How To become a Multimillionaire by Building Relationships Interview with Miriam Steketee

SPEAKERS

Joy Nicholson, Miriam Steketee

Joy Nicholson: 00:02

Mariaam, can you please tell me a little bit, like, where did you grow up? And what is your favourite spare time thing to do?

Miriam Steketee: 00:08

Hi, sure. So I grew up in New York City. And then we moved when I was eight years old to the suburbs somewhere in New Jersey in the United States. And what was the question you just asked? What do I like to do in my spare time?

Joy Nicholson: 00:17

Yes.

Miriam Steketee: 00:18

Is that what you said? Yeah. Oh my god. So I actually was a professional dancer in my early 20s. So I, I always love to dance and take any sort of fun dance class with my friends or on my own. And I love to travel. I love to ride bikes with my family, we, my husband's an avid cyclist. So, we like to just, I'm the kind of person, we wake up with my family. And we're like, what are we doing today? And we kind of come up with some fun ideas. hiking, biking, going out to eat, definitely love travelling. Unfortunately, it's been a little hard to do that, right?

Joy Nicholson: 01:02

Yes.

Miriam Steketee: 01:03

So, being creative, having fun, and for sure, moving my body.

Joy Nicholson: 01:08

That's awesome. so, being a professional, like, being into dancing and starting your own business. That's quite a transition. How did that come about?

Miriam Steketee: 01:16

So, I yeah, I moved to New York City to pursue my dreams of being a professional dancer and I got an agent. And I landed some fun gigs and music videos and shows and things like that, and then to pay my bills on the stock. And when I wasn't, you know, getting paid being a dancer, I was either waitressing or bartending or I stumbled upon a friend who was like. Oh, we have all these actors and dancers selling real estate, join me in this real estate company. And so I actually became a part time real estate agent in New York, and I was running around the city, dancing, real estate, I mean, I was doing all the things, you know, how you have energy in your early 20s. And living the starving artists lifestyle, um, and then I got married. My husband told me he wanted to go to law school and so I became the breadwinner for our family. And so I kind of moved into the corporate side of things and said, okay. I kind of put my dreams to the side, my entrepreneurial spirit sort of died, right? When you start getting a little older, and I alright, I get a 401k, I get benefits for us. And I became a manager at my real estate office that I was working at as an agent, and slowly was climbing the corporate ladder there. And just didn't feel like that was my calling, I still had that itch, I still had that entrepreneurial spirit. I feel like once you have that, it's hard for it to leave you. And so I stumbled upon a network marketing company. Was kind of recruited there, thought it was going to be a way just to pay down some law school loans and credit cards. And it became my new career. And it has just been a dream come true and it enabled me to be really fulfilled coaching people. And I was able to actually write a book recently, from all of my, of all my stories, and all my tips that I've learned over the last 10 years in that industry, and I'm still in it today.

Joy Nicholson: 03:38

That is really awesome. I love your story. And I love how you just evolved. And can you tell people a little bit about your book? So I know your books about building relationships. And one of the best tips I had from a multimillionaire, probably a year ago, is like, take time every week to build one relationship. And it has never let me down, especially with my podcast, you know, I get to build a lot of really great relationships with people. So I know firsthand that, that advice is amazing. Can you tell us a little bit about how, what inspired you to write the book and please show us how your book looks like?

