Ep #188: I Am Not My Offer with Melissa Parsons

Welcome to the Make Money as a Life Coach® podcast where sales expert and master coach Stacey Boehman teaches you how to make your first 2K, 20K, and 200K using her proven formula.

Hey coaches, so today I have a very special podcast episode planned for you. I have been following along in several of my coaches journeys in the 200K Mastermind and the Two Million Dollar Group. And some of them have very inspiring work that they have done on themselves, gaps that they have bridged to get to where they are, things that they have worked through that I think are highly valuable for you to hear from them. So, they didn’t reach out and say, “Hey, I want to teach on the podcast.”

They weren’t doing this work for anything other than themselves. But I wanted to feature their work because I felt like it would be so useful for you. So, over the next couple of months, I am going to play some of these episodes that they have recorded for you. You’re going to get to hear them throughout the next three or four months here and there. And I encourage you to take these episodes as seriously as you would take hearing from me. They are so inspiring, I’ve been following their work in my pages and it’s just in the Facebook pages and our calls.

And it’s really stood out for me so it will be extraordinarily valuable for you. It’s one of my favorite things about masterminds is you get to learn from other people’s ideas and their work. It might not be your work at the time, but it will be your work either in the future or it is your work, and you didn’t know it was your work. They’re going to present ideas to you and how they have worked through things in a way that will be so applicable to you and your own growth in your journey.

So, I hope you enjoy this as much as I have enjoyed hearing these and watching their journey, and learning from them myself in my own self-coaching, learning how they show up in the world has been deeply impactful for me. So, without further ado please enjoy one of our guest podcasts from one of my star 200K Mastermind or Two Million Dollar Group students.

Hello everyone. My name is Melissa Parsons. I am a life coach, I certified through The Life Coach School in September 2020. And I also received my certification in advanced deep dive coaching as of May of this year. I like to say that I coach women with brains. My ideal client is me in 2017 back when I was working as a pediatrician in private practice, really before I had any clue that life coaching even existed for people like me.

I love to help working moms who think that in order for their life to be incredibly awesome that it has to be perfect. Moms who think that they have to control everyone that they love in order to relax and be happy. And those that think that they’ve worked and struggled for years to create a life that they feel they should love but they are overwhelmed. Because when they wake up in the morning or when they put their head on the pillow at night they think, wait, this can’t be it.

This was me back in 2017 before I received any coaching. My coaching journey started in January of 2018 when I made the investment in myself by signing up for Katrina Ubell’s group program, Weight Loss for Doctors Only. After my very successful group coaching experience with Dr. Ubell and Dr. Sara Dill, I made the decision to pursue one-on-one marriage coaching with the marvelous Maggie Reyes.

And after working with Maggie for six months in her coaching container she helped me see what a powerful coach I was for myself. And she pointed out that I had unwittingly been coaching parents and teens in my office for the past 18 years. So, after sitting with this idea of becoming a coach for about six months I really never thought I would be anything other than a pediatrician. I had that dream for myself when I was nine years old. And through coaching decided that I was ready to have another dream for myself.

And I decided to pursue certification and become a coach myself because like many of you, I felt like I had the magical key to the universe, and I really wanted to share it with as many people as I could. At Maggie’s not so gentle nudging I joined 2K for 2K, the story goes like this. I asked her after about a month of coaching people for free as part of certification if I should join 2K for 2K. And her response was classic Maggie. She said, “Well, it depends, Melissa, do you want to start making money now or do you want to wait?”

So of course, I wanted to start making money now and got on the 2K for 2K website and clicked ‘buy now’ and started digesting all of Stacey’s awesome material in there. And then during certification before even registering my LLC and as I shared, when I was on The Life Coach School podcast late last year, it was episode 389, How to Pay your Coach Training Tuition Back, if you want to listen to that. I made $55,000 in the first five months of my business. I applied for the 200K Mastermind in November of 2020, and I was accepted.

And since then, since joining 200K I have generated $270,000 with one-on-one coaching. It was at this point when I had joined 200K that I made the decision to go all in on my entrepreneurial journey and decided to retire from my 22 year career in pediatrics in April of 2021. As of today, in total I have generated $325,000 in my coaching business. I am fully committed to myself, to my business and to the 200K process. I’m currently in my third round of 200K and I absolutely love the mastermind.

I have received two 200K awards which I have dubbed the Stacies. And I’m going to receive my third 200K award in August in Orlando at the live event. As of this recording my highest grossing 12 month revenue is $222,000. Because I believe that my brain is my best investment I have invested much of that money right back into my brain and into my team of coaches. With all of that said, I’m so grateful for Stacey’s brain and her courage and bravery and for the brains of all the brilliant people that work with her and that work for her.

And of course, I am so thankful for all the brilliant brains of the other coaches in the 200K Mastermind. It truly is a mastermind and we truly do work together. The thing that I love about it most honestly is that it is a room where we truly want to see each other succeed. The first 200K event I did was virtual, and it was incredible. I knew after the first of the three days that I had received my $25,000 in value already. And that was when it was virtual.

