Selling without selling your soul

Welcome to the Sole Proprietor Podcast.

I'm Kirk Kempton.

And I'm Melody Edwards.

Each week, we dive into the ethical questions that keep entrepreneurs awake at night.

Whether you're building your own company or exploring life's big questions, you are welcome here.

Melody.

I'm really excited about today's topic.

It's probably as far as topics go.

I've literally hinged my entire professional career on this one topic.

Me too.

I'm excited.

All right, so a summary to the audience.

Today we're going to be talking about selling, as every entrepreneur does, without selling your soul.

Mellod, what does that mean to you?

Well, for me, what that means is that I'm just a nice person who wants you to come to me as a person who has a need and, trust me, want to work with me without me having to sell you on anything.

Like, that's my ideal version of sales, is having somebody just come to me as a referral, essentially say, yeah, I'd love to help you.

And with almost no pushback.

Nothing at all.

Because honestly, Kurt, that was my whole life in business.

Before home service VA was just.

I never had to sell.

It was easy.

They came to me and I didn't know.

I had no idea how lucky I was.

Yeah, you were lucky.

That's.

I had a cleaning company, and that was definitely not the case for me.

I don't know.

I knew how to reach my people the right way, I guess.

And I'm a weirdo.

But.

No, that implied that you didn't know.

We are different areas of the country.

No judgment there.

That's okay.

You did not hurt my feelings.

I know that you're a weirdo, and I know that I'm a weirdo in our own different ways.

Yeah, well.

Well, here's the thing.

When I started home service va, I assumed it would go pretty much the same because that's all it had ever been for me.

Like, people just came to me, and then I just helped them, and that was not my experience.

It turns out that you actually have to, like, not only talk to people, you have to show them that you are an authority on the thing that you're talking about.

There's so many things that make me uncomfortable about selling that I have been battling through for the past six or seven years, consistently more than that, but it's my biggest struggle.

Although I will say now I'm good at the when people get in front of me part now, even if they don't fully know me, I'm still struggling with, really marketing, which is also sales.

You're selling to people who don't even know you at all.

So that's my main struggle now is the marketing aspect of selling.

What about you?

I look at good marketers and I go, wow, they're just really great liars.

Yes.

Oh, my God.

Yes.

It's awful because it means that I can't, because I'm like, but I don't want to be a liar.

Yeah.

But that in itself is actually not a truth either.

Marketers do have to make things look bigger.

Enlarge texture.

Right.

For your cereal box.

They've got to make the magic of Disneyland seem bigger.

Right.

Like, I do get that a big part of marketing is enlarge to show texture.

Objects and mirror may seem closer than they actually are.

But, you know, that's a whole other dilemma.

And I think it's important that our audience knows that about me before I talk about.

My eternal dilemma is that I am always afraid that if you read between the lines, I look dishonest.

And so sales and marketing, both, while you're busy preaching the goodness of what you do, knowing that you're not perfect, there is a lot of margin for that very thing where you seem.

You oversell.

You seem better than you actually are.

And that comes across as disingenuous or maybe unauthentic.

And those are big concerns for me, which, as I've said to you before, Melanie, being disingenuous is the exact opposite of what I'm trying to accomplish in my life.

And therein lies my eternal struggle where I may need a therapist.

And today, Melody, you will be my therapist.

Probably not qualified, because you're basically in the same echo chamber as me, but I do think that both of us have a beautiful ability to see things from multiple perspectives.

And even though we know we struggle in a certain area, we can see where there's room to improve.

So I don't think that what we're going to do today is create an echo chamber.

What we're going to do today is try to find the doors in the room that we can open that will align with our beliefs that will free us into new and better ways of being an entrepreneur.

Yes.

And that does require therapy.

And I will gladly be your business therapist today.

You and I have been in a space in business where we've known people long enough that have marked.

We've bought things from people we've been marketed to for so many different things, services.

And we've experienced the disappointment of buying something we were told it was going to Be magical.

It ends up being just regular and not magical at all.

And sometimes it's worse than regular.

And that's the worst.

And that's where the conditioning, I think, that you and I both have come to know is that conditioning of, ah, this happens.

I've been a victim of it, and I don't want to do anything like that.

Well, because we're both trusting people.

This whole problem, as I start to think about it, the scale of it is so large because it's about trust.

Like, if somebody says something to me.

I was raised in such a way that I believe authority.

I grew up in a way that you trust not only authority, charismatic authority.

And for me, it's just my norm that I.

And I've been tricked over and over again because I. I'm like, well, they wouldn't say that they're really, really good at this thing or that this product will change my life if it wasn't true.

And they're saying it, like, with passion.

So obviously it's correct.

Correct.

So what is your experience with buying things from other people when that's happened to you?

Okay.

Yeah, I. I want to come back.

I'm going to answer your question, but I just want to note to myself to come back to this charismatic authority.

I think this will be an opportunity for us to both talk about our religious upbringings.

Yeah.

Because ironically, I actually am less likely to believe someone who's charismatic.

Interesting.

Yeah, it'll.

It'll be a fun conversation that will fit very well into the.

What we're going to talk about later.

But anyway, my experience was growing up is that we didn't have a lot of money.

And it's a weird scenario today where kids grow up and they have things and they expect that the moment they launch, they're going to have all the things and then it'll just go up from there.

I grew up in a house where I. I think jealous is probably an okay word.

I went to school with kids that I was jealous of that had a lot more things.

So when I launched my life, it wasn't.

That wasn't a hard thing that I struggled with.

What I was taught, though, growing up, not in terms of, like, systematic programming, but in terms of observation and just having a, you know, a care for my.

My parents is that people who sell you stuff are manipulators and people who buy stuff are the manipulated.

Now, I didn't believe that at every single level.

I believed it at sort of a generalized level.

Yeah.

Just to give you a quick sampling Just so you know who you're dealing with here.

I remember that my parents said, saved up for ages to take me.

Ironically, we're talking about magic of Disneyland.

They took me to Disneyland.

Now my, my mom's sister lived in Anaheim at the time and so it was cheap for us to stay because we could stay at their house.

We all cramped into like one big living room area.

We brought our sleeping bags and we drove there.

And then we're gonna get in.

And this is when getting into Disneyland was, you know, still relatively expensive, but not like.

And, but I remember just being so hyped going to Disneyland.

This is I.

People like us don't go to Disneyland, you know.

