Why I quit my doTERRA Diamond business
Alright, here we go, the post that I’ve been wanting to write for months now, but the post that I’m most dreading. Here’s the entire story of why I quit my doTERRA Diamond business that makes me well over $10,000 a month.
Pre P.S. #1: I’ve thought long and hard about posting this, as there have been several other high level leaders that have publicly shared quitting their doTERRA business as well over the last few weeks, and it’s caused a sort of back and forth drama fest of Instagram posts, stories, and lives that I’ve been watching from the outside.
^^^ Actual footage of me watching over the past week! 😂
I’m not sharing this to piggyback on anyone else’s story, I actually wrote out my blog editorial calendar a month and a half ago, and had planned on sharing this news right now anyways.
Pre P.S. #2: You might be asking yourself if this is even news that needs to be shared publicly, and I’ve asked myself several times whether this needs to be a blog post or not.
Ultimately, I’ve decided that yes, I’m sharing this on a blog because I’ll be making big changes on my website in the next few weeks, and I knew I’d be getting tons of questions on social media about if I quit doTERRA or not. It’s easier for me to write one post that I can direct people to, as well as giving me a place to share my story without anyone making assumptions.
Pre P.S. #3: This post is not meant to give anyone else a permission slip to quit their own business. The past year has been turbulent in doTERRA land, but that’s actually not at all related to the reason that I’m quitting.
If this business is your calling and mission, I applaud you! I can’t wait to see you dig deep, rise up, get back to basics, and introduce these life changing bottles of essential oil goodness to all the people in your little corner of the universe.
Pre P.S. #4: Want to find out what I’ve been doing since? Click here to see my latest paid offers!
Let’s get on with the real story now, shall we?
I started my doTERRA business 5 years ago, in 2015, and let’s just say I really had to work through my self-imposed hate of network marketing in the beginning. I even considered quitting 9 months in, after I had already hit Gold rank and was making $1,000 to $2,000 US a month.
I just didn’t know if I could get over the ickiness I felt about network marketing in general, but had to make a decision to shit or get off the pot.
Ultimately, my love for doTERRA’s Pure Grade essential oils, and knowing in my soul that so many people would benefit from being introduced to them, got me over my negativity about the industry in general.
I loved how transparent doTERRA was. This is one of my core values, and I loved that, in an industry of incorrect labelling and irresponsible product sourcing, they were taking the route of integrity and building a system that had never been built before with their Co-Impact Sourcing.
I hit the rank of Platinum by the end of my first year of building in December 2015, as my upline bought in for Presidential Diamond, and starting hitting Platinum on my own during my first round of Diamond Club in Winter 2016.
I did Diamond Club again the next winter, and our team hit Diamond in February 2017 (just over 2 years after starting to build).
I was Diamond for half that year, solid platinum during the other months, and in 2018 was Diamond for 8 out of the 12 months. That year I made $180,000 from doTERRA, which was more than I ever imagined possible as income in my business.
I started 2018 knowing that I’d be working towards building our team to Blue Diamond, and started building out my 5th leg before my 4th leg was solid Silver.
Blue Diamond didn’t happen in 2018, not even close.
I wasn’t overly upset or worried, I had mostly the right people at the top of my qualifying legs, and knew that I just had to push more, like I had during my two successful rounds of Diamond Club, to get the volume where it needed to be and develop more leaders.
It was halfway through 2017 and 2018 when I started to feel completely burned out. My anxiety got really bad, so much so that I had a total breakdown at Convention in 2017, and purchased the livestream so that I could watch it from my hotel room down the street from the Convention Center.
I tried Copaiba essential oil, but it didn’t touch my anxiety, so I started using CBD oil to keep my symptoms manageable.
I hardly taught any essential oils classes in 2018, and let me be clear that I LOVED teaching! I had taught probably 200 oils classes over those 3 years, and personally enrolled about 250 people.
From 2016 to 2018, I created an epic training program for my team (this was before the Empowered Success program, and it made other teams jealous to see our team program!), ran multiple rounds of Elite in 6 Weeks and Premier Push, and ran monthly online Oil Camps for our customers for about a year. After we stopped doing Oil Camp (it was so. much. work), I did weekly training videos for our customers in our Facebook group, and everyday during a BOGO week I did a live video, multiple posts, and giveaways.
Most of all of this was without an assistant, and I was working about 40-50 hours a week, minimum
In the meantime, I was also was running an entire other side of my business on this blog and with my Brand, Build, Blog course, as well as having a young son and a husband with his own busy business.
Honestly, writing all of that makes me wonder why I didn’t burnout sooner.
Even though I was utterly exhausted, I started 2019 with the solid goal of building to Blue Diamond. I told myself, wholeheartedly, “THIS IS THE YEAR BLUE DIAMOND HAPPENS!”, and I really meant it. I had no intentions of stepping away or quitting my doTERRA business.
