Play, Shake, and Share

This is from Carl's (BeachBody's CEO) blog yesterday. I love what it says and wanted to post it here for you to read.

If you want to get healthy, lose weight, and build a business for yourself without having to invest a lot of money, read this post.

At least one email a day hits my inbox from someone with a new concept for recruiting new people into the Beachbody Revolution. New advertising campaign ideas, institutional opportunities, and even acquisition concepts. Every idea has merit, but none are as powerful as the powerful force driving this outreach: People talking directly to people they know in order to get them started on the sure-fire solution; Exercise, good nutrition, and peer support.

This is the best of what network marketing can be, where people talk to people with the intent to help them succeed, and in turn help others do the same. High volume, high touch. Incredible results.

That's what we're doing. And for those that stay focused on building a business based on that, the opportunity is proving especially compelling.

Babak Azad is one of our VP's at the company, and he sent me an email over the weekend reminding me how, when every other infomercial company was selling "easy", Beachbody broke the mold by telling it how it is: Losing weight takes work. He compared that message to the opportunity we and our coaches have not to look for the easy way out, but to instead celebrate that if you want to build an opportunity as a coach, you need to work the program and talk to people. Just like health, when it comes to building an income stream, there is no magic pill, and no free ride.

Hard work pays off. It doesn't have to be complex. (In fact complexity is a sure way to frustrate your efforts). It has been my experience that the people who keep it simple and simply "share their success" are the ones who see the reward, both in body transformation and life transformation.

That's why I am focusing so much of my attention promoting the concept of Play, Shake & Share, where you get results, and your journey serves as a role model to inspire people around you.

Play -- Exercise at least 20 times every 30 days

Shake -- Drink a meal replacement shake everyday and improve your overall nutrition.

Share -- Work at building your Beachbody business by sharing it with people. Listen and learn what stands in the way of people getting results. Help them see how Play, Shake & Share can help them succeed. (That builds your business, and keeps your eye on the ball of your own body-transformation... not so easy to dig a fist into a bag of M&M's when I'm representing that this program works.)

For me, the "Play" aspect has been a couple Ten Minute Trainer's a day and an hour walk with my baby son in the Bjorn. I drink a shake a day. For the last few months, I switched from our Beachbody Meal Replacement in order to be the primary guinea pig for our new uber-shake in development called "Shakeology". A year ago I asked our nutrition development team to formulate something that would help me get the nutrition I am missing (I cannot stand vegetables. Truly. I am like a five year old. Don't know why, just can't stomach them). So Shakeology was formulated to give me a whole food source of what I was missing and just plain give me a burst of healthy stuff in at least one meal a day. While some people will spend over $6 on a Jamba Juice or a frozen Frappa-cappuccino thing at Starbucks, I wanted a shake that I could truly consider my healthiest meal of the day even if it cost me $12 a serving. And what they came up with is remarkable. I personally believe it is why I haven't gotten sick through the last 30 days of intense newborn-sleep-deprivation. I'm "regular" like sunrise, my calorie intake is steady, and everything about my health is better. The days I don't drink Shakeology, I miss it. We're launching the clinical study/test group in a few weeks, and expect to bring the product to market in early fall.

Funny aside on Shakeology; One of the main contributors to helping create that formulation was my wife, Isabelle. She has spent her career providing nutrition, fitness, and training advice to professional athletes, big time executives, and even rock stars who need to detox when they come off the road. She's the most voracious information junkie I've ever witnessed, and highly skeptical of anything "new" unless it is based on decades or even centuries of use. (Ironic that she married me, a guy who thinks pizza is a food group) She's so disciplined about nutrition that she recently called EVERY health food store and manufacturer of baby-formula she could find on the internet to find one with no preservatives or so-called "bad stuff" to help her supplement breast milk. This went on for days, asking stock boys to read ingredient labels to her over the phone. She couldn't find any one that she liked 100%. One day we needed to supplement baby-Danny (he's a heavy drinker) with a formula, so we used the best one she found. Well, you'd think I was making him an arsenic martini. So the fact that she not only put her stamp of approval on Shakeology, but actually makes my shake for me on the weekend means this stuff is top shelf healthy.

I push play, I take my shake, and I talk to people all day long to share this opportunity.

The bottom line to all this is, if you want results, the tools are there. It's time to work for it. Work the program. You want to be lean this summer, you need to put a DVD into the machine and mash that play button 20 times every 30 days. You need to eat right. That means no skipping breakfast, and no eating too late in the day. Intake calories steadily throughout the day. A shake is great way to do that without a lot of math. And if you want to give yourself a fighting chance to stick with it this time; Share it. Surround yourself with people doing the same thing. Ignite them to get healthy! And they will keep you on track.

My goal is that Beachbody and its coaches reverse this trend of obesity, and get people to make health a priority. (That includes me.) I am convinced this is how we're going to do it. I need people around me who will support that goal with hard work and courage.

I've said I want to sign up a million coaches... I need to clarify that: The goal is not just to sign-up a million coaches -- but to get a million coaches who will help get a hundred or more people healthy -- that's over 100 million people who will find the answer and feel better. THAT'S SUCCESS.

And in the world of government health insurance initiatives, corporate wellness programs, fitness gimmicks and pharmaceuticals, all which are grasping at a magic mass-solution, who would imagine that the basic concept of combining Exercise, Good Nutrition, and Peer Support would be the answer? I would.

Play, Shake & Share.

It's going to take passion to get that message out there. It's going to take patience. And it's going to take work. If you're willing to do the work, I want you on the team. You'll get healthy. And You'll get others healthy. And we'll share the rewards.