Distance Makes the Ego Grow Larger

Barry Maher
Fri, 05 Dec 2025 15:08:22 -0800
Opinion

Most of my adult life, people have paid me money because they liked the sounds I made. No, I'm not a musician. That requires talent. I talk. And people give me money. Nice, huh?

Humans like good talkers. Especially good talkers from faraway places. If I'm speaking in Singapore, for example, I'm a big deal the minute I get off the plane. "Wow, the Singapore Society of Superannuated Shoulder Surgeons is bringing in a speaker all the way from America. He must be amazing!"

I think of it as the difference between Barry Maher and MISTER BARRY MAHER. In the States, audiences aren't especially excited to see me. In the States, my wife isn't especially excited to see me. The first time I ever spoke in the Middle East, I was exhausted after the flight. Wiped out. But the audience was so thrilled to have an American speaker, they got me jazzed enough that — if it had been humanly possible — I might have even lived up to the promoter's hype.
Updated: Fri Dec 05, 2025

Most of my adult life, people have paid me money because they liked the sounds I made. No, I'm not a musician. That requires talent. I talk. And people give me money. Nice, huh?

Humans like good talkers. Especially good talkers from faraway places. If I'm speaking in Singapore, for example, I'm a big deal the minute I get off the plane. "Wow, the Singapore Society of Superannuated Shoulder Surgeons is bringing in a speaker all the way from America. He must be amazing!"

I think of it as the difference between Barry Maher and MISTER BARRY MAHER. In the States, audiences aren't especially excited to see me. In the States, my wife isn't especially excited to see me. The first time I ever spoke in the Middle East, I was exhausted after the flight. Wiped out. But the audience was so thrilled to have an American speaker, they got me jazzed enough that — if it had been humanly possible — I might have even lived up to the promoter's hype.

MISTER BARRY MAHER travels in a different world. Once, in Mexico City, a government minister attended my session and insisted on taking me for a tour of the city the next day. Too much fun and food and tequila, and suddenly it was too late to make my flight.

No problem. The minister simply called the airport and had them hold the plane. I couldn't believe it. "When we finally arrived, the airline had a woman waiting for me at the curb. "MISTER BARRY MAHER?" she asked like she was confirming that yes, I was indeed the new Pope — as the actual person with the power to hold planes drove off unnoticed.

The rest of the staff had lined up to get a glimpse of this Barry Maher wonder. Two of them rushed me through security, and I could hear the others whispering, "Es el senor Barry Maher" — It's MISTER BARRY MAHER — as if they had any idea who the hell senor Barry Maher was. Fortunately for all concerned, he wasn't a mad bomber because the 10-second security check was a terrorist's dream.

As for the passengers who'd been waiting for me on the flight — well, "impressed" wasn't the word. "Homicidal" would be more accurate. Clearly, they somehow knew that the plane had been held for the jackass hustling down the aisle. Fortunately, they didn't seem to know my name. At least they weren't muttering it. What they were muttering wasn't fit for a family newspaper. Or a battlefield.

The distance thing functioned in reverse in my hometown of Santa Barbara. I'd promoted a seminar myself, getting a ton of radio spots in exchange for tickets for the station's staff. The radio station had piled on the hype, and I don't remember hurting myself restraining them.

After the session, I signed books for people and answered questions. Then someone asked me when I was flying home. "I'm just driving," I said. "I live here." Fortunately, there were only a few people left at that point. Because their faces all fell. Everything in the radio spots was still true. Basically. And they'd all enjoyed the seminar well enough to line up afterwards to buy books. But I instantly plummeted from "Big Deal" to "Just Some Local Guy." And this was in Santa Barbara, where a local guy could be a rock star or a movie star or second in line to the English throne. Or he could simply be plain old Barry Maher, no big deal. MISTER BARRY MAHER had left the building. No great loss. He can be a bit full of himself.

Check out Barry Maher's dark humor supernatural thriller, "The Great Dick: And the Dysfunctional Demon" here. Contact him and/or sign up for his newsletter at www.barrymaher.com.