And I got there and my aunt saw the shoes I was wearing and she said something to my mom like, you're going to make him walk around all day in those shoes.

I was very young.

I'm going to go ahead and just throw a number out there.

I know it's not exactly eight years old, but I was in that eight year old range.

And I knew at that age that my mom was now pressured to make a decision to buy me new shoes in order to get the approval of her sister.

So we went to a Payless shoe store, which is the only place we would ever buy shoes.

Payless shoes, same.

My mom bought me a pair of XJ9 hundreds.

They were designed to look just like Jordans, but they're made out of plastic.

I remember just guilt ridden like, mom, these shoes I have are fine.

I don't need any new shoes.

I'm athletic.

I could run around all day.

I don't need new shoes.

And she's like, no, we're gonna get you new shoes.

We're gonna be standing on our feet all day.

You know, I want to take care of your feet, Mom, I don't need new shoes.

I really don't.

I really don't.

I went home just bawling my eyes out, thinking that my parents already making this massive sacrifice to get us here.

Gosh, I can already feel the emotion coming over me right now.

I'm going back in time.

And I remember coming home in the car and just being like, mom, please just return these, I don't want them.

And I just laid in bed crying, thinking that I had put my parents through something.

They were trying to do something nice for me and they got punished.

Now I'm only telling that story to inform you of the fact that when I was an entrepreneur, that same little 8 year old kid grew up into an adult thinking that he was making a way for himself and making honest dollar.

And I find myself selling a window cleaning or a pressure washing job, my first ever opportunity.

And all of a sudden I felt like a charlatan.

It's terrible.

It's funny.

You chose 8 as your year and, and I relate to so much of what you just said because I definitely felt, I didn't ever feel poor, but we grew up in a housing development till I was about 12 and we definitely were poor.

And then as my parents got older, because they were very young when they had me, so that immediately puts them back a step.

And then they did better as time went on, the life of my parents, they did.

My parents did too.

Yeah, exactly.

So like that's kind of like the curse of being the oldest also of young parents.

But When I was 8, I was in a cult and so.

Oh yeah, it was.

Oh wow.

Yeah.

Maybe between the ages of 8 to 10 or 11.

It was a charismatic Christian evangelical church.

It was definitely a cult because there's a support group online for it.

The leader was very charismatic.

All the things that on the checklist.

But most importantly, when we left, we were cast out and we lost every single human that we knew and that had been a part of our life every day because we lived and breathed at church.

I was just talking to my dad about this recently and so that was kind of my life with my parents.

A lot of the time when they were younger is they were seekers and they're kind of charismatic seekers in a way.

And I'm a follower of the seekers.

The way I described it is they'd kind of be like on a path forward.

They believe in this thing.

And then suddenly I'd still be going for the like, no, we're going this way now, you know.

But I'm still kind of following the thing.

It took me until I was really old.

I mean, like I've always gone on my own in many different ways.

I moved out of the country when I was young.

Like, it's not like I followed the, the thing all through life, but that young 8 year old version of us is very, very open and susceptible to carry things with us for the rest of our life.

And so I've always felt it is a special age.

It's an age where you haven't got to become a teenager to where you've rebelled against your parents.

They're still kind of the, you see them for what they are as far as like providers and lovers of you and sort of your biggest cheerleaders.

And you haven't really developed probably at that age yet.

Friends.

That will give you other perspectives into the world of how it might be in other bubbles that other people live in.

Even if you do hang out with friends a lot, it's just such a.

It's such a metered.

Yes.

Age.

So, yeah, I. I mean really for today's topic of selling without selling your soul, you can see that I truly do need therapy.

But it's very complicated.

Yeah.

But what I did, you know, as far as my story goes, I got married young.

I was married when I was 21.

Rachel was 19.

We had a baby.

We got pregnant eight months later.

So we had a baby.

Not within our first year of marriage, but, you know, dang close.

And then I was trying to provide, you know, and protector provider.

Those are important things for me.

And I went out thinking that it was just going to be about working with my hands and doing good, honest work.

And I literally created a software to systematize and automate the selling part of my business.

And I wouldn't have told you this at the beginning, but I will tell you now that not only did I feel like the most massive fraud as I was out selling window cleaning jobs to people who literally called me to come sell them a window cleaning job.

Yes.

Like as a poor person who pays to have their windows cleaned, that's crazy to me.

Did you give the rich person best friend discount at times as well?

Obviously, because I need to make sure they're my friends.

And so yes.

But obviously I automated past that and that was a big revelation for me.

What I learned in those first years was that I loathed, and I use that word intentionally, going to those places and offering people the value that they were asking me to provide.

It turned out that if you just listen to what good honest salespeople do and then just systematize it, which is what I ended up doing.

And then it turned into my whole software company.

What I found is, is that can build a system that's really, really true to your authenticity that follows a system and you find out that the buyers actually really value a great buying experience.

What I'm really excited to talk to you about today is how charisma and how sharing your value stack and how all the.

We're going to talk about some technical terms, how all of that actually is used not to manipulate someone who came to you with a specific problem looking for a solution, but to persuade them to do something in their best interest that your company has systematically provided for.

And that's where that good, hard work comes into play.

You built something that genuinely provides a solution to people seeking those opportunities.

But you got to learn how to beat your drum properly so that the right people hear your music.

Yes.

So we'll.

We'll get into that.

But that's sort of where I'm coming from.

And, you know, it's weird to say it all in, like, this paragraph narrative because as I listen to myself, I think my company exists because I was chicken.

I was too chicken to do it on my own.

And I know there's people that use my software that are there for the same exact reasons.

And then obviously, it's fun to also have users of our software who.

Who just, you know, that's not where they're coming from, but they just need the system, you know?

Well, I mean, that's how I got to know you, of course, was using your software for the very reason that you talked about, because I understood that, you know, at what point do we, like, there's a lot of things in entrepreneurship where we're like, we have to become the best at this thing.

We can't let it, like, we're weak if we don't work through it.

Right.

And so people are just like, you just gotta sell.

You gotta learn to love.

You're.

You're selling.

Like, I've heard every reason in the book to love selling or to the reasons why I shouldn't care.

But what you're saying, and yet hearing.

It'S not the same as actually absorbing.

No, of course not.

But here's the thing.

At what point do you just find a solution that's outside yourself?

Yeah.

And that was responsibid.

And it did exactly.

