are we the hero of our own story?

Almost every week I receive emails, messages on LinkedIn or requests on Instagram along the lines of "We can help you get 100 new leads/1,000 new clients/earn six figures a week/month (or something equally ridiculous)!"

I immediately delete these messages.

I was talking about this drive for more with an acquaintance last month who has begun coaching. We were discussing coaching as a career, goals, hopes and dreams. I shared my current exploration of alternative approaches to offering my services (on a donation or pay-what-you-can basis). They suggested this approach was "dangerous" as apparently I was at risk of becoming a charity case if I didn't aim to earn more money. I was told that the more money I earn the more people I could help. Like Bill Gates - look how many people he helps! (Although if I was being really pedantic, I might argue that he doesn't personally help millions, he pays for other people to help millions. I couldn't possibly coach thousands of people a year - there aren't enough hours in the day! I could become a manager of a business that coaches thousands of people. But I don't want to be a manager. I want to be a coach and educator.) It reminded me of those spammy marketing messages I get.

Shouldn't I be aiming to help millions of people? Isn't that better than helping maybe just a few hundred in my lifetime?

isn’t more better?

In our current global culture, we seem to be obsessed with more. More clients, followers, income, impact... more is better right? It's like the more we acquire or achieve on a numeric scale, the more of a hero we are right? And don't we all want to be the hero in our story?

Bizarrely as I was out for a run the other morning, I was struck by a random and sudden though (inspiration works like that): what if our purpose is not to be the hero of our story but the guide?

the hero’s journey

If you're not familiar The Hero's Journey, it's a common narrative structure or archetype apparently first presented by the writer Joseph Campbell and widely adopted in the worlds of fiction, film and more recently, marketing.

If you think of almost any well-known film or book franchise, the narrative generally follows this (abridged) pattern:

There's a hero... (Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter, Neo)

They have a problem... (The Sith/Dark side using the Force for evil, Voldemort's desire to rid the world of Muggles, AI subjugating humanity via The Matrix)

They meet a guide... (Obi Wan Kenobi, Dumbledore, Morpheus)

The guide introduces to them a challenge...(Take on Darth Vader and destroy the Death Star, battle the Basilisk and destroy a horcrux, take the Red Pill and battle The Agents)

And achieves success/a happy ending... (Death Star explodes and reignites the The Rebels hope, defeats dark magic and learns of his own powers, is resurrected as The One and sets out to destroy The Matrix and liberate humanity)

The focus is usually on The Hero. They're the one that is front and centre on billboard posters, that gets all the glory, the one we're rooting for, right?

being the guide

But a classic tenet of marketing (if you're a business trying to sell your products or services) is: stop trying to be the hero in the story. Your clients are the heroes in this story. YOU are the guide. Without you - the guide - there are no heroes. Would Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter or Neo have defeated evil and changed the future without Obi Wan, Dumbledore or Morpheus? Those guides helped one person (or a handful) of heroes in those stories, but that changed the future. Forever.

Perhaps we could all take a leaf out of The Hero's Journey book. What if we all stopped trying to be The Hero, and just focussed on being The Guide? What if by making an impact on only a handful of people in our lifetime we could change the world forever? What a weight to be lifted: the need to work ourselves to an early grave, to make millions, to serve thousands!

What if serving only a few (but really well) was enough?

Wouldn't that, paradoxically, make us all heroes in the end?

I'll think I'll forgo the thousands of clients and six figure income. Frankly, it sounds exhausting. I'll carry on trusting that each client I serve is enough. Each client I serve is a hero who will go on to have an inconceivable impact on the world. I don't need to try to be a hero, there are plenty of 'em out there.

What about you? Who might you be a guide for? Your children? A friend? A colleague? A client?

How might your support help them to be the hero of their own story?

What difference might it make to you to let go of trying to be a hero and be a guide instead?