Miriam Steketee: 04:08

Oh, sure. So this is my book. It's called the secrets of meeting your business. And I really, truly feel that I'm building a business comes down to one thing, and it's relationships. It's how you treat other people. It's how you cultivate relationships from, you know, from that first meeting throughout your journey with that person. And so, in my book, it kind of starts out with sort of starting to build that relationship with yourself and creating confidence. Because if you're not confident, and you don't have a strong relationship with yourself. It's really hard for you to be, become an entrepreneur, build a business, motivate people as you start to grow a team, whether it's in direct sales, or it's in coaching. Or it's in, you know, a retail store with employees, whatever that is, you have to be very confident, as a leader, as you step into that role and leadership. And so if you don't, if you have some things you need to fix about yourself, you have to fix those things first. And so it starts out with this building, you know, falling in love with yourself. And it's the same thing. I think it goes as when you're dating somebody in the beginning, right? When you're, when you're dating in your teens, and maybe your early 20s a lot of times you, you know, you're dating the wrong guys, because you're, you know, you're dating that guy that doesn't call you back and treats you not so well. And for some reason, there's that fun game that we drive ourselves crazy with, right? And then when you finally realise, and maybe this is not you, this is definitely me, like wait, I actually am worth a lot more than that. And when I started treating, you know, treating people back the way they treated me and saying, you know what, I'm actually leaving this relationship. And if, when I talk about it in my book, there are times when my husband wasn't the best boyfriend. And I was like, you know what, I think we need a break. And he's like, what, and I think sometimes it's about having that confidence to end those relationships that aren't serving you, right? And I talk a lot about that in the book too, and how to treat people. And when you treat people well, they treat you well back and then they perform for you. They buy from you. They trust you. They like you. And they say that most people stop buying a good or service because they didn't feel appreciated by, by the, by the person that was selling to them. And so it's really about appreciating people and, and as you start to build a team, if that's something that you do. Whether it's a co worker, or one employee or 1000s of team members, I've been able to build a multi million dollar business. Over the last 10 years I've had 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of consultants and reps on my team. And I think all of them will say to you, you know, Miriam's just really humble and makes us feel really good. And it's just about always being humble, and treating others with respect, no matter if they're the guy working in the mailroom, serving you your lunch, or the CEO of the company. Treat people with respect, and they will treat you well back and that starts to evolve. And that could build that, that could really grow your business into something absolutely insane. When you put your best foot forward, and you're constantly thinking about treating people with respect.

Joy Nicholson: 04:10

Yes, a beautiful cover. I really love that. And it is so incredibly true what you say because you put, you get back what you put out there. It's a complete fact. So, what is, like, say you starting out in business, for argument's sake, say starting out in business, and you're not exactly sure, you know, where, how do you start building relationships? Say you've got no following online, you don't have, you know, like, at least we're in a fortunate position with all our following. It took us a few years to get there. But you know, you get there eventually. So, how do you start building relationships? If you have nothing? You've got no following, no nothing? How do you start that, that process?

Miriam Steketee: 08:10

Well, I really think in the beginning, when you are building your business, sometimes I think we tend, social media is a gift and a curse. And I think sometimes, right, it's smoke and mirrors. Oh my gosh, they have so many followers, they must be doing so well. And they might not be because they're not engaging with their audience. They're not building relationships in the DM. Right? And so, if you are just starting out, I think you first, you have to start out with your immediate sphere of influence, your family, your neighbours, your best friends, people that are successful. We call that like your dream team list. Who are those people that if you could go into business with someone or someone that's really successful, that's almost scary to talk to send that message to them? Pick up the phone, Hey, would you meet me for coffee? Hey, would you do a zoom meeting with me? I just started this new business. I'm so excited about it. I'm so nervous, though and I really respect you. And I would love your opinion and any tips you might have for me. And people love being asked to help. People love getting compliments. So, the first thing you want to do is connect and compliment, right? Hey, I just want to say I respect you. You're so successful. I was actually nervous to reach out to you, but I bit the bullet and I did it. Would you meet me on zoom for 15 minutes, I'll send you a Starbucks gift card or whatever coffee or just having those first initial meetings. And then guess what's going to happen, as you start to share your business and your products and your service. They're going to give you ideas and successful people guess what they do? They give people referrals. They do. They want to help, they do. And so, when you go out there and you kind of make yourself a little vulnerable and don't ask for sales, compliment, connect, share what you have, ask them about what they're doing. Ask them for tips, what do you think I should do? If you have any ideas for me, you don't understand how much more I appreciate that kind of meeting than someone trying to pitch me.

