I heard this story as a little girl and it had a lasting impact on me so I wanted to share it with you. So many times I witness “Cold prickly” behavior. It especially saddens me to see it in Direct Sales. We are all a potential customer for another entrepreneur. All of our customers purchase a plethora of products from cleaning supplies to jewelry. Why not support the industry by shopping from other representatives and referring clients to them? This spirit of reciprocation will build both businesses. Sadly, too many sellers focus only on themselves. The fact is that your customers are buying those other products at the mall and you could be turning them onto other great DS products, increasing awareness of our industry, blessing someone else’s business, racking up some VERY good karma AND positioning yourself as an expert in the eyes of your customer. Instead we choose to “hoard” our customers, ever fearful that they may spend money somewhere else. Just like the Warm Fuzzies or the Cold Pricklies, what you do comes right back around to you.
Enjoy!
Once upon a time there was a village. All of the people in the village got along very well. There was kindness, love, compassion, and justice. Every person in the village owned a special bag. It was given to them by their parents at the age of 3. Inside this bag were hundreds of warm fuzzies. Warm fuzzies were soft, cuddly, cottony little puffs. When you gave someone a warm fuzzy, they felt warm and fuzzy inside. People in the village gave each other warm fuzzies anytime they wanted to let someone know they were loved. When someone received a warm fuzzy, they put it in their bag.
One day, an evil sorceress came to town. She saw that everyone was giving out these warm fuzzies from their bags and she didn’t like it. She went up to one villager and said, “Why do you keep giving away your warm fuzzies? Aren’t you afraid you’re going to run out? Here, take this bag of cold pricklies and give these to the people in your village instead, and keep all your warm fuzzies for yourself.” The villager took the bag because he believed the sorceress’ tale. The next time he ran into a friend, he handed him one of the cold pricklies from his new bag. A cold prickly looked like a warm fuzzy but they made someone feel cold and prickly inside. Soon all the villagers were handing out cold pricklies and hoarding their warm fuzzies. In short order, the little village was no longer the warm, happy place it had once been.
One day a prince arrived in town and almost immediately someone handed him a cold prickly from their bag. The prince, recognizing the cold prickly, refused to take it. The villager was surprised and tried again. The prince handed the person a warm fuzzy from his bag. The villager was surprised, and a little ashamed that he had tried to give this warm prince a cold prickly and instead received a warm fuzzy.
The prince addressed the crowd and said, “Why do you give each other cold pricklies?” One villager said, “Why should we give away all of our warm fuzzies? Shouldn’t we keep them for ourselves?” Other villagers agreed. But the prince said, “Every time you give away a warm fuzzy a new one is created in your own bag. Don’t you see? The more you give away, the more you will have.”
To demonstrate, the prince had everyone put down their bag of cold pricklies and retrieve their bag of warm fuzzies from their homes. He asked everyone to take out a warm fuzzy from their bag and hand it to a neighbor. This they did, but warily. Then the prince told them to notice that they all still had the same amount of warm fuzzies in their bags as before. People started giving away more warm fuzzies and noticed their bag was never empty. There were indeed enough warm fuzzies for everyone.
The sorceress was very upset and tried to interrupt the prince. But the villagers didn’t want to listen anymore. They threw all their bags of cold pricklies into a wagon, set the sorceress inside it, and sent her out of town.
And they all lived happily ever after!
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Michelle Archer is a certified coach with nearly 25 years experience in direct sales. Michelle works with companies and individuals to explode their business potential. Connect with her on Facebook Learn more at http://directsalesinstitute.com/
Michelle Archer 