The in person events in Cabo San Lucas and Kentucky were even more amazing because I got to hang out with my coaching besties and meet so many incredible colleagues that I had known virtually for many months. I started out coaching for free like I said, as part of certification. And after joining 2K, quickly decided, actually to be honest I was prodded by one of my free clients who said, “Melissa, you’re giving me way too much value to be giving this away for free, to start charging.” And she coincidentally is just starting certification through The Life Coach School right now, so amazing.

So, she prodded me to start charging. And my first price point was 5K for six months of one-on-one coaching. I increased my rate to 10K for six months in January of 2021. And I am increasing my rate again. At this point I have enough demand in my one-on-one coaching practice to start a group coaching practice, so that is the next step in my evolution. I am enormously grateful and humble to be delivering this podcast for you today. I got the email asking me to do this while I was in Austin, Texas at The Life Coach School Mastermind.

Initially I misread the email and thought Stacey was asking me to guest coach in 2K for 2K. I had a mini panic attack while I was walking down Second Avenue in April. I got back to the hotel and immediately asked for coaching from Maggie, and Melanie Childers, and Sara Fisk. They are my coaching besties in 200K. And if you don’t already have coaching besties, I suggest you get some ASAP. Of course, they coach me brilliantly.

And then I actually read the email for the second time which really was the first time because I realized it was actually asking me to deliver the podcast instead of coaching in 2K for 2K. And then that calmed me down even more so until it was time to actually come up with the content for the podcast and then record it. But here we are, and I hope you enjoy. And then actually funnily enough since then I got the email asking me to guest coach in 2K for 2K. So, you’ll be seeing me there too later this summer.

So, the topic for discussion today is, I Am Not My Offer. It is helpful. And if I may go so far as to say it is essential to separate your offer from your self-concept. If you’re listening to this podcast I’m going to assume that you want to make money as a life coach. As your business grows, separating your self-concept from your offer becomes more and more important.

I was advised to join 2K as soon as I started my business so that I wouldn’t make some of the same mistakes that coaches who don’t have access to this amazing business coaching, I don’t make those same mistakes that they’ve made along the way. The sooner you separate your self-concept from your offer the better. To explain this further using Stacey’s brilliant PSPR method, the problem which is the first P of PSPR is that you likely tie your own self-concept to your offer.

The solution, the S of PSPR is to separate your self-concept from your offer. The process which is the second P is to figure out all the ways that separating yourself from your offer is beneficial to you in your business and to figure out all the ways that tying your self-concept to your offer is detrimental to your business. The result, the R of PSPR will be, or at least my hope is that the result will be after listening to this podcast, that you will see your self-concept is completely separate from your offer and that you’ll be able to go out and make a shit ton of money while serving others.

This is the best job in the world. So, in this podcast I’m going to concentrate on the process. And the way I’m going to do that is to explain it by giving you examples. I’m going to toggle back and forth between the ideas of if I am my offer and if I am not my offer based on how I think about things. I recognize that the listeners of this podcast are uber intelligent and I trust that you will be able to follow along. So here are my ideas, I am sure that there are more and I would love to hear from you if you have other ideas, or perhaps especially if you have a different viewpoint than my viewpoint.

Number one. If I am my offer, when someone says no to my offer, I make it mean something terrible about me. And conversely if I am my offer I’m relying on external validation when someone says yes to my offer. And that amazing feeling that you get after the yes only lasts for so long if you’re relying on other people’s answers to your offer to fuel that amazing feeling.

The second point. If I am my offer, when you’re on a consult, a potential client may not see the value of what you’re offering. They often say to me as an objection, “I’m not saying you’re not worth it, Melissa.” Which is really their way of saying that they don’t think that they are worth it.

I often reply in the consult something to the effect of, “You could never talk me out of the value of what I have to offer you. You do not determine my worth. That is my job. And I know for a fact that I could never charge you enough to make what you’re going to receive from yourself if you make this investment in yourself worth it. There’s no dollar amount to be placed on creating the life you actually want for yourself with intention.”

The third point. If I am my offer as I scale from one-to-one, to group, to program, to mastermind, or whatever, you get the idea, I have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to change who I am as my offer evolves. Now, of course some things are going to have to change as you scale. But you don’t have to change the essence of who you are as you scale if you separate your offer from your self-concept.

Number four. If I am my offer, I better never get ill, or get pregnant, or have a significant other, or a child, or a parent who needs me, or go on an extended vacation because if I am my offer it inherently means that I can never take time off. Imagine if Stacey Boehman tied herself to her offer, in 2K for 2K we would not get exposed to Maggie coaching in there. We would not have the brilliance of Melanie Childers occasionally coaching in there on Mondays. We wouldn’t have Olivia Vizachero’s incredible mind coaching us in Ask a Coach.