Joy Nicholson: 10:17

Most definitely. Yeah, Yes 100%

Miriam Steketee: 10:19

Right now and just go through your phone, literally go through your contact list and go through every single person in your phone. Hey, I haven't talked to him in 10 years, it's, you know, it's Miriam. I'd love to, you know, catch up with you sometime, just have those relationship building conversations. Ask them, I always say, it's like a game of tennis, ask them a question, throw, you know, hit them the ball. Yeah, they're gonna ask you back, it's gonna go back and forth. Instead of getting nervous and getting your knuckles all white. Oh, my God, I have to pitch them, I have to pitch at the sale the right thing. No, it's just going to happen organically. And I got so much better at pitching my business, sharing my product and my opportunity. When I started doing that, and just like what you were saying, I'm like, I'm gonna pick up the phone to one person in my network. And I'm going to try to have one conversation every day. And that's the difference between the people that make it here and those that make it there. They're the ones that are having the meetings. And yes, now, especially now and then with the World Wide Web and the internet, you can have clients and customers all over the place. It's not just, no, no one's just retail really anymore, unless you have a localised, only business or restaurant. So, think outside the box, think about, you know, who do you know, in what places? Who do you know that are similar to you? Who do you know? Sometimes, I'm like, hey, I want to reach out to different demographics, hey I'd love to pick your brain about my business, I would love your feedback. I'm just being creative, but being humble, and complimenting people and asking for the meeting instead of pitching people. Because everyone's pitching someone these days.

Joy Nicholson: 12:14

And it's annoying, nobody wants to be sold to them.

Miriam Steketee: 12:16

It is annoying and no one wants to be sold on, oh, hey, girl, hey, you know, was wondering if you'd be interested in doing this? Like, who are you? What do you do? Right? So, instead, and I think going back to the social media piece, so let's just say you run out of your whole warm market, you've had all your, you know, your meetings, your introductions, your, your networking meetings. Start to build that audience, add value, what's your niche, start doing videos, you know, go in the stories, use the hashtags. These are all just free ways to get new followers, just because you get a new follower. Now it's like, hey, thanks for your follow. I'm going to start following you, too. How did you find me? What do we have in common? How can I help you? Just engaging with people in your social media sphere, the same way you do with your warm network. But those are people you're just starting to reconnect with, or get to know a little bit better to finally say, hey, I'd love to chat with you. And I've made some really cool connections and friendships with people online. Over the years, just by kind of being like, oh, they're clearly not, you know, have their own business. They don't want to do what I want to do. But I like them and I want to learn from them. So, a lot of times it's learning from other people.

Joy Nicholson: 13:42

And it's so amazing the type of relationships that one can build up these days. I mean, some of my best friends, I've never seen in my entire life, because they live in other countries. And it's just because we've just been connecting on a different level, using social media. And it's amazing how you can build that relationship by just reaching out to people. And I really love that approach. So, obviously, your avatar is important to you, because you basically mentioned it, you know, like reaching out and asking them, you know, the demographics, etc. What is your ideal avatar?

Miriam Steketee: 14:14

Oh, so I always say I think it's someone like me. Someone who's a mom who wants to work, who is driven, is probably a career woman. But also realises that she actually doesn't want to sit in a cubicle or an office till she's 65. And so it's people that are dreamers and doers. Many times it's, it's someone who is really busy. I tend to connect well with busy people, because I'm a yes person. I'm always going to say yes, it's actually something I'm working on to say no to things. Because when you have three kids, and a business, multiple businesses, a marriage and friends and all the things. Sometimes you have to learn to say no but find those people that are always saying yes, and that's probably my avatar.

Joy Nicholson: 15:09

Yeah. And it is amazing because if you say yes to something you have to say no to something else and it's finding that balance, especially with kids it's so hard, right? It's so

Miriam Steketee: 15:16

So hard and it's funny because I remember you know, when I had little babies it was easy to just say yeah, I'll do it, I'll do it, do it. But I mean as they start to get older you know you really, you kind of need to be there at bedtime more than when they were two. Even though at the time it felt hard to leave, they don't remember, right? But now it's like they ask for mommy and I feel like I want and I sometimes I feel like when I'm laying with my kid. My sons finally tell me something at that, you know, last moment before bed. Like, they finally gave me some boys, I have three boys, boys don't tell you as much, at least mine don't, right. What did you do in school today? I don't know anything.

Joy Nicholson: 15:58

Nothing.

Miriam Steketee: 15:59

Who did you speak with, no one. You know, the same kid every day. So, I don't want to miss those little, it's those, that little. Like, sometimes just picking them up from the sporting event and just having that 10 minutes of that ride just the two of you. And, and so, I like to have those, that, that special time and not always be on the phone. And having what I like to call, like, your hours of operation and I know now that from and I've been able to build this huge successful business that I can pretty much turn off my business from three till eight. I did it before when I was first building my business, I worked all the time. I'm sure, you know, you understand like Oh, they say entrepreneurship you work like nobody else for the first couple of years.

Joy Nicholson: 16:44

Oh no, definitely.