Like, remember in the early years of your software, like, how it didn't actually quite work yet for where I live, as you were doing.

Oh, oh, oh, yeah.

You're like, hey, what about these crazy window styles?

And I'm like, in Arizona, in Arizona, we don't have anything.

Yeah.

I was like, a very early, enthusiastic adopter.

I look back to the early days.

I can't believe people paid me money for that.

Like, I genuinely thought it was the greatest thing ever.

Yeah.

Really did.

Yeah.

And then, like, in those early days, I look back and I go, wow, I just didn't have a clue.

Well, it's a good thing you didn't know, because it wouldn't exist.

I would have never sold it.

I never would have sold it.

Right.

But.

But the thing is, I trusted you.

Right.

Like, the way that you talked about the things The.

The whole, like, that's the thing.

If people look at you and me and if they actually see how we are in this world, I think we're pretty trustworthy people.

And people can trust that when we talk about something, we're not scamming them.

We're not.

But internally, that's the thing we struggle with.

Right.

And so I never thought, like, oh, can I trust this guy?

I mean, you did such a good job of explaining why it was cool, how it could work.

Cool.

You're the one who taught me about packages way back then.

Well, you're the person I listened to first about it, but it took me a couple more years to even feel the courage to try it.

And, of course, we both know that when you offer people things, it's surprising how many times, like, what they actually end up with has nothing to do with what they actually need.

Yeah.

It's just some people just want the best.

And we would never, you and I would never, like, take the best because of our, you know, in some ways, you know, conditioning.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But also, everybody's different and we assume based on our own upbringing, our own behavior.

You know, it's funny you say that.

Like, years ago, I actually used to, you know, always buy used computers just because a Mac.

Me too.

A year old is so much cheaper.

Yes.

And then, like, one day I was like, this is like, your cool, dude.

This is how you feed your family.

Yeah.

Get the good stuff.

And I walked in, I had this, like, sort of guilt of like, oh, I'm gonna spend, you know, extra, you know, fifteen hundred dollars to get the Muscle Power Machine.

And I walked out of there and I was like, good for you, dude.

Like, you're.

You're gonna get to work and not deal with problems.

Like, and that's actually remained true.

So it's funny, as I have moved into this, like, we had a guy come do our landscape.

We paid an ungodly amount of money for our landscaping, our.

Our new house.

And I'm like, I can't believe this is happening.

But, like, I see the value in what he's selling me.

Yeah, this is going to be gorgeous.

It's going to just be fantastic.

It's going to increase the value of my home by more than I'm paying this person.

Yeah.

So I was able to do all logical things to.

To make my emotional self pick chill pill.

In certain ways, I moved into the target market that I've served for so long, and I'm like, oh, oh, wait, so these people aren't Just throwing their money away.

They actually are buying insurance against all the problems that cheap skates like, I, you know, am in a lot of ways in my life that just deal with problems.

Yeah, they're just like, I would rather pay the money and not have problems.

Guess what?

You have auto insurance, right?

You got homeowners insurance.

Right.

It's buying their time.

They have money.

They are at a certain point in their life.

And this, it's like people who want these kinds of services value their time.

They also know, hey, I'm not the best at landscaping.

I hate being outside.

Not me personally, but I would rather pay somebody to do that for me or mow my lawn.

Like, it's buying back their time.

And so now that you and I are old, we get it, right?

Yeah.

I could not have understood when I was 20 something.

I couldn't.

I. I could never have imagined because I didn't have anything and I'd never really had anything before that, so.

Well, let's.

If I could, I want to move this conversation to our religious background.

That's something that I know this podcast is a little bit around, and I know there's a spiritual side to your religious beliefs, and I know that there's sort of the dogmatic side to the religious beliefs.

We've talked a lot about our upbringing.

We haven't talked publicly about this, you know, in this.

To this depth before.

And so I want to bring up to us and our audience a little bit about this idea of charismatic authority and charisma and selling, because I think that that's really important to me.

And I don't want to speak for you, but charisma is something that my psyche ties back to good and wholesome or yucky and manipulative.

So tell me if you would, a little bit about your charismatic authority experiences growing up and.

And even if you would share a little bit about, you know, I know when I tell you mine, I think people classify me as being a member of a cult as well.

So let's talk about the authority and change authority.

I love that we can talk about all this stuff.

So here's the weird thing.

I really, I'm such a weirdo with when it comes to spirituality, religion, all these things, I'm very like, I'll go and sing at church, and there's a couple churches locally, and sometimes people will ask me to sing.

So I'll go and sing at churches.

I'll attend services, sometimes my local congregational church, because it's like my little community church.

And I love helping Them at their dinners and, like, meeting all the people.

It's a community when it comes to the actual.

I was at church on Saturday because I had to go to a friend person's memorial, and it was a service.

You know, we talked about the person, but then they were preaching.

And so it's interesting that my experience in these situations is pretty much always the same.

And it might be because of this charismatic background thing.

Right.

And also, I didn't really have a choice of how I believed when I was younger.

We were.

We didn't listen to.

I missed all of the music of the 80s, which is why I love the music of the 80s.

I listened to only Christian music when I was up until about sixth or seventh grade.

Let's put a quick pin there.

Just, I think, for effect, is that in my church and I think in yours as well, we wait until the age of accountability, which is eight at our church, for you to be able to make decisions about joining or becoming baptized or whatever.

I think it's interesting we brought up the number eight several times.

That at the age where you are most impressionable.

Yes.

By the authority in your life, is when we've decided that, you know what, that's when you can make big, big, lifelong commitments, you know?

Oh, okay, cool.

Then why shouldn't I be able to choose my wife right now, too?

Well, you're not that ready.

Oh, okay.

Well, so what do you believe?

So anyway, I want to point that out, that as you're talking right now.

Yeah.

I don't know if we're allowed to.

At what age, Because I never was allowed to do anything.

I felt like.

So it really depends on your family, on your background, all of these things.

I really felt like, whatever.

Oh, listen, I hope my parents never hear this, but I love them so much.

But when my parents were at their most charismatic evangelical stage in that cult church, they were able to convince our neighborhood, some of the people in our neighborhood, that Halloween was evil and that kids should not go out and celebrate it.

You can imagine how popular that was with the kids.

And then even when I was allowed to go back out and celebrate Halloween and dress up and do the thing, there were some kids who never got to do that again.

