James Altucher said he had originally come to prominence by talking money and finance; he wrote books about it, appeared on television, worked on Wall Street and even made websites that helped people choose stocks. It was his full-time career, and he had done pretty well with it.

James came to a point, however, when he’d decided he didn’t want to talk finance anymore. He wanted to talk about his life — personal struggles, separation and divorce, caring for his kids, questioning his personal worthiness, and what he’d done to bring himself back from the doldrums of depression and self-loathing. That material became his most popular book, Choose Yourself.

James said that, once he started talking about all this personal stuff, stuff he really wanted to talk about, he lost most of his financial advice / Wall Street audience. That makes sense; those people had come to James to hear about money, and he was no longer delivering.

But, James finished, while he lost that audience, he gained a whole new audience when he started talking about himself and his personal challenges.

When he found his voice, his audience found him.