I am getting a slew of messages asking if I am going to “Hoopla”–Keep’s national convention. Short answer is NO.

Long answer is this…I have been to 14 national conventions for direct sales companies. I think in all but two of them, I have been recognized for being one of the top in the company (so I felt like I had an obligation to attend). In fact, TWICE (at two different companies) when I finished #1 in certain categories–I wasn’t planning on going. One required a call from the president of the company, explaining to me why I “had” to go, and the other was when I was asked to be a trainer too, and felt an obligation to go.

The truth is, these conventions cause me a lot of stress, and I do not enjoy them. Simply put, to me, it’s like prom for middle-aged women, with everyone posting their trial manicures a month ahead of time (I kid you not–makes my head explode), their dress options, what stiletto shoes they are thinking of wearing, etc. Well, when you don’t do your nails (because you do art that trashes them), you are lucky if you can find ONE dress that you don’t look like a blimp in, and shoes with heels higher than an inch makes your bunions throb…well, you feel like the toothless hillbilly at the Miss America pageant.

When I was with a previous company (NOT THE ONE I AM WITH NOW)…thousands of women would be in attendance, and during the awards portion, when women would be on the jumbotron in the arena, women in the audience would be making snotty, catty comments about their weight, clothing choices, etc. That made an impression on me, and instead of thinking about how cool it is to have worked my ass off and be on stage being rewarded for it, I was fixating on what would everyone be saying about me…if I didn’t have the perfect outfit, if I gained a lot of weight since they last saw me, etc.

In fact, in 2011, I had gained considerable weight since the previous convention, so two weeks before, I got my hair cut into what ended up being the haircut from hell. I thought if I hacked all my hair off, the catty women would gossip about that, and not how fat I got in the past year. In 2012, I knew I was going to be featured a LOT at the national convention, and I lost 65 pounds before so I wouldn’t be so self-conscious. It wasn’t healthy, and I didn’t keep it off, but it was one less thing to worry about being gossipped about.

I was talking to my sister this morning about the fact that I was actually HAPPY and proud of myself for sticking to my guns, and not being pressured into attending Hoopla. I said, “Remember all the times shopping for those damned dresses, and what an ordeal it was?” And she replied, “YES!!! We’d have to be looking for dresses with sleeves in the middle of summer, because you would never show your arms!” I laughed–I had forgotten that.

Another thing that always gave me panic attacks is feeling responsible for everyone on my team enjoying themselves and getting something out of the convention. On the average, I would say I spent at least $1500 to attend each year–I am assuming it costs everyone else that too (the attendance charge, airfare, hotel, outfits, etc.). When you are a leader, it costs even more with team gifts, team dinners, etc. I would feel like I had to make sure everyone was fired up, everyone was excited, and everyone was enjoying it. And frankly, I suck at being a cheerleader and a mom to dozens of women over the course of three to four days. I am too transparent to be able to be all cheery to the team back-stabber and the team drama queen and the team moper for several days. I take everything personally, and it’s just not a good mix when you have all that going on.

I realize that national conventions are GREAT for most attendees. I understand that it boosts business, after thousands are fired up. I think if you are in direct sales, you really DO need to attend them at some point.

All I am saying is *THIS* 50-year-old didn’t want to have to feel pressured to buy a bunch of outfits that I will never wear again, get a manicure on my stubby, broken nails, and put a perma-smile on my face for four days. I am wired a certain way that I always do my best, so attending a conference isn’t going to fire me up. I had no desire to squeeze into Spanx two sizes too small in the hopes that I didn’t look like an Oompah-Loompah, hobble around on stylish, uncomfortable heels, and pretend to enjoy doing a “conference dance.” I will miss seeing the new jewelry, learning some new things, and seeing friends from around the country who I only see at the incentive trips and convention. Frankly, I won’t miss the panic attacks I have every year over it.

I have to say, I debated putting this out there–and instead answer my messages with some phoney-baloney reason why I wasn’t going, but that’s not me. And honestly, I know there are other women who feel stressed about it, feel inadequate and upset that they aren’t part of the cliques, and feel like a beluga whale among flashy, colorful fish. I just want them all to know they are not alone. I finished #1 in FOUR different companies…and I felt that way every damned national convention. You are not alone. Next year, if I go, all the “beluga whales” are welcome to hang with me. In the meantime, this beluga whale will be hanging out in my pottery studio in my sweats, with a messy bun, surrounded by cats who don’t care how fat I am or what I am wearing, or asking for any words of wisdom. They don’t care…and this year, neither do I.

I have to apologize. It’s been almost a month since I have written.

