I am so excited to be joined today by Micah Folsom, she is the host of the Do Your Crap podcast. She was a customer in Beachbody for four years, and then she became a coach in Beachbody after she had her first baby. How? She started off doing insanity, and even though she liked it, she wanted something fresh. So, Micah went to Instagram and saw Beachbody. She started following a girl and that’s when she was first introduced to superfoods. She loved it but at the moment it was expensive for her. That’s when she discovered that you can get a discount if you sign up as a coach. 

“I didn't know what I was doing. I just knew that I wanted to pay for my shakes. So I had a goal. Find three friends. So I shared that I was gonna do a group and I wanted some women to do this with me. And things got rolling. And I literally just figured the next step out as it came. I got lots of people who didn't answer, but then I got some people that were ready to go and wanted to do it. I didn’t even know how to sign someone up. So, I had to figure it out. And that's basically how I built my business for eight years.” 

What do you think it was that made you want to like to sign up with your upline sponsor? 

“Well, you know, well, first it was her abs. And I'm not saying you have to be physically fit to be successful. But she put herself out there. And she clearly had done some work. She was a product of the product. And wherever I was feeling in a funk, feeling frustrated having postpartum baby weight to lose. That was like, Okay, this girl is walking the walk. So let's freakin go. So that's what made me talk to her to send me some info. And then she was just a real human-like, she was so kind. We had our conversations, she was excited to help me and I just trusted her because she was the product of the product.”

I love that and it's like the rest is history. But it's just crazy to think that over eight years like that, especially someone who's as successful in the business as you in it, you've had to overcome some things to get there. And it wasn't just smooth sailing the whole time. What are some of the hardest lessons you've had to learn in this industry and overcome to get to where you are?

“Fear of rejection was huge. I read John Maxwell's 15 invaluable Laws of Growth, and Go for No because that is when I was struggling with rejection. That totally shifted my mindset around rejection and around. I took it so personally, and I learned that it's not about you. It's not what you can get. 

Another one was sharing myself openly. It was also fear of judgment. I was very vanilla on social media because I didn't want to offend anyone, I didn't want to, like, brush any feathers. I remember I was listening to Jasmine star, and she talked about how you don't want to be vanilla because then you're not talking to anyone. If you're trying to talk to everyone, you’re not talking to anyone. So I began taking small steps to show myself as I am. I got to be okay with people not liking me. I got to be okay with not being their favorite flavor. As soon as I just didn't care anymore and was like, I'm just gonna be true to who I am, and share my message and share my heart and who it aligns with, if it doesn't, that's great, too. Showing up got so much easier. And so that was a big roadblock that I had to get through.”

Yes, and I know that a lot of people in Beachbody Listen to this. What would be something that people would be surprised to know about your journey in business? 

“It could be that I've actually enjoyed every season. I know that lots of people feel that in order to get to the top or in order to be successful, you have to sacrifice all these things in life and you have to give up all this time with your family and you have to stop doing all this stuff and dedicate that's never been the case for me. And I'm not saying that I have not worked freaking hard. In the early years in my business, I was every crack I had was filled with intentional activity for my business every crack. So I got really good at being like okay, I got 10 minutes here. Let's send some invites. I got 20 minutes here. Let's go connect with some people. But it wasn't reporting seeing my family time, it wasn't taking place of the time I had with my kids. It was replacing the fluffy crap that I had in my life before that wasn't moving our life forward. 

Then, as things progressed, I was like, Okay, I don't really want to feel like I have to be on all the time. So I was on all the time for a few years, doing all of the things myself, mommy, cleaning the house, doing my business, like everything. And then I'm like, maybe there's a different way. So then I started delegating housework. And once a month, like it started once a month, and then it started two times a month. And now I have a girl that comes every single week. Um, but that's the first thing I delegated. I'm like, okay, that feels good. So then I have, instead of cleaning, I can spend an hour playing with my kids. I'm like, All right, I'll switch that any day. And then I started delegating some of the kind of admin stuff in my business and stuff that didn't take my brainpower. Throughout the eight years, while we've continued to progress, and our income is growing every year, our impact on our team is growing. It's not because we're sacrificing more, or I'm spending more time. I work less time now because I work way smarter than I did in the beginning. And we've continued to grow. You should be learning how to innovate and how to work smarter, and how to delegate what doesn't take your brain capacity and your zone of genius, and pouring into the stuff that you love that fuels your heart that feels your soul. And that's how you continue to have fulfillment in something doing it for so long.” 