And so, like, there was a lot of things that were weird.

Like, when I look back, I'm like, that's weird.

And I'll ask my dad.

He's like, oh, that's because of this thing that was going on behind the scenes, because there's adult things that are going on.

But I Don't know.

Like I was baptized, I think about five or six times from the age of.

Oh yeah, we were baptized like really young.

And then every time we were re baptized and there was speaking in tongues at certain points and that which I would try.

But I always felt extremely guilty because I knew that I wasn't speaking in tongues.

You're just, I was saying things.

We'll have to do an episode with Bobby Walker.

I know he's one of the brethren in his Pentecostal Church and they have a lot to add to that.

That's always been interesting.

Fascinating to me too.

I'll make a note here.

Talk about that, please.

Yeah, it was very confusing.

I don't think there was some, like general.

It depended what church we were going to, I guess was the rule.

But I missed, I missed.

I went to Christian school from first to sixth grade.

It was very small.

I didn't listen to, I didn't watch movies that were, you know, I once got to watch when I was in sixth grade, Dirty Dancing, which sounds like the most X rated movie you could ever watch, right?

Dancing in a dirty way.

I never, I, I, to this day, I've still never seen it.

I don't even know you're about to say.

Yeah, I don't even know if I was allowed to watch it.

I remember I was supposed to go to a sleepover where they were watching Dirty Dancing.

I don't actually think I did watch it then.

I think I wasn't allowed to.

I had to stay out of school when I went to public school.

When they did mythology, I wasn't allowed to learn mythology, which makes my conversations with my son and my husband, who are love talking about all of that stuff, very difficult and boring because I never learned most of it.

I know Zeus, so there's a lot of things that are weird, but I definitely had a relationship where I think it's just religious.

But I was kind of taught to be a servant of others in a way.

To serve others, to take care of others and not necessarily to think of myself first.

And that's a Christian, that's a Christian teaching.

It is.

I think I went and maybe took it too far because it came at the, at the expense of what's best for myself.

And it still does.

Yeah.

Oh sure, sure, sure.

So that isn't it.

I'm not just blaming it on religious beliefs that I, I now struggle with charismatic anything.

At the same time, Kurt.

I look at charisma as passion.

Like when I, I can be very charismatic with people.

But it's passion.

It's not, like, sleazy.

Does that make sense?

And I bet you you can, too.

You can.

I've seen you on a stage before, talking about something you really believe in.

Yeah.

The moment someone tells me you're charismatic, though, the first thing I do is like, oh, crap, did I ruin my whole talk?

Yeah.

No.

Yeah, you're right.

When I get passionate, things do start to change.

So what.

What was the role.

Let's talk about that.

What was the role of charisma in your personal faith journey?

Well, I mean.

Oh, right.

Because we're talking about faith.

I forgot.

Yeah.

Well, we're going to tie back to sales here.

Yeah.

But I. I don't want to.

I don't want to mix the two for yet.

Yeah.

I think that when I look back, it was really hard for me after I left that first, the church, the cult church.

I feel like I could trust anything.

And I also have to say, I never felt even.

Even what?

Even I wanted it with all my heart, but I never felt connected to Jesus or God, which is a huge problem.

I feel like there's.

And that comes from a very young age because I can think back and remember, and maybe I'll talk about reasons for that in the future, but I definitely struggled with that.

You know, I've already made a decision.

I've already made a decision that I hope you agree with.

Yes.

We're going to do an interview of me asking about your entire faith journey background.

Same for you.

Yeah.

And then you can interview me.

And what we'll do is we'll always be able to reference people to those particular podcasts when we need to.

That'll allow us to not have to repeat ourselves a ton.

Because this is deep.

Yeah.

This is like, a little too deep almost.

Yeah.

This might have to just go in that other episode.

Well, I think that for the purpose of today's episode, though, I am very interested in understanding, like, if you didn't have a relationship with Jesus or God, which obviously, as you said, that's very problematic.

Yeah.

You're not gonna be able to stand on your own of your testimony of.

Of this doctrine, these gospel, you know, stuff.

So it sounds like charisma is what you replace as this person is charismatic, I. E. Passionate.

You know, you're just kind of akaing it.

And therefore, I will stand on their passion.

Maybe I think it was more that I desperately wanted to believe.

That's the thing.

It wasn't that I didn't want to, or I was like, I Don't believe this crap.

That's not what it was.

And I still desperately want that.

I want to.

But the thing that people that I see, my friends experience, I don't.

And I think one of the things I learned from my parents is they really experience their love of Christ and God in a very passionate way.

They feel it, right?

They feel it through the music.

They feel it.

The only time I feel God is when I'm at a gospel church.

And like, it's that level of power.

And like a black gospel church, probably in Brooklyn or Harlem or something, that's where I'm going to feel it.

Okay.

You know, it's almost like God is charisma.

And then I go to my.

Wait, whoa.

And then I go to my congregational church where it's very Zen, and it's just like this.

We read this hymn and God is love.

And it's very much the opposite of that.

And it feels very meditative for me to go there.

Interesting.

Well, then I'm going to share with you each other.

Yes, that.

So those listening again, we're going to do.

We're going to do an episode where you can hear all of our backstory.

I'm going to give you enough just to understand what I'm about to explain here.

I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

I have been through a deep faith crisis.

I actually think I came out of my faith crisis probably as most members of my church, which also is known as the Mormons.

And those of you who are hearing Melody talking about being a member of a culture, there's some of you who are very spiritually, you know, Christian oriented, who probably believe that what I just said is that I'm a member of a cult.

And even though I disagree with you, I understand how the BITE model works and I understand why you say it.

My point is, is that the place I'm at right now would probably put me at odds with a lot of members of my church, because I accept it with some reservations.

And I'll explain all those reservations in another podcast when we talk about our backgrounds.

But that doesn't change the fact that when I grew up, I saw things very black and white.

And one of the things that is taught, I shouldn't say it's taught in the whole church, because I haven't been to every single one, even though I know we mostly all follow the same patterns, teach the same lessons, and, you know, down to a lot of it.

Yeah.

But it's what you get out Of a lesson, not so much what's taught in lesson.

So I'm going to be a little bit careful here walking this line.

But I was taught that the world is very black and white.

There is a God side and there is a not God side.

I grew up in the church understanding what was being taught, which by the way, I don't understand it this way anymore.

