Natural Ink: Why I Quit Being a "Health Coach."

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Why I Quit Being a "Health Coach."

I signed up to be a health coach for BeachBody and thought, 'Finally! Some income!' as I've been struggling with finding a job.
But it turned out to be way-not-fit for my personality, and the people were a little off to me. It just didn't feel right. It is a bit of a pyramid "scheme" except you do make money - but only if you're one heck of a people person, which I am not. And once I thought, 'Oh, shit, I don't want to do this. This is stressing me out MORE!' I found out quickly that everyone in my 'fit family' was really only there if I was on board with all the salesy stuff. Take, for example, the Shakeology Beach Body offers. I'm allergic to stuff in every variety of it. What did the "fit fam" tell me? "Try the vegan version! Ask your doc, I'm sure it'll be ok! You need this and/or a program to sell to people!" OK...but I'm allergic. After that red flag #1, not many people talked to me because I guess I wasn't "on board" enough.
I couldn't land any clients because you have to talk and pitch and talk and get to know them and talk some more. All my conversations came to dead ends or "no" when I would mention them signing on with me. That's just not in my personality. I'm an introvert. I don't like small talk. I don't want to talk to strangers and then try to sell them something. It was stressing me out beyond belief, trying to land clients and work through the bootcamp. They made it sound so easy in the boot camp and in reality it shouldn't be that hard to land some clients. Well, it is. And during the bootcamp you're supposed to sign up for all these trips and retreats which would've cost me like $300 at least...that I don't have. So I opted out of that.

They claim that they help and motivate and coach, etc., but every. single. time. I asked HOW they help, HOW they coach, WHAT DO THEY DO WITH THEIR CLIENTS I got the same very scripted reply. 'We help and motivate! We're a family! We encourage!' and so on. Okay...but WHAT DO YOU DO? No one would ever answer me. I could see the encouraging on Facebook, but never coaching. It was all just about signing on more members to make money, get more people to sign up, get clients to advance because you make a profit off of them advancing. No one would ever actually tell me HOW they coach. Red flag #2. You literally need no health knowledge at all to do this - you just have to want money.

I e-mailed my 'mentor' that I was having doubts and thinking of pulling out - because if you do within 30 days you can get a refund. Well, the mentor went from taking hours to reply to me to days. Like once she made money off of me, I wasn't a priority anymore. It took her four days to get back to me. She claimed she had "unplugged" for a long weekend but she was active on Instagram, so that was just an excuse. Red flag #3. And when she replied it was another scripted 'how can I change your mind' thing.

Well, shit, she took four days and by that time I decided to cancel my account. So I replied to her telling her that this just wasn't for me, thank you for being so nice - she really was - but this isn't what I want to do.

And it took her two weeks - two weeks - to answer me. Mentor my ass. She was on to other "clients" by then and since I was no longer making her money there was no need to answer me in any kind of timely fashion. Huge ass red flag #4.

Can you make money doing this? Yes. But you have to SELL, SELL, SELL. Like, message everyone on your FB feed and start conversations that end with you trying to sell them Beachbody programs, shakes, coaching spots, etc. OK, yeah, because my 70 year old family members really want to try P90X. Then you're onto strangers. Because that's not awkward.

If you're very people-oriented and you're a huge extrovert, this could be good for you.

Are you actually doing health coaching? I'm thinking no, but how would I know because NO ONE WOULD ANSWER ME. This is not like talking to someone about health issues and how can you help. This would be, "You're overweight? You should try this Beachbody product!" Granted, you are a face of Beachbody and you are selling a product of theirs. But "coaching" to me is more than a program. It's knowledge and nutrition and life-long health. And no one I came into contact with had any of this. It was a bunch of girls wanting to make money. And if they're determined, they probably will.

But for me, I wanted to actually coach. I see these women on Instagram with programs of amazing nutrition and support and that's what I wanted to do. And this was not it. It was a money pit.

And I didn't want this to be "IT" for my life. Most of the women I met that make good money doing this, it's their full time job. It's their life. I was looking for something fulfilling, like health coaching, that I could do while I continued to write. Because writing is what I want to do. But this would've progressed and I would have leveled which means more clients and time and I think writing would've slowly been pushed on the back burner.

So, I quit. And the knot in my stomach loosened. When that happens, you know you made the right decision.

So, that's why I quit being a "Health Coach." Because there are major flaws in the program, espeically some of the people, and it's a little frightening that you need no health knowledge to coach people on their health.

Good luck to you if decide to try it out, but, no, thanks.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

OMG, this is Exactly how I feel about this, I signed up end of May, forced more like it, and everything else you said is what I have come to realize! I've got to call this week to cancel everything, that should be fun!

Melissa Blevins said...

I spent a year of my life as a Beachbody coach. I should say I WASTED a year of my life! I think a lot of us quit for the same reasons. You can read about my story here. :) http://perfectionhangover.com/why-i-quit-beachbody-coaching

stop TS said...

you can't just be a people person to be a beachbody coach, you have to be a crook, scammer, and a liar. All qualities you should be thoroughly proud of not having!:)