Miriam Steketee: 16:45

And no, you're not making a lot of money. Definitely not make a lot of money in the beginning. But now I'm able to set those boundaries and those, you know, right now I'm talking to you and you're in New Zealand and I'm in New Jersey in the United States. So, we had to, you know, find the time which is always interesting when you have an international.

Joy Nicholson: 17:06

It's hard. It was so hard. It's tricky.

Miriam Steketee: 17:06

Client, okay, always tricky. So, even Joy and I are like, oh my god, the kids are home and she is, like, sorry about it, I am a mom too. I'm like okay. Which is so nice too that I think during the last year and a half working parents, non working parents. Everyone sort of got a glimpse into everyone else's lives and I think we've all had a little bit more compassion for everybody. Including our teachers, including, you know, if you're a stay at home mom. I mean homeschooling my kids. Oh my gosh. It was hard and so, I think all of us have had a really rough time. But also just, now it's like enjoying the little things and, and still having that time with. It's always important to, you know, to put that phone away and to have that special time. Even though when you're, you know, working 24 seven in your business you have to remember to have that 30 minutes with your spouse, you know. To, to unwind and have a glass of wine and say how was your day, you know, because that happens sometimes too, you going to burnout

Joy Nicholson: 18:14

Yes. Oh most definitely.

Miriam Steketee: 18:16

You have to have, like, at least half a day off, work.

Joy Nicholson: 18:19

Definitely.

Miriam Steketee: 18:19

Right? I remember my husband said to me, I was like six months into building our business and he's like, I miss us. Like, we used to hang out at night and you know. I was working full time, we had the baby and then now I'm working at night, building my business on my computer. Networking and having my meetings and all the things. So, I remember Tuesday night was our night. I'm like okay, I'll give you Tuesday night, a way to watch a show, hold hands and you know, he was happy because it's important to, to not, you know, lose those, those valuable relationships. So, it's, it's just making sure that every piece of your time is taken, you know, is, is, is taken up with doing income producing activities or spending time with people that really count and matter in your life.

Joy Nicholson: 19:06

Yeah, no definitely and I completely relate with the date night. Because me and my husband, we have a date night on Friday nights, that's our date night. We don't always go out but, you know, because obviously we had some lockdown things too. But just spending time together, having a meal together, doing a takeaway and just spending time together and everybody that's close to me knows, they don't even try to book anything on a Friday. It's just not gonna happen. It's date night and I've got friends that's just, like, oh, what are you doing date night? Everybody knows it's my date night. And it's

Miriam Steketee: 19:33

Yeah, that's so, I'm for it. I mean, we definitely would do a date night on a Friday or Saturday, but you know your baby, or you have to schedule it. And I tell that a lot when I coach, a lot of my moms say you have to have that me time. You have to have an hour or two a week for your time, whatever that is, get your nails done, take the yoga class, go on the walk by yourself and then have that date night with your spouse. Because that's when things start to get rocky.

Joy Nicholson: 20:00

Yes. So, one of the things that you mentioned in your book or when I went and stalked you on Amazon and checked out your book. By the way, I'm definitely buying your book, it looks amazing. You were talking about, you know, achieving success, it really comes down to obviously relationships that we've been talking about. But it's a healthy relationship with yourself that breeds confidence. So, how do you start, obviously, self care and entrepreneurship, that's incredibly important, you know, eating healthy, exercising, having me time, you know, doing your meditation, whatever you do for me. But what is your, do you have, like a blueprint that you can share with the listeners on how to actually start building that confident relationship with yourself?

Miriam Steketee: 20:40

Yes, so I think it's important to work, you know, from the outside, in or the inside out, however you want to do it. But if you're not feeling comfortable on the outside, right, it's really hard to, oh, to build that inside of two. So, I know for me, like, after I had my first son, I could not lose the baby weight. And I, my clothes were not fitting, I didn't, I just felt like I really lost myself and my little sister who was single in the city, I was like, take me shopping. And we you guys, I didn't have a lot of money, we went to some consignment stores, thrift stores, I bought a couple of new outfits for so cheap. But sometimes it's just if you're not, if you're not the same way you were 10 years ago, and you're still trying to fit into the old pair of jeans, like maybe you were a size 30 and now your size 34. Like, go and get the size 34 pants, don't try to fit into your old clothes, don't try to, like, stuff that is a little baggy and loose just makes you feel better. If that's something you're struggling with, right?