But I did understand there was taught as either you're a member of this church, which is God's true church, and you are accepted and you have accepted, or someone has a fake counterfeit of this church and it could be worshiping Allah or it could be worshiping Jesus Christ proper, but they're still, they're not worshiping the right Jesus.

And I've grown to believe differently than that now.

But that black and white model was also grounded in the fact that we have strong feelings and feelings are important, but we don't manufacture them.

Now the reason that's important, because I'm talking about charisma right now, is that if we had a band up the front of the church and they were playing music that used vibration and heavy this, and you know, you could bring me up and then bring me down, you could manufacture the feelings of the spirit.

And never, never once did I, I didn't know what a holy roller was until much later in my life.

And it was you talked about.

Can you.

Yeah.

Can you explain your definition of a holy roller?

Holy roller.

To me?

I understand that there are churches.

I've.

I've been to a couple of them now.

I, I've been to many, many different churches at this point in my life where people are shaking, they're on the ground rolling around and speaking in unexplainable languages.

And so I didn't know that that existed.

We didn't make fun of people who did that.

We just were always very cautious.

Let's be careful that we're not doing something that will manufacture people to, quote, feel the spirit, the Holy Spirit, because now you can't trust those feelings.

Okay, so we have no paid clergy in, in our religion.

I mean, I, I'm going to continue to refer to my church as the religion because I think it's the most accurate.

So we don't have paid clergy, therefore no one's trained.

We all go to a seminary, but that seminary is really to learn scripture and to learn doctrines and, and things like that.

And, and it's not by any means.

Like if you gave me, I got a certificate of graduation from seminary, but trust me, it does not.

It does not match what people who go to other Christian seminaries do.

We have everyone from the congregation gets up and there's usually two speakers per hour long congregation meeting.

We call it the sacrament meeting.

In sacrament meeting, we hear from just regular dudes.

I am a child protective services worker by day, and today I'm speaking to you on charity.

And then the next person who gets up might be his wife who is.

Maybe she's got an Etsy store and she's going to speak to us today on long suffering, you know, or.

Or the atonement of Jesus Christ or something.

Are there songs?

Is there music?

And there are songs.

Those songs are accompanied by either a piano or organ.

Usually a congregation song will be an organ which is also played by somebody who has no professional training.

They're just, they can do it.

And I say that, but sometimes people are pretty serious about it.

But yeah, my point is, is that everybody's just doing their part and we're trying to keep it super reverent.

And in fact, reverence is a big thing we talk about.

In fact, someone probably talk about it in sacrament meeting.

That might be their topic.

And so finally, to my point, with that background, charisma to me has always equaled manufacturing.

Interesting.

And manufacturing to me, I'm not saying this for everyone else, but manufacturing to me typically means that I am ready to deceive you with something that I have created to override real world.

Now, I'm not going to say that every member of my faith believes that.

In fact, I'm not going to say that large portion of people.

That's how I interpret it growing up, is that I'm a member of the true church with the true gospel and that we are very careful that there are wolves in sheep's clothing everywhere and the moment you sniff that something is not real, run away.

We went to the same church.

You know, I also grew up in a church where we were the true gospel.

It didn't matter early on.

Any church I went to, that is the true gospel in the evangelical faith.

Be weary of anybody else who says that that's not true.

The difference was we could feel the spirit of the Lord.

That's what we wanted.

We wanted to feel the spirit of the Lord.

Well, we do.

And people will through music.

And we feel through music too.

I want to be clear.

Yeah, very focused.

In fact, the whole Mormon, Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints.

I'm trying to be respectful here of our naming, but the whole thing is, is that your faith is based on the feelings that come from the spirit.

And I know a lot of people have a problem with the fact that our religion does not maybe look at the facts the same way and that we constantly have the answer.

Well, the Holy Spirit's made it known to me, so therefore I have the truth.

And that's a very frustrating conversation for someone who's trying to, like, get you to see something that you won't look at because you're like, doesn't matter.

Spirit already told me.

So the way we feel it.

Yeah.

Is that we typically will feel it in tears.

We'll typically feel it in a very reverent way.

And while you may say it's manufactured, it feels very real to me.

What would bring you to tears if there's no charisma?

Great question.

Actually, this last Sunday, we were singing a song through the organ in church.

And again, I got to tell you, I'm not sitting in a room with a bunch of people who believe exactly the way I do.

Yeah.

And so there are a lot of times people say something.

I'm like, I wonder if they've ever questioned.

They're talking about.

But a song came on that talked about Jesus looking at me and seeing me for who I really am and understanding me.

And it hit me so deep, my voice just locked up, could not speak, tears flowing down my face.

I just had that moment of just thinking, looking him in the face and him knowing me better than I know myself.

And it was so personal, it was so special.

And I thought, that's the moment I'm going for right now.

I am living this moment so that I can get to that moment.

And that can happen for me when someone's speaking.

It could happen for me when I'm listening to a hymn.

It can, actually.

You talk about meditative state.

Yeah.

Lots of meditation has happened to me.

Not.

Not giving that specific thought process, but the thought process of the gift that God has given me of my family maybe might do it or something.

So that's.

That's.

It's not charisma driven.

It's typically very, like, message driven.

Like, I'm.

I'm receiving a message.

Can I. I'm wondering if it's more like the Catholic faith is kind of reverent.

It's very, like, driven by, like, the hymns happen.

That.

I've only gone to Catholic funerals and weddings, but it's all, I think, maybe one service, but.

But it's always very, like, the music is very reverent because it's only organ.

There's no band playing yeah, My dad, by the way, my mom and dad have always been in music ministry, so that's another reason why.

Sure.

Music plays deeply into their spiritual belief.

We weren't, like, holding snakes or, like, writhing on the ground.

I just need to make that known to everybody.

We're not that kind.

Well, if you were, it's still.

I think you're wonderful.

So it's not just like that.

For example, we would never recite a prayer.

We would never recite a prayer that someone else gave to us.

It would be no Lord's Prayer.

No.

Well, we might.

We might read the Lord's Prayer, but it wouldn't be a prayer.

It would be an example of a way you could pray.

A talk that's given in church.

It's specific to that particular person, and so it's very personalized.

There's no chanting, there's no anything like that.

So, again, because that would be a manufactured creed or something that we have to, like, be driven by.

Again, kind of.

We, as a member of.

Yeah.