I’d like to say it’s 100% because I work in direct sales, and you all know that this is our BUSY TIME…gift giving, holiday deadlines, etc. I could write about it and make it sound convincing, since most of you live through that every year.

But, I’d be lying. I haven’t written because this past month has been the one year marker of when a lot of things were changing in my life–a time when a lot of big decisions were being made, and every time I would reflect back on it, I’d get more and more angry.

I’d love to say I have been quiet because I am trying to follow the old adage, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all…”, but that would be a lie as well. Those of you who know me know I am a huge believer of always being painfully honest, and I never hold back on saying what I think (gee, have you seen my Facebook page?!?).

There is a time and a place to say what’s on my mind, and unfortunately, now is not the time.  I want to see how this whole thing ends up playing itself out. The story is not done.

So, I am going to review 2013 generically, and instead focus on what I learned in little blurbs, and those blurbs will become full posts down the road. There were so many lessons crammed in this year, too many to make a singular post. It would fill a book, literally.

So, I did my last party for the company I was at for almost 9 years the first weekend in January. I cried the whole way there–it was an end of an era, and I could not tell anyone. I have to be honest, my past hostess showed up as I was wiping tears away in the driveway as I arrived, so I did tell her, and she was shocked. Very supportive, but shocked. It felt so strange doing a party, knowing my heart was not in it and I was done. I am a very passionate person, and to go through the motions was not my style at all.

I resigned from that company January 8th, and the storm that hit immediately after was just mind-blowing, to say the least.

All throughout my decision process, I had confided in my “best friends” in that business. One, in fact, was intimately involved in the process, as she “interviewed” with them as well. And all along, we all said repeatedly that a job does not define our friendships. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I am friends with people because I enjoy them, not because of what they can do for me.

I quit. The phone was ringing off the hook so much immediately afterwards that my husband suggest we leave the house for a while, and go out for dinner and drinks, leave the cell phones at home, and ignore them all. It was not going to change my decision, and having people express concern and want to “help” when the time for that was three months earlier when I asked for it and it fell on deaf ears was just adding insult to injury.

It’s funny how much people want to all of a sudden get involved and “help” when their paycheck is affected. I asked for help in September. Not only did I not get it, but the people who I literally called in tears asking for help on the situation that ended up making me leave never even called or followed up to see if the situation was ever rectified.

Again, anyone who knows me knows I am a very black and white person. What is right is right, what is wrong is wrong, and I don’t care how much money is involved. I don’t care if the person who is wronged does one show a year on my team–I’ll go to bat for them if it is warranted–and I have.

All the actions on the night of January 8th showed me I made the right move. It hurt like hell to see it play out, but it was the right move.

On January 9th, I got a call from one of the two gals I considered a great friend and business mentor in some ways. We cried on the phone for a couple hours, and knew nothing would be the same, but still had intended on maintaining some friendship. It meant the world to me that she called to see how I was doing the day after the storm. I’d like to think that was done out of a good place in her heart. Considering she did something that ended up resulting in a lawsuit in this whole mess, I am not sure. But that’s what I would still like to think.

Out of respect for a big event that my former zone was having that weekend, I did not announce what I was doing for my next job–I would do that once their event was done. I figured everyone would gossip about me quitting and the new company I was going to instead of focusing on the training at the event, so I announced nothing. It turns out, that didn’t matter. They all gossiped anyways.

I announced on the morning of January 14th that I was doing this new business. I was served legal papers at 4:30 that same day. People asked me all throughout the year “what I did” to get sued. Well, do the math. I had NO non-compete. Had not recruited one person yet. ZERO. And was served papers 8 hours later that gave me until 9 AM on January 16th (MY BIRTHDAY, thanks, and happy birthday to me!) to “cease and desist.”

So, at 8:50 AM on my birthday, I responded I was not going to NOT WORK. And I WAS going to honor my manager agreement. That should be the end of the story. It was not.

The next five months were a blur of legal papers, lies, and things that had someone told me would happen, I would never had believed it. Some days I sat in my office and laughed, some days I cried. I laughed about the really pathetic email communications going out, demonizing me…telling everyone they were required to “unfriend me” and have no contact with me. I laughed because this actually was a better recruiting tool than anything I had in my arsenal. People who never really knew me were all of a sudden messaging me, asking what the big fuss was about, and asking me for information about joining my new team. As long as they were not in my former upline or downline, they could join my team…and did.