Joy Nicholson: 21:50

Yeah.

Miriam Steketee: 21:50

Maybe it's your hair, maybe you're getting grays. Or maybe you're just looking in the mirror, and you're just not happy with what you see. Maybe it means you have to start exercising, right? I think sometimes we forget to do that. I mean, there's probably people that are watching, you're going to exercise every day, I need it. But a lot of people don't, and we start to lose, to gain weight, and then you don't feel good. So, take that hour every day. I don't care if it's at 6am.

Joy Nicholson: 22:15

Yeah

Miriam Steketee: 22:16

Or if it's at 8pm, you have to move your body every single day. For me, I have to pay someone, I am not that motivated. I will never push myself, I know that about myself. Growing up as a dancer, I always took classes. So someone pushed me and when I tried to take the dance class at home, I'm like, ahhh, 15 minutes in, I'm like, oh, you know, like, I'm just gonna go get that for a second. And so for me, I have to take a class, whether it's, you know, a group boot camp class, or even those nice zoom classes. I have to be in the live class or I will cheat. I know that now about myself. So it's like finding that feeling good about yourself, you have to work out, you just have to take care of your body. Right? So, that's, that, you know, the outside. I think the inside comes from personal development. Instead of scrolling on your Instagram, watching what everyone else is doing, watching, you know, David's birthday party, or like you aren't invited to this or you know, watching these skinny girls do their dances pointing to things you know, in their little bodies and you're scrolling, you're in the scroll hole. listen to a podcast, right? Listen to Tony Robbins or Marie Forleo or some people that don't even have nothing to do with your industry, you're nothing to do with anything. And take that in, because you're going to get something and for me when I started to listen to podcasts at the time, we had like CDs, and I would just find YouTube videos of motivational speakers. And that was something I never knew anything about. I don't know about you. But I just learned about this new personal development thing. My mind was blown, because I'm like, Oh my gosh, I've been feeling so bad about myself because I had this really terrible friend in my life, I have to get rid of her. And then I just realised that when I had the confidence in myself to go, I got to divorce my relationship with this friend who wasn't serving me for a long time. And I cut her out of my life slowly and I did it. I began to grow. So it's like, it starts with the confidence from the outside and then it's nurturing your heart and your insight and your mindset and then it's also getting rid of people in your life who are not making you feel good. It's toxic, you know friendships, toxic relationships, and it's just lit sometimes it's just a little toxic. Some even know there's sometimes that one person that's just always putting you in a bad mood or making you feel bad. Sometimes it can be your mom or your sister or family member which you can't really get rid of but you can slowly like in my book I talk about how to just slowly create distance. So if someone's always calling you, text them back, don't call them. Sorry, so busy, like they call you and wait two days to call them back. Whatever you do, don't follow through with the communication that quickly creates time and slowly, they'll either change because they realise I'm losing this person a little bit, or you will start to create distance and that's okay. And I've had to have those tough conversations with a really good friend of mine. And I finally realised like, you know, she was fighting with everyone, she always had drama attached to her and I was so sick of being a part of it. I'm like, this is not me. And what do they say? Like you are like the five people who talk to the most and now my circle is such a strong circle. I mean, I have so many people I talk to you and whether it's online or on the phone or face to face, but if if you don't love yet that and that, that circle of yours, you need to find a new circle most days to find the second circle that's going to fuel you. And I had to get rid of those friends who are naysayers, those people who, let's face it, like when people don't ask you about your job, or about your career, or your new business, Doesn't it hurt? Like you're in a conversation with someone? And you're like, How are the kids? How's work? How's this and they're talking and talking and you're just waiting for them to be like, Oh my gosh, I saw your Instagram that you launch that business, and then they don't ever ask. And I think that that's not right. That's not that's not someone I want to be around. I want people in my life that are supporting me and cheering me on. And I'm doing the same for that.

Joy Nicholson: 26:42

Yes, I completely 100% agree with you. And it's quite interesting. I don't know if you've had the same experience. I know firsthand of people who were actually married and ended up getting divorced or they lost themselves. I've lost a whole bunch of relationships, like friends, close friendships. And not not because I ended at these some had to have like I say, the tough conversations, but it just kind of fades away. Because you become amazing as your business grows, how you grow as a person, it just kind of happens automatically because you invest your time. Like I mean, I read a lot of books, and I invest my time.

