Nobody Asked for Your Epic

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is now playing in theaters, putting Homer’s ancient story back in front of a modern audience. The film follows Odysseus as he tries to return home after the Trojan War, facing monsters, angry gods, temptation, and consequences created by his own pride.

This is not a movie review. It is a confession.

Full disclosure: I am guilty of the thing I am about to criticize. When writers and business owners run out of things to talk about, we often turn to the one subject on which we can always claim expertise: ourselves. Our journeys, struggles, and successes are familiar territory. The old advice says, “Write what you know,” and what do we know better than our own lives?

As of this writing, I have published 25 articles since beginning my weekly blog push in March. Nine of them include some reference to me, my experiences, or my personal history. I have written about a jar of Sanka, my daughter’s first car, and my years in broadcasting. Some of those references earned their place because they gave readers a concrete way into a larger subject. Others may have survived because they were easy for me to write.

That is the uncomfortable question behind this article. Are we using personal stories because they help the reader understand the subject, or because talking about ourselves is easier than finding a better way into it?

I rarely appear in my own videos for a related reason. Once I turn the camera toward myself, I feel the pull toward self-promotion. Suddenly, I am no longer explaining an idea. I am auditioning to become the same dancing monkey I have warned business owners not to become.

Damn the ego.

Every Business Owner Has an Epic

People start businesses for countless reasons. Some feel held back by employers and believe they can do the work better. Some spot a problem they want to solve. Others lose a job, inherit a company, turn a side project into an income, or step up after a spouse, parent, or partner can no longer continue.

Some want freedom. Some want control. Some want to build a legacy. Some simply want the chance to prove somebody wrong.

Every one of those beginnings can become an epic filled with risk, sacrifice, setbacks, stubbornness, and victory. The owner remembers the first customer, the first major mistake, and the month when the money almost ran out. Those memories matter because the owner had to live through them.

The customer did not.

They may eventually care about how the business began, but they usually want to know what it can do for them first. Every business owner has an epic. The mistake is assuming the customer already bought a ticket.

Putting Your Name on the Ship

This may be especially true for those of us who named our businesses after ourselves. Guilty as charged.

There are good reasons to put your name on a company. A name above the door can mean, “I stand behind this work.” Your reputation becomes attached to the product, the invoice, the promise, and the result. Part of it is ego, but part of it is accountability.

That accountability can build trust. It can also create a trap. When your name is on the company, the business can easily become tangled with your identity. A bad review does not feel like criticism of a service. It feels like criticism of you.

A successful project becomes another chapter in your personal legend. The website begins to sound like a biography, while the blog becomes a travel diary through your struggles, opinions, and accomplishments.

From the perspective of The Odyssey, the danger is not having a name. The danger is needing everyone to know it.

Odysseus and his men become trapped in the cave of the Cyclops Polyphemus. Odysseus calls himself “Nobody,” blinds the giant, and escapes. Once safely aboard his ship, however, he cannot resist revealing his real name.

That name gives Polyphemus the information he needs to call upon his father, Poseidon. Poseidon is not simply another god. He rules the sea and earthquakes, earning the title “Earth-Shaker.” For a man trying to sail home, he is about the worst enemy imaginable.

Polyphemus asks his father to prevent Odysseus from reaching Ithaca. If he must return, the Cyclops asks that he arrive late, broken, and without his crew. Poseidon’s anger turns the sea beneath Odysseus into an enemy and helps explain the storms, shaking ships, and years added to his voyage.

Odysseus had already won. He was safe, and then his ego shouted from the boat.

Business owners can do something similar. We survive the difficult beginning, build something that works, and then feel compelled to explain every hardship we endured along the way. We want people to understand the long nights, risks, sacrifices, bad partnerships, lucky breaks, and unlikely chain of events that brought the company into existence.

To us, it is an epic. To the customer, it may only be background information.

Your Customer Already Has an Epic

Nobody asked for your epic because your customer is already living through one of their own. They may be trying to keep a business alive, repair a damaged home, care for a parent, plan an event, replace lost income, or solve a problem they never expected to face.

By the time they find your website, blog, video, or advertisement, they are rarely looking for another main character. They are looking for help.

