Are You Willing to Go to Any Length?

In high school or college, did you have to read the epic poem Beowulf? I did. I’m guessing most were bored by it.

I didn’t grasp its true meaning until I was in my late 40s.

King Hrothgar has built an impressive beer hall. All his merry men love to come together and drink there every night.

But there’s a problem: Grendel, an evil monster, shows up every now and then, kicks down the door, demolishes the place, and slaughters the knights and soldiers. The killings are resulting in a lot of bad Google reviews for Hrothgar.

Enter Beowulf. Hired gun. Not terribly different from a great many entrepreneurs—guys and gals who solve problems nobody else can solve.

A few nights later, Grendel kicks down the door and goes swashbuckling through the mead hall, smashing warriors and terrifying everyone.

Beowulf, clothed in chain mail, attacks Grendel.

Beowulf’s weapons don’t work, so he ends up relying on his secret superpower: the mighty death grip of his own right hand.

Beowulf grasps Grendel by the shoulder and literally rips shoulder and arm right out of the socket and tosses them onto the floor. Grendel stomps back to the swamp from which he came and plunges into the water, leaving a trail of blood and gore.

Grendel is dead! A great toast is raised to Beowulf!

But the story is only one-third over.

~

A few nights later, another monster kicks down the door.

It’s Grendel’s mother. And she is MAD.

As poet and essayist David Whyte puts it in his excellent book The Heart Aroused, “It is not the thing you fear that you must deal with, it is the mother of the thing you fear.”

How many entrepreneurs have solved a perceived difficulty at the first stroke only to realize it was merely a symptom of a deadlier disease at the heart of the business?

Back to the poem: The swamp where Grendel’s mother lives is so dreadful, even a deer being chased by wolves would rather get eaten than dive in. But Beowulf dives in anyway, to confront the new monster. He brings a magnificent sword given to him by Hrogarth … and loses it almost immediately.

Grendel’s mom attacks him in a rage. The only thing that keeps Beowulf alive is his chain mail. He manages to wriggle free, and just when she’s about to impale him, he spies an ancient sword, crafted by ogres. Beowulf seizes it and takes a swing at Grendel’s mother. The new sword slices all the way to the bone, killing her instantly.

I bet the Beowulf saga describes every big, ugly, badass problem you’ve ever solved in your life. It does for my life.

It’s me getting a sales job and being thrown into the cold-calling swamp. I nearly drowned, but then I discovered direct marketing.

It’s me hanging out my shingle to become a marketing consultant, and then desperately needing sales leads. Writing articles and getting publicity put a patch on the problem for a while, but I didn’t really solve it until I mastered Google Ads. Then the problem of buying Traffic still wasn’t solved until I solved Conversion and Economics.

You have a monster to kill. The weapons others gave you don’t work. You have to find new superpowers … your own gleaming sword at the bottom of the swamp.

From Perry Marshall’s book Detox, Declutter, Dominate

About the Author

Perry Marshall has launched two revolutions in sales and marketing. In Pay-Per-Click advertising, he pioneered best practices and wrote the world's best selling book on Google advertising. And he's driven the 80/20 Principle deeper than any other author, creating a new movement in business.

He is referenced across the Internet and by Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, INC and Forbes Magazine.