Miriam Steketee: 27:18

All the time.

Joy Nicholson: 27:19

And it's amazing how you just grow in I guess you grow in confidence as your business grows. And unfortunately, your friend circles I don't always grow with you.

Miriam Steketee: 27:27

Because they're not doing personal development. They're not reading books, they're not doing all the things they don't get it and they're like, you've changed and I'm like no, I grew that

Joy Nicholson: 27:37

thing. Yes, yes. I think that's the secret word is you grew you didn't change you just grew you know? Yeah, definitely. I agree with you. So with your book, where can people reach your book?

Miriam Steketee: 27:50

You can find my book on Amazon. Yes. The secrets of dating your business and America. Thank you for my website miriamsteketee.com not gonna even spell it for you but you just Google me? Yeah, exactly. And I'm thankful to my husband. I was so excited to take my husband's name. I don't know it was something that excited me and now I'm like, why did I do that? And people are like, what's your last name? And I like oh my gosh, I Kushner before I was so cute. I want to know why we do these things right?

Joy Nicholson: 28:31

Because we love them.

Miriam Steketee: 28:33

I know and you want you know I mean most of my friends I mean it's so it's split 50/50 some team and it's just so easy now but anyway so Miriam steketee comm or on Amazon and you can find me on Instagram, Facebook, just find my name on there. And yeah, give tips and you can follow me and my journey and I absolutely love I have loved over the 10 years building my network marketing direct sales business I'm in the beauty business and growing the team and creating I think we have over 18,000 consultants on my team

Joy Nicholson: 29:14

That's awesome. Well done.

Miriam Steketee: 29:16

thank you and they just feel me and fulfill me and I literally wake up every day excited to work and people are always asking me What's your secret? What's your secret? How did you do it? How'd you do it? And I finally was like you know what, I have to put it down on paper it wasn't enough to just share some tips right?

It was because there there are steps to it all right, there are steps to sort of creating that falling in love with yourself and having that confidence to to then reach out to people and have the conversations and prospect people and talk to people and invite them to buy from you or join your team or or join your help you or partner with you or whatever that is and then my book goes into how to cultivate relationships and create a culture, in your organisation in your business on your team, that people, maybe they join because they want to make extra money or they want to make money, but they stay because of the community and the culture and that the growth that you get personal development that you get from being an entrepreneur, but sometimes being an entrepreneur is lonely, right, it's like, and that's why I love this business, because it's about it's about teamwork, and camaraderie, and I just absolutely love it. And I love sharing all my tips.

And I really think this looks really different. It's for anyone that you know, is starting a business, whatever kind of business that is to people that have a team already have employees or consultants or, or VA's, whatever that might be how to treat people, the way they should be treated. And, and, and never acting like you're above them. I have one chapter, it's called, you know, more we and less me. And when you talk to your team, when we talk people, it's about like, we can do this, and we're going to make this better, we're going to do that this is our vision, and I think you should do this, or you need to do this, or you need to do that, or this is how I do things. Right. It's that we're in this together. Yeah, I think there's something really, right, I think there's something special about, you hear about organisations where, you know, the CEO would walk around, you know, and go to the mailroom and go to the basement and talk to employees, and people didn't even know who he was and ask for feedback. What do you think about working here? Do you like it and people didn't even know he was a CEO, I forget which company this was, and it was so smart.

Because when you hear the same thing over and over again, it's about having that humility to ask, How can I do better? How can I make this better? I'm watching this show, Ted Lasso, have you heard about it, Apple TV show, and it's about this, I think it has a lot to do with this too. I just started watching it. But it's like a phenomenal. And this guy is asked to coach this to the soccer team in London. And he's never coached soccer before. But he creates incredible winning teams in different sports because he creates a culture, and he builds relationships within the team. And when the team is happy on the inside, they play better, right? And it's it goes with anything, new people are happy, and our people are feeling loved and appreciated, they're going to do more. And they're going to stick it out through the good and the bad and the ugly.

Joy Nicholson: 32:38

That's 100% true. And it's interesting, I was in a coaching programme at the beginning of this year. And it was a big chunk of the coaching programme. What that taught is How to Build Team relationships specifically within your team, and how to cultivate those relationships, because it's important. And that's how you get loyal staff and people working for you and like yourself, that are building up this network marketing team. It's, you know, building that relationship with people is really, really important. What advice would you have for somebody that is either sitting on a fence and they haven't started the business? Or they have a business, but they are stuck? What advice would you have for somebody on that?