That does not mean customers are selfish or uninterested in the people behind a business. A strong founder story can build trust, provide context, and make a company easier to remember. The problem begins when we assume the customer will find our journey meaningful before we connect it to theirs.

A contractor may be proud of learning the trade from his father, but the homeowner wants to know whether the roof will leak. A marketer may have spent years in radio, television, video production, and local media, but the business owner wants to know whether that experience can help bring in customers.

The personal history matters when it answers the question.

Your origin story explains why you care. Your marketing must explain why the customer should care.

The customer is not asking us to erase ourselves. They are asking us to translate ourselves. What did the journey teach us? What can we recognize or prevent because of it? How does that experience make the customer’s decision easier, safer, or more informed?

Our story becomes useful when it enters the customer’s story as experience, guidance, judgment, or reassurance. Until then, it is autobiography.

Placement matters too. A founder story may strengthen an About page, add context to a blog, or deepen an existing customer relationship. It should not stand between a new customer and the answer they came to find.

When Authenticity Becomes TMI

We often tell our stories because we want to be relatable. The fashionable word is “authentic.” Business owners are encouraged to show the struggle behind the success, admit failures, reveal fears, and let customers see the person behind the company.

There is value in that. People generally trust human beings more than polished corporate furniture. But authenticity has a boundary.

When honesty becomes too much information, customers may not feel closer to the business. They may begin to lose faith in it. They hear about financial trouble, burnout, family conflict, or uncertainty about the future. The owner may believe they are being transparent, but the customer may hear instability.

Can this person handle my project? Am I hiring an expert, or becoming an audience for somebody’s personal recovery?

Customers do not expect business owners to be invincible, but they do expect us to be capable. They come to us because they need something fixed, explained, or improved. They are not looking for another problem to carry.

There is a difference between revealing a scar and displaying an open wound. A scar says, “I went through this, learned from it, and improved.” An open wound asks the customer to witness the struggle while it is still happening.

That may be honest, but honesty alone is not a marketing strategy. The goal is not to manufacture perfection. It is to share vulnerability after it has become useful judgment.

Share the failure when it explains the lesson. Share the hardship when it proves resilience. Share the vulnerability when it helps the customer feel understood. Leave out the details that weaken confidence without giving the reader anything useful in return.

There is another boundary too. Founder stories often include spouses, children, former partners, employees, clients, illnesses, deaths, and betrayals. A story may be authentic and still expose someone else. Before telling it, ask whether the whole story is actually yours to share.

The Epic Test

Personal experience should be chosen because it is the best way to make the point, not simply because it is the easiest story available.

Before using a personal story in your marketing, ask five questions:

1. Can I make this point without putting myself into it?

2. What does my story give the reader that another example would not?

3. Does the story show useful experience and judgment, or reveal an unresolved problem that could weaken confidence?

4. Is the entire story mine to tell?

5. After telling it, do I return the focus to the reader and their problem?

That gives us five distinct jobs: necessity, value, credibility, ownership, and customer focus.

Brevity is a separate editing rule:

Tell only the part of the story needed to make the point.

Sometimes the honest answer to the first question will be yes. We could make the point without mentioning ourselves. We simply enjoy our version better. That does not automatically disqualify the story, but it does expose the ego hiding beneath the floorboards.

So, Did This Article Pass?

Yes, I began an article about overusing personal stories with a personal confession. The irony is not lost on me.

The question is whether that confession clarified the lesson or merely gave me another opportunity to talk about myself. Was it useful, or was I simply shouting my name from the ship because I wanted everyone to know who defeated the Cyclops?

Our stories matter. They shape our businesses, our judgment, and the way we serve people, but they are not automatically useful simply because they belong to us.

Tell enough of the story to build trust. Explain what the journey taught you. Then stop talking about the captain and help the customer get home.

Your business story may be worth telling. Woodruff Media can help decide which parts build trust, which parts serve the customer, and which parts should remain aboard the ship.

You run the business. We help people notice it.

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AI Disclosure: Artificial intelligence assisted with brainstorming, organization, research support, and editing. The opinions, personal experiences, conclusions, and final editorial decisions are those of the author.

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