Steven Pressfield

If we’re artists, we think of this higher level as Mount Parnon, the dwelling place of the Muses. This level is the source of inspiration. From this level come all creativity and all art. If we’re artists, our first order of business is to learn how to open the channel between this level and ourselves.

Someone once asked Somerset Maugham if he wrote on a schedule or only when struck by inspiration. ‘I write only when inspiration strikes,’ he replied. ‘Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o’clock sharp.’

In the sphere we call the artist’s journey, we ‘get down to business.’ Crazy time is over. We have wasted enough years avoiding our calling.

The professional has learned that success, like happiness, comes as a by-product of work. The professional concentrates on the work and allows rewards to come or not come, whatever they like.

What fascinates me about the character of Alexander the Great is that he seemed to see the future with such clarity and such intensity as to make it virtually impossible that it would not come true—and that he would be the one to make it so. That’s you and me at the inception of any creative project. The book/screenplay/nonprofit/start-up already exists in the Other World. Your job and mine is to bring it forth in this one.

Narrative device is supremely important in self-help. You, the writer, *are* the reader. The reader will hear you and listen to you only to the extent that she knows you know what you’re talking about and that you are there only to help.

In Eugen Herrigel’s 1953 classic, Zen in the Art of Archery, the author, a deeply serious student of Zen Buddhism, travels to Japan and enrolls in an academy of archery. In this school the physical act of drawing the bow and loosing the arrow (as also in other schools with meditation, martial arts, the study of calligraphy or flower arrangement or mastery of the tea ceremony) is not undertaken for its own sake but as a portal to insight, to enlightenment.

The best and only thing one artist can do for another is to serve as an example and an inspiration.

Resistance is the dragon that guards the gold—the gold of our authentic self, our true voice, our artistic and personal destiny.

What you and I are really seeking is our own voice, our own truth, our own authenticity.

Like the monk and the mystic, the artist enters a mental space. He becomes a child. She becomes a vessel. They tune in to the Cosmic Radio Station and listen to whatever song is being broadcast specifically to them.

The Kabbalah describes angels as bundles of light, meaning intelligence, consciousness. Kabbalists believe that above every blade of grass is an angel crying "Grow! Grow!" ... I believe that above the entire human race is one super-angel, crying "Evolve! Evolve!"

You can practice your art. You can produce, over time, a body of work that is the product of your calling, the fruit of your authentic being, the full expression of your truest and highest self.

When we experience panic, it means that we’re about to cross a threshold. We’re poised on the doorstep of a higher plane.

When you and I put our ass where our hearts want to be, we do it for keeps. We’re in it to the end of the line.

This was my epiphanal moment. My hero’s journey was over. My artist’s journey had begun.

Rule of thumb: The more important a call or action is to our soul’s evolution, the more resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.

“The amateur tweets. The pro works.”

He knew that Resistance was strongest at the finish. He did what he had to do, no matter how nutty or unorthodox, to finish and be ready to ship.

Are you a CEO preparing a speech for your stockholders? Write it like a novel or a movie. Use the principles of storytelling. Write your Ph.D. dissertation the same way. And your grant proposal. And your plea to your landlord not to raise your rent. Stories work. Tell me a story.

Henry Fonda was still throwing up before each stage performance, even when he was seventy-five. In other words, fear doesn't go away. The warrior and the artist live by the same code of necessity, which dictates that the battle must be fought anew every day.

I wrote in ‘The War of Art’ that I could divide my life neatly into two parts: before turning pro and after. After is better.

We unplug ourselves from the grid by recognizing that we will never cure our restlessness by contributing our disposable income to the bottom line of Bullshit, Inc. but only by doing our work.

This is the day. There is no other day. This is the day. In other words, I release every thought that smacks of, ‘Maybe we can do this some other time.’ There is no other time. Today is the Super Bowl. Today is the day I give birth. Today is the day I die.

Resistance will always rise against your best work.

In that moment—the instant when the individual commits to solving the problem, no matter what it takes—her or his seat of identity shifts from the ego to the Self. In that instant, true change becomes possible. In fact, true change has already begun.