Religion, we would actually see that as cult life, you know, so we wouldn't.

We wouldn't participate in something like that.

So now imagine here I am, an entrepreneur, and I've got to persuade someone to feel when I want them to feel and to buy what I want them to buy.

And I hope that in the amount of time I've spent sort of explaining my background, I hope that you can just sort of connect those dots as to how against the grain that is for me, naturally, it felt.

Exactly.

And it's funny.

My parents were so proud of me, you know, starting my own business and everything, and yet I felt like a fraud.

Like, what if they knew have to go sell these jobs?

Have you talked to your parents about that ever?

Like, I mean, you must have.

I mean, you have a company for it, but.

Yeah, and I have.

You know, I think the way we're talking about it is much different than I.

Way I. I talk to my parents, you know, you talked about.

You hope your parents never listen to this podcast.

You know, I mean, they might.

I still would be so devastated if my parents ever thought that some type of parenting that they did was wrong or broken or whatever.

My.

I love my parents.

I love my wife the very, very most, and I love God a lot.

I think I might love him more than my wife, but I'm not sure about that.

You really like Rachel a lot.

I really do.

Rachel's my very favorite.

I know.

And I think I even like my kids possibly more than my parents.

But after that, it's my parents.

My parents are just like, I love them so much and, And I want to please them.

I want to.

Want to make that clear too.

Is that as a people pleaser, I want to please my parents.

Yeah.

And so.

And that's not.

I'm not saying as a kid, I'm saying right now, they are worthy of whatever I can do to please them, I will do it because I'm not doing it out of obligation.

I don't feel like I have to do out of obligation.

I. I want to please my parents because they are worth pleasing.

I love them.

Yeah.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah, I hear what you're saying.

I think I've gone through so much.

It's very.

Everything you said about your upbringing, even though you're talking about a completely different experience, it's what I experienced also.

The only difference was that we were allowed to look for.

We did want reverence, but reverence came, like, with emotion.

Like that's how you were going to experience the emotion.

I mean, the reverence and feel closer to God.

It's.

With that.

And so it's interesting that I've never heard about how a service is in the Mormon faith.

So we'll.

We'll do it.

We'll do.

I think we'll do a series.

As you were talking, I wanted to double click on a few things.

I know there's so much.

So in the interest of time, I'm looking at.

At how far we are into this also.

This is like, definitely not a part.

This is part one.

So.

Yeah, we probably could have had a whole podcast on selling without selling your soul.

Yeah.

But I think we should try to.

Try to like, like the so what here.

Let's do the so what.

So let's go into your experience.

Melody, how have you, personally, taking your experience, how have you been able to get comfortable with selling without selling your soul?

So I've paid so much money.

Well, for therapy, but also for.

For business.

Ne.

You know, conventions, conferences, coaching.

Coaching.

Just the coaching was huge for me also.

Just being around.

I've paid to be around people who are really good at sales.

And I'll bring up Josh Latimer as an example, if that's okay.

I think that's good because I'll.

I'll end up bringing him up too, I think.

Okay.

One of the things that's cool about Josh is he's really, really talented at selling.

I don't always believe the way that he does it is.

It wouldn't be right for me but what I love about what he did about two years ago is he put out an offer, and in his offer, he basically told us how he was convincing us to buy his offer while he did.

That was what the.

The sale was.

Isn't that clever?

Brilliant.

And for somebody like me, it's everything I dreamed about.

I want somebody to tell me, like, hey, this is what I'm doing to you right now as I sell you on this thing.

Do you want me to tell you all the secrets to sales?

Join my thing?

And I was like, absolutely.

I need to join that thing, because.

Penn and Teller did.

Made a whole business out of this.

Right?

I love that.

But the thing is, like, I need to understand the thing first, because everything is based on the emotion of what my history is and everything.

I want to understand it now that I understand sales on a much deeper level.

There's a lot of things that I'm.

That I still struggle with, but I don't struggle with the fact that I'm doing something that helps people.

I've also been doing it long enough now to know that I. I mean, how many millions of extra dollars have you put into communities based on your software?

Right.

How many hours of time have I given back to people because I got them an executive assistant and taught them how to work together and things like that.

Like, we do things that actually support other people's growth well beyond what we can imagine.

See, I just sold you on what we do.

But I believe in it because I've seen it, I've heard it, and I've had enough people tell me, like, I would never, ever.

You could.

There's very little you could tell me you're a charlatan.

I'll be.

That's adorable.

Like, oh, gosh.

Oh, wow.

But, like, I'm sorry.

Like, the worst.

But, like, that's the app.

I know, but it.

But.

But you're not.

I would be like, that's adorable that you think you're a charlatan.

You're not.

Like, I can see right through that.

But then also because we have this backend thinking thing, I'm like, well, what if I really am?

And I'm just getting really good at just selling the thing?

And I don't know.

Are we overthinkers, Kurt?

Is that part of this whole thing?

I think that's the.

The hinge that this podcast swings on.

Yeah.

Yeah, Right?

Yeah.

Now I'm at the point where I understand I'm really good at the thing I do.

And it sucks that I'm bad at talking about it in a way that.

That people can really feel.

And so I'm getting good at talking about it in a way that people can relate to and that, you know, the right people that I want to serve.

That's the whole point is I want to attract those people to me, and I want them to trust me, and then I want to tell them how I'm going to help them.

That's selling.

You know, it's funny, I have a Josh Latimer story right on that one.

Like.

Like if I can pick up where you left off right there.

Josh talks about how it's our moral obligation.

He does to tell people about the thing that we do.

And you are so authentic and you're, you know, so far from charlatan.

And here we are both pumping each other up.

Like, you guys are like, gosh, here at Melody.

Is that, like the main thing you do is just pump each other up?

Maybe.

Who knows?

Maybe it is.

But internalizing that, you know, you just said it.

I'm really good at what I do.

It sucks that I can't talk about it.

And I actually do believe, I really do believe that Josh is right.

It's your moral obligation.

Josh has been trying to get me on a podcast for years.

Like, Kurt, you of all people need to have a podcast.

I agree with Moral Stories, and you're the one that I'm like, Melody, I think if I did a podcast with you, I would do a podcast.

And we did.

And we did.

And here we are.

But Joshua said.

He said, kurt, you're just so passionate, and it's going to translate perfectly on a podcast.

And I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I hear you, I hear you.

But I've got things I got to do.