Then, in March 2019, a little thought entered my head that I immediately ignored, pushed down, and generally wouldn’t address because it seemed crazy and like it came out of nowhere:
What if I didn't do doTERRA?
I was like “WTF is that?!”. I mean, we all think of quitting at some point when this business gets hard (because, y’all, it’s hard, just like any business is). When one of our front line leaders quits, when a leg collapses, when your rank or volume falls to a level that you haven’t been at in 2 years. I think most people think of quitting at least once a month.
But this was different. This was like a whisper tugging on my soul that I couldn’t ignore.
And it didn’t make any sense. Everything I had been working for the past 4 years was about doTERRA. I thought about it all the time, I worked so hard, I poured my heart and soul into it.
I spent weeks away from my family during Diamond Club, drove 986 kms in one day to do a class for one of my downline builders, spent the lonely nights driving home after midnight from out of town classes, got up at 6 am during BOGO weeks and went to bed at 3 am after flying home from Convention and driving 300 kms home so exhausted that there were times I questioned if it was safe to be driving at all.
I opened my house to people who, sometimes, I wasn’t comfortable having there because I had no idea who they were. I went to houses where I was convinced “this is where they’re going to find my body”. I pushed my body past its breaking point on a monthly basis, if not more.
I did what all good doTERRA Presidential Diamonds do and made my life all about doTERRA.
And I did it all happily because my entire why in my business was to make a full-time income and allow my husband to step away from the corporate job that he no longer liked, and to start his dream business. Which he did in 2016.
I envisioned the day when I was Blue or Presidential Diamond, and could fund our dream renovation and maybe buying a cottage or an RV.
But my body was telling me differently.
2019 was like one long panic attack. Every day I was on the verge of completely losing it, and in September and early October, I did.
I decided to go on anxiety medication, and that, coupled with Copaiba essential oil, gave my body a physical break from the 24/7 stress it had been under for the past year.
When I started to do a few hours of work again (you know, after I could even open my computer without hyperventilating), all that I wanted to do was to play on my website.
I then asked myself: if the thing that brings you so much joy, that it’s the first thing you do after 6 weeks of hell, is designing websites, why aren’t you doing more of that?
It was at that point that I started seriously discussing with my husband about quitting doTERRA.
There were major implications for our family income, and while our dual incomes were way higher than what it cost us to live (as evidenced by the $30,000 I have sitting in my one bank account “for emergencies”), deciding to step away from over 80% of your income is a major decision that we needed to talk about as a family.
Ultimately, we decided that with the groundwork I had laid with Brand, Build, Blog, and the fact that people were asking me for other work like building custom websites or business coaching, that I had the opportunity to make enough income with that.
Also, I did not leave my spot on my doTERRA team.
I feel like I more than earned the ability to continue placing my orders each month and collecting that income, especially when I worked for almost 2 years in the beginning full-time and didn’t make a full-time income. I consider this backpay of sorts!
I am continuing to support my current active builders and customers, I’m just not joining in any conference calls, going to in-person events, doing any team activities (like the monthly calls I was doing before), posting in Facebook groups, or generally keeping up on new business information.
I’m still a ninja with strategy and know how to build this business successfully, so I feel those skills will serve my current active builders well for the next few years.
Before I stepped away, I did some conservative financial projections on what I think I can maintain in rank and volume each month, and estimate that I will still earn anywhere between $80,000 to $100,000 in 2020 from doTERRA, and maybe $20,000 to $50,000 in 2021.
So what I’ve given myself is a 18 month to 2 year runway to build up the other part of my business so that if my doTERRA income goes to zero, I will have made up a full-time income in other ways (in 2019, my BBB course made me almost $30,000, so I’m a good way there already).
I have no plans in joining another network marketing company or doing anything “brand new”. I’m just going all in with the branding and website side of my business, because that’s what brings me so much joy.
I freaking LOVE branding and websites.
In 2015, when I started doTERRA, I was stopping nutrition coaching because frankly, I was bored talking about lemon water and green smoothies all day. I didn’t want to keep repeating myself over and over again about those subjects.
However, I’ve been blogging and talking about branding, websites, and online marketing for 6 years now, and it’s more exciting to me than ever.
This is what I want to do, and I’m excited to be able to put my all into it.
I also still LOVE doTERRA’s products.
I use 3 bottles of Copaiba a month. I’m obsessed with the Essential Skincare line (why is the Hydrating Cream out of stock this month, what am I going to put on my winter dry skin?!). I’m still incredibly grateful that when anyone in our house gets sick, I can support our bodies through it 99% of the time without having to resort to pharmaceuticals.
I’m leaving my business with no hate for doTERRA whatsoever. I’m not leaving for another NM company, I know that the grass is never greener on the other side.
