Dreams: The House

I found my dream house today, and it was overwhelming to see how expensive it was all together. However, I started thinking. I don't need the entire amount for the house, I just need to be able to cover the down payment and the monthly payments without a hitch.

For that, I comfortably need about $4000 a month (more like $3700, but I like to round up).

Well, I know how to do that!

That's called an Executive Coordinator.

What it requires is:

100 personal volume in the company. (Easy Peasy, as this is just what I'm going to use anyway. 200 or more is more accurate for our personal use in this household.)

2000 group volume. (Which means, people like me doing what I'm doing. If you think about it, it's just 10 people switching a few brands, no biggie)

3 Directors. That means three people who want to do this as a business and have a group that has 2000 group volume like me. A Director is the lowest real rank in Shaklee and the average income for that rank is $10,629 for the year. Easy stuff, literally anyone could do that.

20000 organization volume.

Picture this-- so I have me, and my 2000, and I have 10 or so doing what I do. Or only a couple who are even better than I am at it. Considering I am doing this well with a social phobia, it's easier for people who actually TALK to people.

BUT the truth is, it's easier than that. I probably only need a few people, really. People who care about the environment, keeping themselves and their families healthy, and maybe a few people who want to do the business like I do.

The average annual income for this level in Shaklee is $56,760.

For me, that means I can get my dream house.

Interestingly, this is the level at which Shaklee covers car payments (car program) for a car whose monthly payments are between #325-$375 a month. That's a nice car! Think: hybrid!

Actually free cars are insanely easy to get, I'm just so focused on the house that I kind of never go there.

Do you want to see the worksheet I got all this from? It's a great little handout called Drive The Dream and it's great for seeing exactly what you would have to do to reach your goals.

I also have presentations on my website. There's no secret. It's simple, easy, and straight to the point. Social Marketing just means we talk to people and get commissions directly from Shaklee instead of the company paying for TV ads :).

Head Games

My upline (who is also my mom, I mentioned I've been a Shaklee Kid all my life, right?) sent me this email, and I really liked it, so I thought I'd share:

I have found I move ahead faster when I play head games with myself. One example is walking mailboxes: the game is to walk one more mailbox a day each day, no matter what. I've done this several times and have ended up walking good long distances.

When we first picked up Shaklee again in 1996, I played a couple of games. First we were traveling and staying in campgrounds, so I decided to talk to 5 strangers a day, not about Shaklee but up to the point in the conversation where I asked them not only what they did but whether they were happy with doing it. Later when we were settled in our sabbatical location in a town where we knew no one, I decided to talk to one new person a day to see if I could get a business card or an appointment. We grew to director our first month there, our third month in the business.

I took this one stranger a day to the limit: when I went on a Shaklee trip that fall, I managed to talk to one new person at the hotel where all the Shaklee people were staying, and in the shuttle and so on. While all the other leaders were sitting in the cafeteria having coffee, I was out in the lobby looking for someone to get a business card from.

So head games have served me well. In fact, I can also say that without them, I tend to drift quite a bit, even when I have a big goal firmly in mind.

So I need some new head games for myself, and I thought I'd share what I've come up with as possibilities:

1. I will talk to X new people each day. Not necessarily about Shaklee, just talk to them.

2. I will talk to X people about Shaklee.

3. I will ask X Shaklee members for referrals.

4. I will ask X Shaklee members to order something new that they haven't tried before.

5. I will get X Shaklee members on autoship each day/week/month.

6. I will get a list of insurance agents / real estate agents / other and call X of them each day to try to set an appt to look at the Dream Plan.

7. I will have X new appointments each day / week.

8. I will go on a driving / walking tour of the businesses in my town / city and stop in at X of them each day to get face recognition.

9. I will pass X referrals to local business people that I have made for their services (example: your neighbor needs her carpet cleaned, and you tell the local carpet cleaner)

10. I will volunteer at an event where I don't know anyone (or very few people)

11. I will clean desks in X classrooms a day / week / month. (Thanks for the idea, Toni!)

12. I will call my members to ask who their insurance / real estate / child's teacher is and ask if I can use their name and tell their story X times a day / week / month.