I cried when I learned who my real friends were. They certainly were not the people I thought they were. That was the toughest lesson of the year. When push comes to shove, and dollars are involved, people will carry whatever water they are told to carry, regardless of the truth. That was tough for me–because I am not like that at all. Of course, unlike a lot of these other ladies, I have a husband who is actually the breadwinner, and I can stick to my morals and beliefs at all times and not worry about it affecting my ability to put food on the table or a roof over my kids head. I actually would try to rationalize their behavior when talking to my husband about it, and tell him I “understood” why they had to do what they did–not that I agree with it, but I “get” it. He always disagreed with me and said I was just making excuses for them, but I have come to realize that not everyone is like me, and some people won’t rock a boat regardless of what they believe to be right or wrong. I always will. Some people don’t like to stand out. I always have been the black sheep, so I don’t care. I embrace it.

Fast forward to this fall. New catalog. AMAZING pieces. For me, 46 parties on the books from September 11th thru October 31st.  And 10 days into a launch, your company is shut down.

JUST

LIKE

THAT.

Everyone has their theories on what happened. And I can tell most of you that you are wrong. Did I ever get looked in the eye and told specifically what happened? No. But I am the most persistent  person you will ever meet, and it took actually minimal legwork to connect some obvious dots. I can tell you that I was told repeatedly that money was never an object in this. And I believe that.

BAM. Hundreds of women out of work.

What really bothered me the most was there were a lot of women in Canada at this company before *I* came on board. And it killed me for them to get caught up in this and lose their jobs. That just was not right, and still pains me. Really GOOD WOMEN. They did not deserve to be a casualty in some big chess game.

Another lesson I learned…and I have a LOT of anger about this one. A LOT. I am not going to lie. At some point, mid-summer, I was feeling a little bothered about how some things were being handled (or NOT handled) at my company. At the same time, I was talking to a couple REALLY BIG NAMES at my former company. Had they left, a big organization would have tumbled–they were key managers and without them, top people did not have their required levels under them. As much as (after everything that happened January-May) I would have liked to see that happen, I had to stop encouraging anyone from quitting a big job, and making a move to join me…not until I felt 100% confident things were being handled in a way I felt was proper.

I learned this is not about RECRUITING. It’s about affecting people’s lives on SO MANY LEVELS. You don’t just willy-nilly encourage someone to join YOU to bump up your worth, if you know the house you are residing in is not up to par at that time. Not if you have ethics and morals. There is a John Mellencamp line in a song that always stuck with me, “The beds are made, but there’s no sheets on.”

You do not invite people to sleep over if there are no sheets on, so to speak.

There were so many people I was talking to in the last couple months, and I kept telling them to wait for the new catalog, new starter kit. In reality, I was waiting to see if the sheets were going to be put on the beds. *I* can put my head down every night with a clear conscience that I did not bring someone in when I was not comfortable with things, with the sole purpose of bumping my worth up. I wish everyone would have applied that to their recruiting/hiring. That makes me incredibly mad/sad. I find it unconscionable to fly a bunch of women up from another company, roll out the red carpet, have them come on board, and pull that rug out from under them a month later. These women have kids to feed. They have tuitions to pay. You do not mess with people like that. Well, maybe you do, but in the long run, it will bite you in the butt, and I think I see that happening now.

So, 2013 sucked in so many ways. I got to see a side of this business that is revolting. I got to see behind the curtain and see how the Wizard actually operates, and it was so disappointing. It’s not the roses, sunshine, unicorns and u-rah-rah stuff we all see at conferences. This is a big BUSINESS. It’s not a sisterhood (don’t let anyone lie to you about that). It’s not a “family”–unless you share DNA, you are NOT part of their family.

On an up note, now that I have seen all of this, and had so much of it happen to me personally, I approach my business much differently. I have to. I am a firm believer that it is okay to make a mistake, as long as you learn from it. Was it a mistake to leave my former employer? NO. I needed to. Was it a mistake to join that other company? No, I was so involved, I got to learn a lot of things that most women never get the chance to learn.

I did learn this year what ACTUALLY MATTERS.

I have the MOST AMAZING hostesses/customers/friends who have followed me to THREE businesses in one year. THREE! Most women can’t get people to have parties with them with ONE COMPANY. I am blessed with some incredibly cool women in my life.

I have the most amazing husband and son who know this year was awful, but they always tried to do their pep talks, always were supportive and  always were there.

I have my health–when I have three friends going through chemo right now, that really puts it in perspective.

And I still have a great job that I really enjoy. I love going into people’s houses and meeting new friends. There is not a week that doesn’t go by where I don’t meet at least one new person who I genuinely enjoy and cultivate a new friendship with.

So, onward and upward. 2013 was full of life lessons. 2014 is the year to apply them all.

Happy New Year!