I’m leaving to take a bet on myself, because if you won’t bet on yourself, who will?
Big questions I asked myself
aM I QUITTING BECAUSE I’m afraid to keep growing and developing as a leader?
This was the first question I asked myself. I’m very self aware (ask any of my counsellors and therapists!), and have also seen so many other people quit this business because they weren’t willing to work through their limiting beliefs, learn new, hard skills, or have difficult conversations.
I wanted to make sure I was quitting for the “right” reasons (if those even exist), and not because I was hitting a self imposed glass ceiling.
After 12 years in business, I knew that if it was option #2, and I was just afraid of growing through the fear, that I would hit that fear again and again in other parts of my business in some way.
After tons of introspection, I came to the conclusion that the network marketing model just isn’t for me.
Nothing against it, I no longer think it’s icky or bad or a negative thing, it’s just not for me.
At this point, I’ve had experience with running my own one-to-one model, online courses, and network marketing, and have taken part in other masterminds and group programs.
I’ve studied the pros and cons of each (because NONE of them are perfect!), and I know that online courses are more my style.
I mean, I even have a quiz on this very subject, and when I take my own quiz, it tells me that online courses are most suited to my personality, not network marketing.
I think that being a successful network marketing professional requires skills that, frankly, are just not that natural to me, and I’m exhausted from trying to blaze my own path instead of following the road that’s already paved.
So no, I’m not afraid to work through my fears and leadership limits (uh, I’m in 6 months of weekly therapy right now to do that!), I’m just going to do it in another type of business model.
A note on something I’ve witnessed from other high level leaders:
If you have a member of your team quit, please don’t judge them, and don’t make it about you.
Them quitting does nothing to diminish your own mission and belief in the company.
Don’t assume that you know the reasons for them quitting, or play the fear game, and tell them that they’re going to miss out on the best thing that could have ever happened to them.
Just because you want to devote your life to doTERRA (which is amazing!) doesn’t mean that everyone does, even if they are a high level leader.
Sometimes people don’t know what they’re getting themselves into until they get there, and if they don’t like it, or it isn’t what they thought it would be, doesn’t mean they’re a failure and they’re “not a leader”.
They’re doing what’s truly best for themselves, and whether they’re making a “good decision” in the short or long term isn’t up to you.
If you truly care about that person, and you have the compassion and empathy that I know you’ve been building through your self development journey, you will listen to their concerns, ask them, as a true friend, “what do you need right now?”, make sure you cover the logistics of their spot on your team (are they leaving their spot, do their customers or builders need to be supported by you, what is the chain of command going forward, etc), and then wish them well.
There’s no need for attacks or judgement, especially not publicly.
A true leader practices compassion for others above all else, even when they don’t agree with the others’ decision.
is this fair to my team? What responsibility do I have to them?
This was the hardest part to work through. On one hand, I knew my journey with a doTERRA business was done, but I had a team to think about.
I feel like I’m going through a divorce, and I’m the selfish parent who chose to leave the other one when there’s kids involved.
I know that my team aren’t my children, but how I want to take care of them feels the same.
I needed to take care of myself first, which meant stepping away, but it was of utmost importance that I communicated with my team why I was doing it, so that they knew that, yes, they were considered in this process from day #1 (whether they were aware of this or not).
I wanted them to be fully aware that while I knew some of them had starting building with me because of me, and that I didn’t take that lightly, I couldn’t keep pretending that I was OK anymore doing something I didn’t have my heart in.
Same with my customers: I feel like I have a huge responsibility to make sure they’re taken care of, know how to use their products safely, and that they can come to me at any time. I don’t take it lightly that people have chosen to spend their hard earned money on something that I recommended.
This is why, because I’ve chosen to stay in my spot and continue collecting commissions, that I’m still supporting my current team.
They are fully aware that I might not be aware of all the current happenings (like changes to Diamond Club), but that I’m still here to bounce questions off of, to email my account manager when problems aren’t being solved, to lend them an ear when they need to talk through a situation, or to just be a friend and offer them a hug when they’re exhausted and things aren’t going their way.
So while other high level leaders have accused “quitters” of being selfish and ignoring the team that they built, that’s not what I’m doing. I’m trying to support my current team the best I can while focusing the majority of my time on the other side of my business.
am I a failure?
🚨 Major trigger alert … it’s everyone’s favourite F-word! 🚨
Try quitting what you thought was your life’s mission, and see how much, on a scale of 1 to 10, you feel like a complete and utter failure.
The answer is 11.
Then I sat and asked myself why I felt like a failure?
The reason I felt like a failure because I didn’t make it to the “finish line”, which in doTERRA is Presidential Diamond, the highest rank.
But then a thought occurred to me:
What if what you thought was the finish line isn't REALLY the finish line?
Meaning, what if Presidential Diamond isn’t really the finish line?