Yes, I love that. And it totally inspired this next juicy question. Being at the top of the company, what do you think is the biggest misconception about what it's like getting to the top of being at the top?

“You know, sometimes you hear like, ‘the top is lonely,’ but it's never been that way. The further I progressed in my business, the deeper my friendships became, like with teammates, leaders that were not in my organization, collaborating with people who essentially are your competition, right? We're all out there to get to help people to bring them into this ecosystem to change their life. But there's never ever ever been a feeling of competition, of negativity of anything other than collaboration, empowerment.”

Yes. I love seeing you collaborate with other leaders and you guys like bringing teams together. It's just so cool, fun to create that environment to foster growth and so many. And I know another question that I know people are thinking about, what does it take to get to the top, and that's kind of a big question. 

“I think first and foremost, it takes a clear vision of why you want growth and success and what that looks like. I never thought of success as a top Beachbody coach. Like what does that even mean? That was never in the cards. But I knew what I wanted for my family, I knew what I wanted for our life, I knew the memories I wanted to create, I knew I wanted a cabin on the lake with which I could create memories with my kids. And I didn't know how that was gonna happen. But as soon as Beachbody came into my life, it was so clear that this could be my vessel. And so I think for anyone who wants to create massive success in whatever industry you're in, you've got to have a clear vision of what you want in life, what you want in life, and then your career or your income stream, that's the vessel that's going to help you create that. And I think just being so emotionally connected with that is what drives everything else. You have to just be willing to learn, grow, fail, and look like an idiot willing to be a rookie, be a starter, be a beginner, And as soon as you commit to that, there’s no plan B. 

And I think that's what I see a lot is people want a big thing. As soon as it gets hard or frustrating, or, or doesn't feel good anymore, or whatever, they're really quick to take their foot off the gas, they're really quick to bounce, and are really quick to take some steps back. And you're just making it harder on yourself every single time you do that. So I think just being fully committed to what you want. And then understanding that it's going to take some learning as you go and all the things and expecting that and not ever even entertaining.” 

That's amazing. I love how you've been able to build a system that works for you, works for your business, works for your family so that you're able to be a mom when your mom and your business owner when your business owner because otherwise, without structure, then it really becomes a doozy. And I love that you just really normalize delegating a lot of those things and investing in things that need to be invested. I'd love to know, for you Micah, whether it's investing in things on the homefront or investing in things in the business, how do you know when it's time to invest? And how do you make that call?

“When I start to feel frustrated that I'm spending time doing something, that’s when I think that maybe this is something I can do or don't do. Could I play with my kids instead? I had two hours and I started thinking about whether I would spend it with my kids or do laundry and that’s when I started to realize that this is something that I can delegate. In business, It was leaderboards, it was recognition, it's email marketing, it's stuff that I didn't want to have to deal with. I love mentoring my team, I love spending time with my clients, I love being in the trenches with the growth process. That's not something I can ever delegate nor what I want to. But there's so much other crap that has to get done. But it doesn't have to be done by me. And so as soon as I start to feel like I don't want to be doing this. That's when I'm like, all right, Could someone do this 80% as good as me. And that's something that you need to hear because I held on to control for way too long. Because I was a perfectionist around how it got done, I was afraid that people would get messages that I didn't want to get messages, things like that. That's when I started delegating things within the business and went all-in on what I loved and what fueled my fire and what continued to help our team grow. And it's just fun. It's fun and joyful, and so essential for anyone wanting to actually grow a business.”

So true when it comes to investing, right, a lot of the things that I hear from people are like, I'm not making enough money to invest, or I'm not successful enough to warrant investing. How do you approach that whether you're talking to your leaders, or how you talk to yourself when you were first starting to do that?

“I felt like that at the beginning. It’s easier when you delegate stuff that you don’t like doing or that people can do way better than you. But, it’s harder when you do know how to do the stuff and you enjoy it. You just don’t have time for it. That’s when you start to think “is it really worth it?” But, then you have to remember that time is money.”

Listen to the FULL episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify to learn more about how Micah balances her work, and life raising her kids and building an empire.