I’m sitting here thinking about all the ways we abandon ourselves when building our businesses and our brand—the countless moments where we trade our natural expression for what we think is expected of us. This disconnection happens so subtly we barely notice until one day we read our website and wonder, “Who the hell is this person? This isn’t me.”
There’s this moment of recognition that flashes across their face when they realize the voice they’ve been projecting into the digital world belongs to some imagined “professional version” of themselves that doesn’t actually exist.
It’s what happens when we start confusing our authentic selves with our professional identities.
The Quiet Disappearing Act
For far too long, I’ve watched too many brilliant people hide their actual brilliance behind voices that flatten everything that makes their work meaningful.
This pattern plays out in so many predictable ways:
It’s like the therapist who talks about “embodied healing journeys” and “attachment patterns” online but in person speaks simply about feeling safe in your own skin again.
It’s like the business strategist whose written content is filled with industry buzzwords and “proven methodologies” when their actual conversations focus on the messy human realities of building something that matters.
In each case, something essential gets lost in translation—not accidentally, but through conscious choices based on unexamined assumptions about what “professional” communication requires.
When we step back and examine this pattern, we can see it’s not just about word choice—it’s about a fundamental disconnection between how we naturally express ourselves and how we think we should present our work to the world. Let me offer an analogy that might help make sense of what’s happening.
The Recipe of Your Voice
I think about brand voice as cooking from memory versus following someone else’s recipe.
Your natural communication style is like a dish you’ve made countless times; you adjust seasonings intuitively, adapt to available ingredients while maintaining the essential flavor, and create consistent results without needing precise measurements.
When you adopt a voice that doesn’t belong to you, your brand becomes like cooking from someone else’s detailed recipe for a dish you’ve never actually tasted.
Yes, you’re producing content.
Yes, you’re following all the instructions.
But there’s an uncertainty that creates a constant checking and double-checking—like a persistent worry about whether you’re getting it “right.”
This unease manifests physically when you sit down to write content.
You measure each word precisely.
You follow formulas exactly.
You spend hours crafting messages that should come naturally.
I find this isn’t writer’s block. It’s the hesitation that comes from working without the embodied knowledge of your own authentic flavor.
We’re not creating a brand new brand voice formula nor template.
We’re creating that finds your way back to your natural expression that genuinely reflects how you communicate when you’re present, engaged, and not overthinking.
Remembering How You Actually Sound
I’m not suggesting you throw structure completely out the window.
Structure can be enormously helpful—when it emerges from your natural patterns rather than being imposed from outside.
This begins with simple observation.
When you’re talking about your work with someone who genuinely wants to understand it—not a sales conversation, just authentic sharing—what happens?
- What words and phrases emerge repeatedly?
- How do your sentences flow—short and direct, or flowing and connected?
- What analogies or examples appear naturally?
- Where does your energy and enthusiasm become most palpable?
Bonus: Let’s try this. Find a voice memo app on your phone and record yourself explaining your work to an imagined person who’s genuinely curious about what you do.
Speak naturally without planning or editing. It’s going to be weird if you’ve never heard yourself talk.
Listen to the recording and notice what emerges—the terms you use consistently, the structure of your explanations, the examples that appear without conscious construction.
These patterns contain the seeds of your authentic voice. Not because they follow some expert formula but because they’re already yours.
Yet even when we recognize these patterns, many of us hesitate to bring them into our professional expression. This resistance doesn’t come from nowhere—it emerges from very real concerns about how we’ll be perceived if we break from established norms.
Facing the Fear of Being Yourself
Let’s acknowledge something real: stepping into authentic expression can feel vulnerable, especially when industry norms pull in a different direction.
Something I had to recently work through, especially going through this vestibular challenge, was learning to move towards my natural voice and confronting my fear that I’d appear weak and vulnerable when I voiced and shared my story in this manner.
And yes, this fear is legitimate since I’m now breaking from conventional communication patterns.
And also, there’s a much greater cost in maintaining a voice that requires constant performance. That cost isn’t just energetic—it’s relational. The people who would most value your actual approach can sense the disconnection between your artificial voice and your lived experience. They might not name it consciously, but they feel it.
When your brand voice emerges from authentic expression rather than adopted patterns, something shifts. The exhaustion of maintenance disappears. The people who resonate with your actual approach find you more easily. And most importantly, the artificial barrier between your “marketing self” and your “working self” dissolves.
Understanding this tension between authenticity and conformity is essential, but the real question becomes: how do we actually begin moving toward greater alignment between our natural expression and our professional presence?
Reclaiming and Uncovering Your Brand Voice: Practical Steps
I don’t pretend this transition happens overnight. It takes constant repetition.
Moving from artificial to authentic expression typically unfolds as an evolution rather than a revolution. But there are practical steps that guide this return to yourself:
1. Capture your natural communication
Record yourself explaining your work to someone who brings genuine curiosity. Not an interview, not a sales conversation—just natural discussion about what you do and why it matters. This unfiltered exchange reveals patterns you might not notice when consciously constructing language.
For example, I share my behind the scenes on Instagram Reels and stories to honor this journey of mine.
2. Identify your actual terminology
Every field has conventional language, but most develop their own variations that more accurately reflect their particular approach. What words do you naturally use that differ from standard industry terminology? These distinctions often reveal your unique perspective.
A consultant I worked with realized she never naturally used the word “clients”—she consistently said “partners” without conscious choice. This simple distinction reflected her collaborative approach more accurately than her formal materials acknowledged.
3. Notice where disconnection creates the most friction
Rather than trying to transform everything at once, identify where the gap between your authentic voice and current expression feels most significant. Is your website copy unnaturally formal? Do your social posts adopt trendy expressions that feel foreign in your mouth? These specific areas create natural starting points.
4. Develop guidelines, not rules
Rather than rigid formulas, create flexible frameworks that capture the essence of your natural communication. What qualities remain consistent across different contexts? What natural variations emerge in different situations? These patterns form guidelines that support consistency without requiring performance.
5. Practice expanding comfort with differentiation
Moving toward authentic expression often means breaking from industry conventions. This differentiation can trigger discomfort even when it creates more accurate representation. Acknowledge this discomfort without letting it pull you back toward artificial conformity.
As these practices gradually bring your digital presence into greater alignment with your authentic expression, you’ll begin to experience a profound shift in your relationship with your business communications.
The Return to Yourself
When your brand voice emerges from authentic patterns rather than imposed formulas, your digital presence becomes a natural extension of your work rather than a separate performance requiring maintenance.
This alignment creates profound relief—the exhaustion of maintaining artificial voice disappears, replaced by the natural flow that comes when expression aligns with experience. Your community experiences consistent recognition across different touchpoints, building trust through coherence rather than confusion through disconnection.
Most importantly, your voice becomes a genuine carrier of your wisdom rather than a constructed facade that approximates what expertise is supposed to sound like.