Yeah.

And I just find so much healing in.

In the podcast.

But I also think that just along those same lines is that it sucks that I'm not good at telling people how good I am.

I'm not good at marketing it.

Right.

Well, guess what, Melody, you and I both.

It's our moral obligation.

And I believe why.

But why?

Because if we don't either, people are going to be left with something substandard.

Yeah.

Possibly even by less savory people who.

Charlatans.

Give them their.

Yeah.

Or they'll have nothing at all because they're problem unaware.

I think there's the problem unaware people.

There's problem aware people, and then there's people who have taken action to actually solve their problem.

And if I'm not part of Their solution.

I. I believe that they're getting a solution that's not, you know, if the product is good, I guarantee the team's not.

And if the team is as good, I guarantee the problem products not.

So why are we able to say how great we are at the thing we do like we are passionate about?

And I think it's because we know that we're putting all of our energy and effort into making something that actually it's like we ethically sourced our product, our services, because everything we do is about.

We want to help people.

We believe that it.

Sorry, I'm about to put words in your mouth, but I've heard you actually see, say these things before.

We believe that if we're good enough at what we do, if you build it, they will come.

We believe that people will just bring their friends and everyone will just come and we can just be so good we don't have to tell anyone.

I call it punching people in the face of your Jesus ring.

Okay, so I shake someone's hand, I say, hi, my name is Kurt, I'm a husband and father, I have company and I'm a believer in Jesus.

Okay, cool.

What if I just shook your hand and said, hi, my name is Kurt, and you could tell all that about me just by interacting with me.

See, if I punch you in the face of my Jesus ring and say I'm a believer, then it feels like I am already seeding something so that you will automatically begin to trust me because I was willing to.

The same reason that prisons are full of innocent people if you ask them, right, is if I am telling you I'm a believer in Jesus.

A believer in Jesus can say that, but also someone who wants to manipulate people who only deal with believers in Jesus, do business with them, or to work with them or be friends with them or whatever, they.

They also could do that.

So instead of saying it, living it.

You want to live it, I want to live it.

And, but that's what I was taught too.

Like, live your values.

And that's our problem, I think from a marketing perspective is don't go out and tell them you're great.

Just be great.

Yes.

And, and, and here's another thing, Melanie.

As we're, as we're.

I know this podcast, as we go on, I just, I, I think we could do like a 20 hour podcast because stay awake that long.

But Melanie, I believe not only that I can show you with my actions, but if I say it with my mouth, if I megaphone this out into the World, we have had negative experiences with customers.

I'm not perfect.

Yeah.

And I'm afraid that a post goes out into the world that all the people agree with or who have had a good experience with us will say, right on, that's cool.

And they move on with their life.

Yeah.

And then the one who had the negative experience goes out there and says, liar.

Yes, he did this, or their software did that, or I expected this and got that.

And now I've got to publicly explain to the whole world why I'm without blemish here, even though I've made a mistake.

But this was a misunderstanding or this was the thing.

And I've got enough people out in the world.

Yes.

Yeah.

It's not a large number, but it only takes one of them to speak as I'm mega.

Hey, I'm great.

I'm megaphoning that out in the world.

And then someone goes up and gives me a middle finger.

No, he's not.

And now I feel like.

And that.

And by the way, yeah, we could do that for Apple computers.

The biggest.

Of course.

Well, because it's assuming, like when people use your product and when they use mine, I mean, honestly, Kurt, I didn't even use Responsibid the software.

I paid for it for years.

So you're welcome.

But I didn't use it for years until I did.

And when I finally set it up, it was like magic.

Right.

When I finally did the work and got over my confidence issue with it too.

Magic.

So I guess what I'm saying is.

You're awesome.

Oh, well, thank you.

But I mean, I don't want to.

What I'm talking about is a principle that I think applies to both you and me.

How do you sell without selling your soul?

Number one is you realize that there will be 0.5% know you can be great and.05% of the people in the world will think you suck.

Well, actually, I forgot the point that I was trying to make is that your product or your.

Your and my services, they rely on people doing the work that.

Oh, sure, sure, sure.

So people who don't take responsibility are going to say we were the problem.

Right.

I bet.

That's certainly, certainly been.

You can work as hard as you want to to make them successful, but they're not going to be successful.

That's happened to me so many times.

And do you know what I do?

This is how I sell without selling my soul.

Now, Kurt, I actually talk about this.

This is part of my marketing strategy, actually.

And it made Me okay with selling.

I forgot about this.

I actually tell people in our marketing all over, we're not perfect.

Our success rate is.

I don't know what it is right now, but it's, you know, probably in the high 80s, 90%.

And I don't trust anybody who says like they're 100% or anything under 90.

Yeah, but I'm like, we're not perfect.

Most of the time we get it right, but when we don't get it right, the thing is we will do whatever it takes to get it right.

Like we will work hard, but whatever it takes might involve getting on an airplane.

Not for me.

The person grabbing their hand, putting it on the keyboard, making them do that thing right.

Like, oh, I actually set it up now so they can't get their VA unless they do the work ahead of time.

I learned.

So I've set it into our systems that they have to be successful.

And if they're not, I've given them everything possible.

I know in my heart I've done everything possible.

Kurt, you set up a certification system in your software.

You've made it as easy as possible for people to be able to, to do it.

So I guess at what point is that okay?

And also because we know the operations.

Did I talk about that part of like we know everything that's going on in a company.

I'll say.

Me, when I was involved in operations on a day to day basis, I couldn't sell because I felt like I was going to be lying if there was a little micro problem on the back end.

I felt like I can't tell people that we're great when we have this.

I'm dealing with this right now.

Yes, yeah, yeah.

Literally.

Literally.

I woke up this morning to find out that one of our customers forms was being spammed by this new AI bot that I've never encountered before.

And you got 25,000 bids in the course of like a 12 hour period.

Holy crap.

Or what it was.

And it was all about bitcoin.

Is this bitcoin thing.

And this morning I wake up and I'm like, oh my gosh, the world's coming to an end.

And I'm thinking to myself, one AI bot is giving itself a bunch of bids.

Like, yeah, just take a chill pill.

C. It really, you know, you talked about, are we overthinkers?

Melody?

I think that as I'm sort of coming to the end conclusion here of how do you sell without selling your soul?

I think that there's two things.

There's the things that you need to know.

And then there's the things that you need to believe.