The amateur spends his time in the past and the future. He permits himself to fear and to hope. The professional has taught himself to banish these distractions.

A novel will take you two years to write. Or three or four or five. Can you do that? Can you sustain yourself financially? Emotionally? Can your spouse and children handle it? Can you maintain your motivation over that length of time? Your self-belief? Your sanity? If necessary, can you scrap your first eighteen months’ work and start from scratch?

Creative work can be hell, but it can be heaven too. What could be better than beating our brains out on a problem that’s exactly the problem you need to solve to get better? We learn by increments. One word, one image, one piece of code at a time.

There is no other journey in this lifetime after the artist’s journey (other than, perhaps, the transition to the next life). Once you board this train, you’re on it to the end of the line.

When I finish the day’s work, I turn my mind off. The office is closed. The work has been handed off to the Unconscious, to the Muse. I respect her. I give her the time.

When we’re living as amateurs, we’re running away from our calling—meaning our work, our destiny, the obligation to become our truest and highest selves.

From the day I finally finished something, I’ve never had trouble finishing anything again. I always deliver. I always ship.

Rule of thumb: The more important a call or action is to our soul’s evolution, the more Resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.

Can you put your ass where your heart wants to be for life?

Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.

I didn’t talk to anybody during my year of turning pro. I didn’t hang out. I just worked. I had a book in mind and I had decided I would finish it or kill myself. I could not run away again, or let people down again, or let myself down again. This was it, do or die.

When we say ‘Stay Stupid,’ we mean don’t self-censor, don’t indulge in self-doubt, don’t permit self-judgment.

The War of Art is nonfiction. Like your TED talk or your presentation on geraniums, it has no characters. No story. No hero. No villain. No archetypal mentors or spirit animals. No All Is Lost Moment. Or does it? The hero of The War of Art is the reader. The villain is Resistance. The All Is Lost moment happened in the reader’s heart long before she picked up the book. Me? I’m Obi-Wan Kenobi. My last words to you are, Trust the Force, Luke.

The payoff of living in the past or the future is you never have to do your work in the present.

We can’t become anything we want to be. We come into this world with a specific, personal destiny. We have a job to do, a calling to enact, a self to become. We are who are from the cradle, and we’re stuck with it. Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it. If we are born to paint, it’s our job to become a painter. If we are born to raise and nurture children, it’s our job to become a mother. If we were born to overthrow the order of ignorance and injustice in the world, it’s our job to realize it and get down to business.

What exactly does an artist do? The writer, the dancer, the filmmaker ... what, precisely, does their work consist of? They shuttle from Level #1 to Level #2 and back again. That’s it. That’s their skill.

The virtues are like music. They vibrate at a higher, nobler pitch.

Did I forget to say? Keep working.

Let’s declare further that the artist’s skill (above and beyond the technical prowess of dancing, playing the piano, or crafting a work of fiction) is simply the ability to access that Higher Dimension.

We must do our work for its own sake, not for fortune or applause.

If the Hook in The War of Art is, ‘Here’s the problem’ ... If the Build is, ‘Here’s the solution’ ... Then the Payoff is, ‘Ms. Writer, your role in this timeless, epic struggle is noble, valorous, and necessary. Heed the calling of your heart. Stand and go forth.’

Here’s my frame of mind as I sit down to work: This is the day. There is no other day. This is the day. In other words, I release every thought that smacks of, ‘Maybe we can do this some other time.’ There is no other time. Today is the Super Bowl. Today is the day I give birth. Today is the day I die.

Once we commit to action, the worst thing we can do is to stop.

On the field of the Self stand a knight and a dragon. You are the knight. Resistance is the dragon.

Ignorance and arrogance are the artist and entrepreneur’s indispensable allies. She must be clueless enough to have no idea how difficult an enterprise is going to be—and cocky enough to believe she can pull it off anyway.

If there is a single principle that is indispensable to structuring any kind of narrative, it is this: Break the piece into three parts—beginning, middle, and end.

I don’t care of you fail with this project. I don’t care if you fail a thousand times. You have done what only mothers and gods do: you have created new life.