And in 200K we would not have access to the Two Million Dollar Group coaches who lead our small breakout groups and who sub for Stacey when she’s on babymoons, or on maternity leave. And hell, I wouldn’t even be delivering this fucking badass podcast episode for you all. Or worse yet, she could have shot her offer down completely while she was dealing with her early pregnancy and now we would lose access to her brilliance entirely while she’s off taking her well deserved and lovely maternity leave.

Number five. If I am my offer, it makes me graspy on the consult or in my copy because if you are selling you and not your offer, and they say no, or they don’t open, or they don’t click, you take it personally. And this takes you out of service for your client and puts the focus on you instead of how your offer can help your client.

The sixth point. If you are not your offer, it makes it so much easier to evaluate your results. What went well, what didn’t go so well, and what you’re going to do differently next time. You must detach your offer from your identity in order to evaluate your business or else you may not want to do the tedious work of evaluating your business with clarity in an open mind. In the same vein if you are not your offer you can play way bigger because if you fail it’s not about you. You can concentrate on the facts and the math of why you had a fail instead of all the drama that comes when we have a fail.

Number seven. If you are not your offer, even when you’re personally having a bad day, or a bad week, or a bad month you can still be in service to your client and make offers to help them. This goes along with point eight.

If you are not your offer you don’t need your life to be perfect in order to help others’ lives be better. You can have a fight with your significant other and still help someone improve their relationship. You can eat off plan and not be at your goal weight and still help someone love their body. You can have an off month in your business and still help your clients make a lot of money.

Number nine. If you are offer, you likely will offer your offer to people who are less than best clients because as a human we want to be accepted by all the humans. If you are your offer you will think that your offer is best for every human, not just your ideal clients. And this will lead you to speaking to the ‘wrong people,’ signing the wrong people, coaching the wrong people. If you are your offer you will have trouble creating a client standard because again as humans we want everyone to like us and want to work with us.

Number 10. If you are your offer and someone says that your price point is too high you will believe them. Instead of knowing that there is an offer available to each and every person, it may not be your offer and that’s okay. You don’t want to change your offer to make it for everyone instead of for your perfect client. You don’t ever need to do this.

Number 11. If you are your offer you may go into people pleasing mode making decisions for the unhappy people, writing to your haters, believing your haters, coaching people who don’t want to do the work, dragging them along instead of letting them have their own sovereignty. This people pleasing will keep you from asking the tough questions on consults, or even once you’re coaching them in your container it will keep you from asking the tough questions.

Number 12. If you are your offer and your offer isn’t selling you will stay in a low value cycle and spin out and only see the negative in your business, spending a lot of time comparing and despairing about how all of your other coaching friends are killing it with their offers, and you are not.

Number 13. If you are your offer it will keep you from overselling because you’ll want to hold so tightly to your offer such that you won’t want to make changes to your business because you don’t want to change. You will use the excuse that you love your life as it is, and you couldn’t possibly serve any more humans right now and still love your life. Ask me how I know.

Number 14, the final point. If you are not your offer you will be able to consider yourself successful even if your current offer isn’t selling. Since we know that our thoughts create our results, the only way to create success is to believe you are already successful no matter what is happening in your business.

I hope this explains to you why it is so important to separate your self-concept from your offer. It’s one of the most important things you can do as you start your business or as you grow your business. It is much easier to separate your self-concept from your offer when you’re just starting out or when you’re considering changing your offer than it is to untangle and untie all of these things as you go along. Again, ask me how I know.

Don’t make the same error that many of us have made going into our businesses and believing that you are your offer. It is so much easier to separate your self-concept from your offer intentionally at the beginning. As I said, I’m sure there are other examples of the benefits of separating your self-concept from your offer and other examples of the detriment of tying your self-concept to your offer.

I would love to hear your input of examples you have come across personally and even and like I said, maybe especially I want to hear from you if your thoughts are different than mine. Again, thank you so much to Stacey for trusting me with your audience and your clients. It’s an incredible honor to be here and to serve all of you.

I am going to copy Glennon Doyle at the end of her podcast where she says, “If you loved this podcast episode, tag me on Instagram @coachmelissaparsonsmd or find me on Facebook @melissaparsonscoaching. If you didn’t, it’s okay, never mind. No, seriously I do want to hear from you if you had any ahas or if you have any ideas that are different than mine, please do let me know.

And I can’t be on the Make Money as a Life Coach podcast without making an offer to help you. The third step in Stacey’s simple process. So, if what I said at the beginning of this podcast about my ideal client is you and you’re looking for a general life coach who can help you with overcoming perfectionism, recovering from control enthusiasm, and stopping with the people pleasing already, all by starting to treat yourself like your own best friend. People find me at melissaparsonscoaching.com. I look forward to hearing from you.

Hey, if you’re ready to make money as a life coach, I want to invite you to join my 2k for 2k program where you’re going to make your first $2,000 the hardest part using my simple 5 step formula for getting consults and closing new clients. Just head over to www.staceyboehman.com/2kfor2k. We’ll see you inside.