When you see most Presidential Diamonds in doTERRA starting a second organization to hit Double Diamond, Double Blue Diamond, or Double Presidential Diamond … only to do it over again with a third organization, you realize that there IS no finish line, because it keeps moving further and further away the closer you get to it.
I realized that I can define the finish line for myself, and for me, my entire goal in doTERRA was to make a full time income for myself so that my husband could run his own business without the pressure to make our entire household income.
And I freaking did that all the way back in 2017.
No matter how happy I was for my team when they hit their own higher ranks, and no matter how much I tried to find another, bigger why for my dotERRA business, it was always about me creating a full time income for myself and my family.
This thought process of defining enough for myself is what spurred my first blog post of this year “How much money do you REALLY need to make in your business?”.
For me, that number is somewhere in the vicinity of $110,000 to $150,000 gross income, which works out to about $100,000 to $120,000 net income (or take home pay).
Anything over and above that, if it’s killing my mental sanity, is just not worth it.
I’m not a failure because I managed to build an entire other business alongside doTERRA, one that works better for my personality and lifestyle.
That business made $33,000 in 2019, and that’s the side that I’ll build going forward.
There’s a whole wide world of business opportunities out there, and if you decide that it’s not in network marketing, don’t let anyone in network marketing make you think you’re a failure.
Go out and find your own path, build your own empire, and know that if those people find you again in 5 years and ask what you’ve been up to, all you have to say is:
“Google me”
Is it me … or is it doTERRA?
I thought long and hard about this one. Like I said above, I feel like I’m going through a divorce, which seems like it would be easier if you had a “real”, justified reason for wanting to leave (in marriage, something like they were verbally abusive or they cheated). For me, it’s always easier to leave a difficult situation and take action when I’m being fuelled by anger from something someone else did, instead of me choosing me.
However, in this case, I’m not mad at doTERRA. It’s just that they’re going in one direction, and I’m going in another … and they’re not the same direction anymore.
I feel like the doTERRA I started building with 5 years ago isn’t the doTERRA of today, and you know what? That’s OK! No person or company can stay the same over years or decades.
doTERRA has a right to evolve and grow and try new things, just the same as I do.
Some of the things that doTERRA is doing, from a business perspective, isn’t in alignment with how I operate. For example, the endless promos every month, that we have no idea are coming or not, makes me feel like I’m constantly behind and like I can’t plan my life or other parts of my business.
When they switched up BOGO’s last July (which, again, is totally OK! A company should try new things and see what works best), it totally threw my BOGO planning out the window. And then when they did a sale in August for a week, I just ignored it because I was so burned out from BOGO’s the previous month, and I had planned for August to be focused on building a new webinar funnel for my BBB course.
Also, at a Diamond rank, there’s a lot more corporate stuff to show up to than at the lower ranks. Conference calls, events, meetings, putting out fires on your team that you didn’t start, but had to be taken care of … these things are just not for me. My personal version of hell is being stuck on conference calls and in meetings where there’s a whole lot of talking and not much doing.
It was then I realized that I was at the point where I had to choose one business over the other, because I constantly felt like I wasn’t doing either to my full potential.
I chose my own business.
My body and mind is in a place where I can’t hustle 24/7 anymore, and I feel like that’s what’s required of me in my doTERRA business. My own business allows me to have days off, especially when my anxiety is bad or when my husband’s business is insanely busy and I have to pick up more slack at home.
It’s not entirely my fault, and it’s not doTERRA’s fault. On my end, it’s a conscious uncoupling that I’m going through to leave a relationship in a good place, where I can still love the products and the relationships that I gained from doing this for 5 years.
I’ve spend the last 2 months going through a form of grief, with having to let go of a dream that I thought was going to be there my entire life. Even those I chose for that dream to change, I still have to work through the feelings of change and transition, which, self admittedly, I’m not good at.
I’m kind of bumbling through my work weeks, feeling like I’m not working long or hard enough. After 5 years of working solid 40-50 hour weeks, working anything less feels lazy.
However, my anxiety is better than it has been in years, I’m more rested, I’ve been eating more, and I’ve been meditating most work mornings and reading for fun (instead of all self development and business books).
A few weeks ago it hit me that, for the first time since before our son was born (he’s 7), that I’m actually happy. And I’m super conscious and grateful that I’m happy, because for the longest time I wasn’t.
That is worth more than all the money in the world to me, which is easy to say when I’m still making a full time income. Feel free to slap me now.
So there you go, the full story of why I quit my doTERRA Diamond business.
Again, I have nothing but respect for my fellow crossline sisters, upline, and downline, as they carry on the doTERRA torch without me.
I found some of my best friends because of this business, and me leaving won’t change that.
You all work so hard, and I have nothing but the highest opinions of you.
Keep on slinging that oily love, because the world definitely needs more of it!