Miriam Steketee: 33:15

Hmm, that's the magic question. I think it's usually something we talked about, which was, it's not the opportunity, it's not the business, something is stopping you in between your mind and you have to figure that out and write that out. It's usually a person, a lot of times it's someone in your life that you think is going to judge you. Because you're not going to judge yourself. You're trying to do something to better your life. You're right, you're trying to start a business or you started a business and you're stuck. But why are you doing this business because you clearly want something you're not fulfilled in whatever you're doing, whether it's monetarily or whether it's being fulfilled on the inside, feeling like you're impacting the world in one way or another. So I want you to ask yourself, who is it, what is it, what, what person or people? Is it that, that that are stunting you and it's funny, everybody has that person, it's a father or it's a neighbour or it's a friend or it's someone that you think might judge you when you post too much on Instagram or you do a video or you do something and ask yourself, does this person really matter? And if you can have a conversation with that person, you might even want to say, Hey, I'm stuck in my business. I love your advice. Because I trust your opinion, you know, what do you think? I'm really excited about this. I would love your support or any tips. Sometimes people you think are judging you and they're actually jealous that you're doing something out of the box. So true and that they didn't have the guts and the courage to do that. And so they become haters. But they're actually not a hater, they might actually just want to be involved in some way, sometimes. So I found for me, you know, I had a really good friend who was not buying products from me and was not supporting me. And it was like someone that was such a good friend that I had helped her out, I had supported her, her business, her jobs, she should have at least just bought something from me. And, then it turned out that she actually was jealous. When we talked about it, she was like, I want to do this with you. And so then she ended up joining my business, but it was like, I was, I kind of was nervous to talk to her about it because she was being a little negative. But meanwhile, she was just nervous to talk to me about her feelings about it. I don't know, sometimes it's just being open and honest. Like, it's complicated, but sometimes it's just like, hey, doing this business, I'm feeling a little bit stuck. I'm feeling unsupported by you about it. And I'm wondering why. You know, and they might say, I think it's a bad idea. I think you're this and this, and that, and you're gonna say, I'm so glad you told me, but I don't care, because I still want to do it, I'd really, I'd really appreciate your support. And if they still are negative, you have to distance yourself from them. And you have. And so that comes from the mindset of going Who cares? person, but sometimes it's someone that's really close to you. But I'll be honest, most times, it's not. A lot of times, it's like the people you know, your mom, friends, or some girls from high school or whatever, it's always something so silly when you actually say it out loud. Because everyone has a negative view. And having negative vibes when you start a business is out of their mind, because the only way you can really create wealth is by having multiple streams of income. Yeah. And it's, it's some, if they actually did some personal development, they would know that, exactly, it'd be like, good for you. Right? So there, so sometimes you gotta just push those people out. So anyway, going back and forth about it, but it's usually one or two people that you think are judging you, you have to figure that out, before you can move forward, because they're always going to be there.

Joy Nicholson: 37:23

Yes. 100% agree, and it is very true. And if I think about it, now, with my business, I had a similar thing. So yes, 100%, everyone

Miriam Steketee: 37:31

Has a similar meaning: there's always the one person you know, there's always that that, um, or there's the people that kill it in the business and do amazing things because they didn't have that person, or they got rid of them a while ago. You know, yeah. And it's really having a support system. And if you don't have a good support system, you have to find it. Maybe it's going, you know, following people on Instagram or networking or going on LinkedIn, or, you know, just asking for referrals, or who's really good at x and finding a power partner, someone else that's in your industry that you can bounce ideas off of.

Joy Nicholson: 38:10

Yeah, no, definitely. It is. And it's very true. Just reaching out to people like we started with this conversation, just having this initial conversation that goes right. Yep. room. This has been fantastic. Thank you very much for your time. Can you just hold your book up one last time so we can revisit it? Thank you so much. And I strongly recommend you guys go out and go and get Miriam's book. I'm definitely going to go get it right off to school. And yeah, and we'll definitely put the links below so you don't have to worry about typing it out. We'll just make it easy. Thank you so much, Miriam. I really appreciate your time. This was really a lot of fun.Thank you. Thanks.