LuLaRoe, there wasn't a lot of failure in the beginning because
When you're putting $6 ,000, you've got skin in the game, you know? And then as time went on, their kits got 500, 700, still a lot of skin in the game, know, skin in the game, but not a $6 ,000. Whereas like, you know, now some of these opportunities are free or $19. And like, what do you have? And I think those opportunities are where you find people that they join, cause they want that, but they don't know how to actually make it happen.
if that makes sense. No, it makes all the sense. No skin in the game. Okay, so I kind of want to just check in where you're at and where you're going. You know, like what are your what?
tell me you're pregnant and gonna make a big transition again anytime soon my husband would have a heart attack if he heard that how many how many kids do we have now three three three and that according to my husband that ship has sailed I would have loved more children he's an only child and he's like three kids is more than enough and every time we like
Maybe do we want another kid? We've got a new dog. So, kind of balance it out. So, I actually said, he's like, what about a puppy? He's like, we're good. You know, I'm, for the first time in my life, I actually feel like I am where I'm supposed to be. I would like to spend the next year enjoying this and...
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you know, kind of helping other women grow, not so much focused on my own personal selling kind of focused on where can I help people? How can I actually make a difference? You know, how can I motivate people to do what I did? You know, give them any bit of you know, my story and say, Hey, like you can do this too. Like, I always say to people like, and this is gonna weird, like, I'm not special. Like, I didn't have a following when I started doing this. Like I wasn't
wasn't born into money. I have just truthfully worked really hard and people are like, there's gotta be a secret. There's no secret. Every time that I've everybody's trying to find that secret. Yeah, there isn't. It really is truly hard work and showing up even on the days that I don't wanna show up, finding a way to show up, trying to be who I am. One of the things, one of my big bucket list things is I'd love to write a book.
You know, that's something I would love to do. I would love to speak a little bit more. But for now, I feel for the first time in my life, I'm not chasing something, you know, like the rank that I wanted to hit I'm at like, I'm going to enjoy this, you know, I'm going to like, take a seat, you know, take a sit back and spend the next year, I really want to spend this year focusing on my family, you know, focusing on we've spent a lot of time this summer traveling, doing a little bit more traveling kind of like
you know, enjoying the hard work that I put in for these last, you know, I'm not saying give up or, but slow down just for a little season. I know it won't last long because that's who I am. I'm sure at some point I'll be ready for the next adventure, but I just, I want to actually enjoy some of the ride. I feel like I've been so rushed my whole life getting to the, know, having another baby, having kids, getting married, you know, you're always rushing to the next phase of your life.
And like I even said to my family this weekend, we went camping with 60 people in my family this past weekend. We do like this camping thing. And so, you know, I would say at least five people in my family all commented and said, this is the calmest, most relaxed, at ease version of you we've ever seen. Like, what is it? And I'm like, just, everything that I've ever wanted, I have. And so like, I'm gonna stop.
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for a second and try to enjoy that, you know? Because I feel like, again, every time I've gotten what I've wanted, I've tried to pivot and go to the next thing. And I've never stopped and just given myself the chance to like take a breath and enjoy like what you just worked, you know, 15, whatever years, know, 16 years for in your, in all of your careers that have kind of led to this moment. What if, mean, you've gotten what you wanted before. So what, what's different about this time that
is allowing you to kind of enjoy it and ease, you know? Because there's been times where you achieved big things before that you were striving for, but you were still in the hustle of it. So it's actually something my dad said to me. So my dad's mom passed away when she was 42. And so my dad was eight. And my dad always says that he kept, his whole life he kept trying to get to 42.
and like hoping he would live longer than his mom did. And so like when I look back or look ahead even, you know, I'm 38 years old. If God forbid something were to happen to me like her at 42 and you you lose your life. I don't want to look back and go I didn't spend enough, you know, because listen, you can always make more money. You can always go on more trips. You can always do these things. You can always.
achieve more in your career, but you never get the time back with your family. And so my kids are at that age where they're five, eight and 10. And so I really want to be there for them. And I really want to slow down. And again, it you know, when my dad told me that about, you know, how he felt about his mom, you know, losing her at 42 was devastating, and she didn't really know it was coming. And so I guess just using that as like a guide to realize that like, don't
no one knows how much time they have here, you know, and like, if I were to die tomorrow, my biggest regret wouldn't be achieving a rank or having money. My biggest regret would be not spending that valuable time with my family and being so rushed to the next chapter. So I just feel like I'm going to try to sit in a season for a minute. listen, as someone who's like a serial, want to be a high achiever, it's not easy. But I will tell you, I with this
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Even the last six weeks, I feel a monumental shift in myself. And I'm going to be honest that I have to shout her out. Kindle is a lot of the reason for this. A lot of, you know, the conversations that I've had with her and like her making me realize not everybody is going to like you. Get over it. You know, like not everyone's going to like you. Not everyone's going to accept you. Not everyone's going to understand you. And I guess putting all of those things together and like, you know, the wisdom that I feel like I've accomplished over, you know, the last
how I've grown has gotten me to here and just realizing like Crystal, you've got to take a step back for a minute. For the listeners, Crystal is a mutual friend of ours actually who works as Celeste and she's kind of the field coach there. She's a person who's really committed to empowering and training all the distributors there. I love this. I love this so much and I want to give you something, I think for you, but also for the listeners.
