Why is it so hard to write about yourself for your website?

It is very very difficult to write about yourself. Why?

Just to get a bit whimsical, our selves are an infinite array of elements that shift depending on the situations we are in and the people we are with.

With Friends

Opposite political viewpoint

With Children

People We've Never Met

Why making a list of characteristic traits doesn’t help

If we start by listing our characteristics we’ll find ourselves a load of contradictions and uncertainties and unless we’re unusually honest we may well avoid those traits we don’t care to acknowledge. Who’s going share “find it hard to get out of bed some days” with their potential customers?
In any case our visitors don’t really care who we are except in as far as who we are informs the way we do business.
Of course you’re going to tell me you’re good but if what you put on your website allows me to discover this for myself, that’s much more powerful. I feel I’ve made up my own mind about you and I will always trust my own judgement over your claims.

The human brain is designed to be a sense-making machine

It all comes down to the way humans prefer to uncover information and that’s why Story is such a powerful thing.

We are at our most engaged when we are DISCOVERING things, NOT when we are being told them. That’s inference.

Influencing inference

There are all sorts of ways of achieving this.

Talk about what inspires you

If your About page is about the places, things, people, moments that have inspired you to do what you do, people will draw their own picture of who you are.

David Attenborough (Love nature)
Kandinksy (Intellectual appreciation of Art)
Maya Angelou (Humanitarian World View)
Emily Dickinson (Romantic and passionate)
John Singer Sargent (Loves portraiture)

Life in the day of - you can tell so much about a person by how they spend a day

4am - Wake up: Reach for thermos of herbal tea to cheer myself up at this ungodly hour
4am - 6am: Do writing for pleasure
6am - 7am: Run around with dog picking up litter (she hardly does any)
8.00am - 8.30am Get ready for the day
9am - 1pm Work, work, work…

A visitor might infer that this is a serious minded person who will take her customers seriously (though not necessarily someone you’d ask around to get the party going).

Or, simply describe the process of what you do. To you it’s so familiar, to others it’s fascinating and strange

When I’ve laid out a web page I scroll up and down just feeling it.

I’ve been doing this a long time now and I know the way I’ve used the colours, shapes, photographs and blocks of text will feel right, or it won’t and I’ve learned to trust my instinct, the small electric shock that happens when everything is where it should be, and the peacefulness that follows.

If I don’t get feeling of peace I’ll keep going until I do.

You only need a snippet, you only need to get people interested.