13. I will ask my members if they know anyone who has cholesterol issues X times a day / week / month....

OK, that's a lucky 13 of them. You get the idea. Which ones do you like? What can you add to this list? Which games have you decided to play?

I am assuming you already have your goal in place, such as 'next rank by Oct 31', 'car by February', 'Bora Bora', 'iPad', '$5000 / month from Shaklee', etc. These head games are to support those goals. Dr. Shaklee said 'See the people'. These head games are there to help us do that without having to rethink what we should do each day.

Put a time limit on them, such as 'for the rest of 2010'. Or 'for the rest of September'. And see what it does. I guarantee your business will grow.

It's Dream Day

Today I have really been thinking about the motivating Dreams that are behind the actions-- the whole reason why I am putting so much time and effort into making Shaklee work for my family.

I've talked about my little self-sustaining homestead a lot, but on days when I feel like I am making no progress, I like to go and really LOOK at what my dream would look like.

I research where I want to live and what it will take to live there. I research Milking Devon cattle (I want one), and shetland sheep and Dartmoor ponies. I go to ALBC and research the livestock that I want to be part of the conservation effort for.

I practice home-grinding wheat and making things from scratch. I experiment with homemade cheese and butter.

Then I am able to get my head back in the game, because this is what I really want. I would do practically anything to make it reality.

What is your Dream?

Family First

I have so many goals for my family that really help me focus on what I'm doing. I pretty much set the dream (sustainable living) and then create a road map to how I'm going to get there. Each new level includes the one below it, plus the new goal.

1) Cover my Shaklee product use

2) Pay for gymnastics lessons for my sons

3) Cover rent

4) Pay off any debts we have

5) Pay off my husband's student loans

6) Be able to buy a house

At that point, we would be really close to being able to look for our small piece of land and get started, depending on my husband and whether he can transfer to the area we want.

I know that to do that I need great people to work with me, people who, like me, want to care for the planet and make a better life in a better world. I also need people to work with me who want to have better health and better bodies.

All this is a bigger challenge than it needs to be, because of my 'problem'. I have a social anxiety problem. It's why I pretty much didn't drive until this year, I rarely go into public, and I don't really talk to people that much. HOWEVER, I am trying whole-heartedly to fight this social phobia.

It will just make work... interesting... :)

This is Me

I am me, meaning the me that I am in this moment, the ever-changeable, maleable person on the road to who I can be.

I had a wake-up call in my life recently, in which I realized that, if anything happened to my husband, I would have no way to support my family. With this in mind, I decided to start living more actively and to become the me-to-be.

I am a nearly-thirty year old stay at home mother of three young boys. I have food allergies and auto-immune issues. I have unresolved questions about my health that I have put on the back burner because I can. I always put everyone else first.

But it's time to make a change. This is my diary of that change. This is my place for goals, short time and long-term.

Stats, as of a week ago:

5'1"

135 lbs (soft baby weight)

Food issues and migraines, no energy. Very sedentary.

Chronic back pain

No job or income of my own

That was a week ago. Since then I have jumped feet-first into becoming a Gold Ambassador with Shaklee, a company that I have been around my whole entire life as a product user. I have started taking Vitalizer everyday as well as Vivix.

The day I started taking Vitalizer I started feeling better, more clear headed. I started remembering things better. I am breastfeeding my youngest son and I know that I am nutritionally depleted.

Vivix has helped with something completely unexpected, for me, it took care of the swelling in my back. Then, when I twisted my back while nursing my son, I heard a loud CRACK and I could feel it twist back into place. Since then I have had little to no back pain. As I have to carry my baby around, that is really nice not to have to worry about.

With my new-found energy I logged into Sparkpeople.com. I love that site, it keeps me organized and aware of what I am and am not doing. For one, I drink way too much water.

I also keep track of the exercise I am starting to have the energy for.

So, goals for September.

1)Find three people who want to be Gold Ambassadors like me

2)Do my bloodwork and allergy testing

3)Run at least three days a week and weight train every Mon, Wed, Fri, Sat

4)Eat well and keep my milk up for my son, while not over-eating

5)Switch all my household cleaners, etc, to the green products at Shaklee.

6) Help ten people feel better like I do.