Put on Your Big Girl Panties

Written by Raisinberry

We have talked about the cult mentality and technique that Mary Kay sales leadership employs to draw in and convince women that the world of Mary Kay is the most wholesome and strengthening environment for women. Slogans designed to shut down objective thinking are repeated over and over until one repeats them to themselves.

Hiding behind the control of “positive attitude,” the faults and flaws of Mary Kay can’t be discussed and those who attempt it are shunned. What we do not notice is a reduction of our “standing” as an independent contractor. Inundated with slogans, we have a diminished capacity to evaluate what is really being said to us and believed about us. A woman who tells you to “put on your big girl panties” is mindlessly repeating a slogan that was said to her without ever evaluating what she is really saying.

Your objections, hardships, concerns and criticisms are reduced to one single thought. You are acting like a child, and you need to grow up and get a pair of whatever the women wear, who don’t complain and criticize or have concerns. Putting on your big girl panties is a vulgar and demeaning way to reduce you to nothing more than a whining baby in a diaper.

Let me ask you a question. In a professional environment, would your boss, male or female, EVER tell you that the answer to your concern that you have no leads or bookings is, “well put on your big girl panties and get to work”?

I mention this, because one of the reasons why Mary Kay is out of control in its abuse of women, is that very few women have actual success in this company. They believe (due to the positive mental attitude control tactic) that everyone ELSE does. So they adopt the sayings of all the noteworthy, stage hogs and repeat them without ever evaluating what they are really saying.

It is a combination of the lack of personal success, the “fake it till you make it” attitude, combined with mimicking those who are believed to be successful, that brings us this vast sea of mindless slogans that offer us no real help in the building of our so-called businesses.

From, “believe and achieve”, to “show up to go up”, “stars drive cars” to “if it is to be it’s up to me”, all this crafted sloganeering hides the grim reality that most of the “professional” sales force have no real leadership training, no real personal success selling this product, and no evaluation of their skills from a “National” or Corporate Sales Trainer that could have course corrected this nonsense long ago.

Masquerading as a cosmetics giant, Mary Kay, by its own behavior, admits that it is simply a large Cosmetics Day Care for hobby consultants who squeal and prance over the illusion of success and cheap prizes. And “managing” that production are the directors who believed the sloganeering and kept their mouths shut as to their lack of success, because they were certain that success was just a recruit away. They, after all, had earned their big girl panties when they finished DIQ.

I find it ironic that women who wouldn’t tolerate this kind of talk in a regular corporate environment do so from OTHER WOMEN! Mary Kay as a direct seller, escapes responsibility for attending to the leadership skills or lack thereof of the NSDs and sales directors. In essence, even directors are only taught, “book sell book recruit.”

That leaves the entire consultant sales force victim to the bad behavior, deceitfulness, manipulation and ignorance of those who are supposed to be teaching them. One look through the stories on this site will validate the fact that many NSDs are guilty of abuses of finances, spirituality, emotions, and leadership, through the way they communicate and the little concern they show for skills development in their downline.

After all, what skill does it take to write down the numbers of a credit card, hold a meeting, or dangle a prize to get guests to come hear a new batch of sloganeering?

And Mary Kay, Inc. is protected from responsibility, it seems, because we are all “independent”. How convenient.

It might be time to think of nothing else than for conviction to fall on every NSD and all of Mary Kay’s corporate staff. A real awakening of all the abuses on so many levels that this company has tolerated and looked the other way on, to the detriment of beauty consultants, probably world ide.

I mention this because I was told, that “what you think about you bring about.” I’d sure like to see if this is true.

7 COMMENTS

  1. But won’t re-framing their “deserve level” be the answer? The slogans hold all the answers, well that and the “I” stories. And yes, I’ve watched some “I” stories on YouTube. Clearly hollow puffery. But then this is all part of the indoctrination, uh, company provided “free” training.

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    • I almost never comment on Raisinberry’s posts because they’re so good that I have nothing useful to add. This time, however, I can provide an art history lesson.

      The unfortunate gal in the thumbnail is from a painting by pinup artist Art Frahm, whose specialty was pictures of women with their knickers around their ankles, usually in that exaggerated legs spread pose, looking over her shoulder with a mildly annoyed expression. Her hands are always full (the grocery bag, complete with celery, is the usual encumberance) There’s always a gust of wind or some other factor about to reveal Everything, and every man around is leering at her about to be uncovered nethers. Any other women in the piece will be totally oblivious to any of this. Apparently, the helpless woman surrounded by leering men, britches down and about to moon the world, was considered sexy.

      Chances are this came from the Depression era and WWII rubber shortages, when people couldn’t afford to or weren’t able to replace their undies when the elastic wore out, and sometimes a woman’s underwear would give out right in the middle of wherever she was. The “proper” thing to do was to step right out of them while everyone else pretended nothing had happened.

      Art Frahm’s helpless lady really is the perfect metaphor for Mary Kay, though not in the way they’re intending. No one comes forward to take her bag of celery so she can hitch up her underpants. No one’s thumping the leering men with an umbrella and telling them to behave. No one’s offering to run into Woolworth’s and grab her a new pair. The women ignoring her aren’t doing anything to help, but you know she’s going to be the talk of the bridge club circuit. And, you know, if she’d been wearing slacks none of this would have happened :p

      Meanwhile, Miss Pantsafallindown is standing there on full display. Instead of just stepping out of her fallen undies and carrying on with dignity, she’s cheesecaking for all she’s worth. “Oh, look at me with my undies around my ankles! Don’t I look silly! Who will buy my celery for a dollar so I can buy a new pair! In fact, why not join me in selling celery so we can all stand around in our underpants?” like all the desperate Facebook posts exhorting the reader to buy, and sign up, and sell, and make desperate posts of their own.

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    • And that Wikipedia article links to another mental trick that they exploit big time: “The rhyme-as-reason effect, also known as the Eaton–Rosen phenomenon, is a cognitive bias where sayings or aphorisms are perceived as more accurate or truthful when they rhyme.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhyme-as-reason_effect

      Show up to go up. If it’s to be it’s up to me. Stars drive cars. Fake it ’til you make it. Soar like never before in 2024.

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