Yeah.

And I think that what you need to know, just to go back to the Josh ladder Mer ism, is that you need to know it is your responsibility to sell your product.

No one's going to do it for you.

You.

You are the thing.

You need to believe that your product is authentically a solution to a real problem, creating real value.

And if you can believe that, even when you know that perfection is out of reach and it's just by the way, no one is going to have it.

Right.

No one's going to get that.

Yeah.

But if you're striving for it, you're worthy.

You need to believe that you're worthy of being able to create a value stack.

You're worthy of being able to follow a systematic way to persuade people to spend their money with you, because you're going to provide them more than those number of dollars in value.

Now, when I cleaned windows, that was really hard for me to understand.

How could someone give me $300 cash?

And how could I possibly create more value for them than that?

Dollars in cash?

And when you're serving someone who's not in your.

When you aren't in your target market, I'll put it that way.

Yeah, I understand that could be a really hard thing.

But when every time someone votes for you with their dollars, they're proving that to be a true statement.

And so if you can't live on your own belief, please at least stand on the belief of someone else.

Maybe it needs to be your customers.

That's brilliant.

I'm going to put that on my bumper sticker that I will stick in my wall.

I could just do a regular sticker, I guess.

Yeah, it could be a bumper sticker for your wall.

That's cool.

Yeah.

No, but that.

Say that again.

So you need to believe that the value that you create is greater than the number of dollars that you're asking for.

And if you can't get all that belief on your own, then can you at least stand on the belief of others?

Yeah.

Including those who are already voting for you with their dollars, your customers.

Can you use their belief in you to provide the belief to push you to know and believe that it is your moral obligation to put as much of your service into the world as you can truly facilitate.

Wow, that's really good.

And it's true.

And I'm going to take that with me away from this because I kind of needed to hear that as I do every day.

So I'm just going to take a clip, put it on my phone, it'll become my alarm.

Well, I don't think you will.

I don't think you should.

I might.

But if you do, I hope for all of our listeners if Melody and are anything, we're transparent and you certainly got that today.

My hope is that you will take what we've discussed today and realize that it's cool to want to be authentic.

It's cool to want to be genuine and morally straight.

But what's not cool is that sometimes the symptoms that come with that disease, it's not a disease but the symptoms that come with that are sometimes these weird limiting self beliefs and if you don't recognize them in yourself, which hopefully we've helped to put some anchors in to help you to see some of that in yourself, I hope that you will see the value in taking action.

Fact is, is that a good person does deserve to win.

I know that Melody and I have a topic we want to cover.

We have a whole long list of stuff.

One of the things we want to talk about is nice guys finishing last or first or however they should finish and what a leader like a nice guy should look like or gal.

Nice guy or gal.

I hope that today in our discussion you have found in yourself the incongruence of I want to do the best job but I'm nervous to tell other people.

And if anything comes out of this, the fact is is that when you sell your actual soul, you're not selling your soul.

Right.

You're selling who you are like the soul of yourself in the most authentic and transparent way possible.

That's actually kind of the greatest gift you can give.

The people that sell their soul air quotes in a negative way are saying I will take, I will exchange any amount of money.

I will say whatever it takes for me to collect the largest amount of dollars regardless of the impact it has on others because I'm the only one I care about.

Look, if you already are the type of person that we've described, that's not in you.

Isn't that a corporation what you just described?

Well, you know, large, multi.

I think just saying we could unpack that.

We could unpack that.

I'm not.

Let's not the people within a corporation necessarily.

Yeah.

Because the corporation needs to win at all costs.

Maybe it does.

I think there are corporations that have kept their mission and values.

I don't want to be so pessimistic.

So I'm going to Say I.

Well, they work for their share.

Well, they work for their shareholders.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

And.

Shareholders.

And.

And your argument is, is that a shareholder wants a profit regardless of 100% profit first.

Is what.

Okay.

And that's.

I think I. I think I fundamentally disagree with you.

Interesting.

Even though I know that I'm going to have to dig hard to probably find the.

Add it to our list.

Okay.

We'll put it in the list.

Melody, what are your final words on this?

I. I've been talking too much.

What.

What are your final words?

I'm.

Listen, you're literally preaching at me in a way that I can hear all day.

Like, you're very.

It's just been very helpful to me.

I would say that this is something that I think I might.

I don't know if I will ever reach the point where I fully embrace being an amazing marketer salesperson.

And I think I'm okay with that.

I think that if I did, that might become a problem, is my guess.

And so I want to keep my awareness, but I'm not averse to selling to people who need my service.

I think that's the one thing we need to think about, is a lot of people are selling to people who don't need something.

Yeah.

And that's the difference is not the problem.

Yeah.

I really.

I really want to give my service or to help people who actually need it, who can afford it.

Not based on what I believe, but what they believe.

And I'm okay with that.

But I don't think I'll ever be fully okay with the sales and marketing.

One of my coaches, I think I said this before, but a business can be a ministry, but not a charity.

And it helps to confirm to me, like, it's okay to have.

Be on a mission to help people and to be making profit off of that.

Yeah.

Because I wouldn't be able to do it for free.

And I also can't just.

It has to be a business.

Yeah.

You know, being a good person who has a mortgage.

Exactly.

Really, really necessitates.

And if.

Do you enjoy, like, eating meals, for example?

I've heard.

I mean, it's.

Yeah, it's okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

You start going through that budget and you go.

Being a good person does not clear me of.

My kids.

Do not get clothed by being a good person.

Yeah.

Well, Melody, as always, I absolutely adore my time with you.

I am.

I want to start recording our next podcast right this second.

I know.

Because this is so enriching and I hope that our listeners are listening to this.

Maybe, maybe I'll maybe leave one one question with our our listeners.

What one change do you need to make in yourself that will bring you closer to overcoming a challenge of selling or marketing?

I think marketing fits perfectly.

Melody just said I don't know if I ever want to be a great marketer.

Well, guess what, that's probably something a self learning belief that you need to overcome.

We'll come to that in another topic.

But I would like for our listeners to sort of think to themselves, what's an area right now that I am holding myself back in terms of really helping the value that I get out into the world, get out into the open and so think about that.

And I hope that by listening to this podcast you've been entertained.

But more importantly, I hope that you're entertaining a new way of being and that that will help you to become more of who you actually want to be.

Wow.

Profound.

Ditto.

I agree with you, Sam.