Don't underestimate that this work that you're taking on has to be learned. And you have to learn how to turn it off. You have to learn how to fill that time in different ways. It requires practice, just the same way that you learn to hustle. Now you gotta learn to trust, you know, and it also...
It's interesting. don't know how like woo -woo spiritual you are, but it requires a trust because, you know, one of the reasons that we develop this hustle -hustle mentality is because we don't trust that it's going to be okay. So we have to, you know, so you got to like learn. And a lot of the work that you're also going to do is even deprogramming your body to understand and teach it how to relax. So
I want you to be really generous with yourself and don't get down on yourself if you find yourself getting angsty and know that it's gonna be a process and play. Just play with different things, play with different modalities. Like, you know, I'm a big fan of floating. Have you ever done that? No. So you go in a sensory deprivation chamber, a little pod, and there's like a thousand pounds of...
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salt in the water so you just float on it like you literally cannot drown and No lights no sounds and you just go there for like 60 minutes and the best way that I can describe it It's like you just turn off your nervous system for for for 60 minutes. There's no stimulation There's no like you're with yourself. You're with your thoughts, you know, you're you know, but you're not like Connected to a device getting all this like you're literally just turning off your nervous system and letting it relax
So there's a lot of things like that that really start to add, because I get it, I'm the same way. And it's something that I've had to really ease. And it's been a journey. I literally have been on this journey for about two and a half, three years of just learning to not be like this all the time, making stuff happen. And I'm still like, even this morning I had a talk with myself. I was like, what are you doing?
relax, it's gonna be okay. I'm like, okay, okay, okay. It's a skill and I just wanted you to know that because for you and for other people that are listening, because often we approach these things as we should know. And it's like, no, and even the entrepreneurial mindset, it sounds like you were pretty good at jumping in and hitting the ground running when you started your business. I don't know that's just how the story is coming out, but it sounds like that way.
I had to learn that. Like, I literally had to learn that. In fact, I didn't start out as a business coach. I started out as like a life coach. But in the process of me doing that work and like removing all the things and doing all the digging and building myself, like I became so passionate about working with entrepreneurs because I was like, how many people are dealing with this stuff that's stopping them from like really truly living out?
their dreams and desires, you know, because we're not trained to, said, we're not trained to, you know, to be entrepreneurs. We're not trained to risk. We're trained to stay in a box. We're trained to play it safe, you know? So, lovely, lovely conversation. It's been so much fun having you on the show. Thank you so much. I hope you will come back. I will, and thank you for having me. Hopefully I can come back and share how.
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I've applied all these things to slowing down. Yes. That's going to be our follow up show. We're to do a follow up show. And how's it going after you declared you were slowing down? Well, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. It's been really a pleasure getting to know you. I'm really excited and I'm so glad that we got connected. Yeah, me too. Me too. All right. Talk to you soon.
As I said earlier, pivoting is easier said than done. But I do think it's a muscle and a skill that can be practiced. At its essence, it's a deep trust. Not just a trust in yourself, but a trust in something greater. It requires trusting that everything is going to work out your way. Even if not exactly how you expected it, or more specifically, how you wanted it.
It requires trusting that you have everything you need to figure out the challenge ahead of you. And it even requires trusting that the challenge ahead of you is there for a reason. That is an opportunity, putting in front of you a decision that you have to make or a lesson that you need to learn. But trust can be a scary thing, right? There's absolutely no evidence for it. It's just a feeling and intuition. And that's hard to take to the bank sometimes.
But if you do some research and look at people that you feel are successful, trusting their intuition is a big part of their success. I believe that we're being spoken to at all times. Little downloads are coming in all day long, but we ignore them. We push them aside. We pretend that we didn't hear them. I believe a big part of Crystal's success was her immediacy in which she was moved. She got the hit and then she went with it and didn't look back.
she immediately went to work at empowering the new direction by taking action. And that's something that I really want you to remember. What empowers the new direction is action. Not sitting there and thinking about it, obsessing, going over it and over it and analyzing, that does the exact opposite. You make the decision to pivot and then immediately you get all the way behind it. And you don't have to know what to do.
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At no point did Crystal have a plan or roadmap. She just took the first few steps and those steps informed the next and then the next. But because she wasn't looking back, doubting her decision, she was able to take ownership and move with speed. As always, I want to thank you for joining me this week. If you've enjoyed the episode, please consider sharing it with two or three of your favorite people. By doing so, you can help me spread the message of leadership
and ownership around the globe. I don't know about you, but I think we could use all the leadership and ownership we can right now. Also, I want to let you know that we're going to be taking a short break here at the ownership game. I'm going to take a few weeks to do some traveling, some resting, and some dreaming. If you're part of our mailing list, you're going to receive a weekly email with some of our favorite episodes from the past year that you may have missed.
You can go to ownershipgame .com to sign up for those emails. I will see you back here on October 1st, refreshed and with a brand new episode. The biggest of hugs to you.
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