The Cult of the Personal Brand (and Why It’s Giving Me the Ick)

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This morning I opened social media and saw a post that started with a fake “DM.” It led straight into a story about a miscarriage.

And I just sat there thinking, what are we doing?

First of all, the setup is false. No sane person would DM such a intensely personal and unrealistic question. And secondly, I don’t know you like that.

When we put these stories up on open social media for strangers to see, we are basically trauma dumping to make people like us. And that is just uncool.

You don’t need a personal brand. You need to solve a problem.

The Real Issue

Maybe the issue is that people build personal brands to connect with people who are problem unaware in the client journey.

Or maybe it’s just narcissism.

Maybe it’s this weird exhaustion with being put in the boxes of what we do, and we’re all just looking for an excuse to be seen as whole people.

Here’s the truth: clients don’t need to know your whole life story. They need help. They need answers that actually work.

When we make everything about us, we lose focus on the person we’re supposed to serve.

Backwards Logic

Some of the most famous entrepreneurs in the world got that way because they first built a product or service that was so amazing people wanted to know who was behind it.

They solved a problem, and then they became a household name.

We’re trying to reverse-engineer the process: create a brand all about us so people will buy whatever we sell. But that’s not reasonable, because all those people don’t all have the same problems.

When the focus becomes me instead of them, it stops being business and turns into self-worship disguised as marketing.

The truth is, we start hoping people will love us enough to follow us around and buy whatever we offer.

But that kind of attention doesn’t last.

Because eventually, we fall off that tall, narrow pedestal we’ve built when we let people down in some way. And we will—because we’re human. We can’t be perfect all the time.

I’ve seen more moral failures in small businesses that overshared than I care to admit. When your brand becomes your identity, every mistake feels like a collapse.

That’s the danger of building a brand around yourself instead of your mission. It’s fragile. It feeds on praise and attention. And when the applause fades, it leaves you emptier than before.

If You’re Curious How I Can Help You

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Contrived Authenticity Isn’t Connection

What we’re calling “authentic” online often feels rehearsed.

Somewhere along the way, vulnerability turned into exposure. We’ve learned that being messy makes people pay attention, so we start performing pain for validation.

It’s not real. It’s just noise.

Even in pop culture, the celebration of oversharing has reached a level that feels like a performance of brokenness. And when businesses mimic that, it stops being honest connection and becomes another form of self-promotion.

You Don’t Need a Personal Brand. You Need a Viral Solution.

If you’re running a business, it’s time to pause and rethink what you’re actually building. Because the world doesn’t need more personalities. It needs more solutions.

Ultimately, we are the same person in our homes and in our businesses. When we lead with our values, it comes through in every conversation and interaction we have.

You don’t need a personal brand to shine.

You just need to serve faithfully, solve real problems, and live a truly Radiant Life.