Steven Pressfield Quotes

The artist cannot look to others to validate his efforts or his calling. If you don’t believe me, ask Van Gogh, who produced masterpiece after masterpiece and never found a buyer in his whole life.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Artist Believe Effort Inspirational Life Production
Don’t prepare, do. Don’t let Resistance sucker you into wasting months on background, foundation, planning. All that can come later.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Foundation Preparation Resistance Wasted Time
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.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Imagination Job Life Ourselves Philosophy Time
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.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Artist Battle Code Day Fear Live Necessary Warrior
The Spartans say that any army may win while it still has legs under it; the real test comes when all strength is fled and the men must produce victory on will alone.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Alone Army Legs Man Production Strength Victory Win
Stay stupid. Follow your unconventional crazy heart.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Crazy Heart Stay Stupidity Yourself
Don’t prepare. Begin. Our enemy is not lack of preparation. The enemy is resistance, our chattering brain producing excuses. Start before you are ready.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Beginning Enemy Preparation Resistance Start Yourself
The professional respects his craft. He does not consider himself superior to it. He recognizes the contributions of those who have gone before him. He apprentices himself to them.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Art Contribution Himself Professional Recognition Respect Superior
When we see others beginning to live their authentic selves, it drives us crazy if we have not lived out our own.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Authentic Beginning Crazy Drive Live Ourselves See
The most pernicious aspect of procrastination is that it can become a habit. We don’t just put off our lives today; we put them off till our deathbed.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Aspect Bed Death Habit Live Ourselves
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.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Amateur Call Live Meaning Run True Work
Defeating Resistance is like giving birth. It seems absolutely impossible until you remember that women have been pulling it off successfully, with support and without, for fifty million years.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Born Defeat Impossible Resistance Success Support Time
Ignorance and arrogance are the artist’s and entrepreneur’s indispensable allies. She must be clueless enough to have no idea how difficult her enterprise is going to be and cocky enough to believe she can pull it off anyway.”
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Arrogant Artist Believe Difficult Enough Entrepreneur Herself Ignorance
The amateur believes he must first overcome his fear; then he can do his work. The professional knows that fear can never be overcome. He knows there is no such thing as a fearless warrior or a dread-free artist.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Artist Believe Fear Freedom Professional Warrior Work
Resistance by definition is self-sabotage.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Definition Destruction Myself Resistance
What finally convinced me to go ahead was simply that I was so unhappy not going ahead.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Happiness Myself Simplicity
The amateur tweets. The pro works.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Amateur Effort Master One Liner Work
Every sun casts a shadow, and genius’s shadow is Resistance.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Genius Resistance Shadow Sun
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.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Art Better Division Life Myself War Writing
This man has conquered the world! What have you done?” The philosopher replied without an instant’s hesitation, “I have conquered the need to conquer the world.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Deep Hesitation Man Myself Need Philosophy World
A cavalryman’s horse should be smarter than he is. But the horse must never be allowed to know this.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Animal Home Man Smart
In my experience, depth of work consists of two components. The first is recklessness; the second is discipline.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Death Discipline Experience Work
The critic hates most that which he would have done himself if he had had the guts.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Action Brave Criticism Hate Himself
The professional tackles the project that will make him stretch. He takes on the assignment that will bear him into uncharted waters, compel him to explore unconscious parts of himself. Is he scared? Hell, yes. He’s petrified.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Exploration Himself Professional Project Water
Figure out what scares you the most and do that first.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Act Brave Fear Inspirational Scare Yourself
When we sit down day after day and keep grinding, something mysterious starts to happen… Unseen forces enlist in our cause; serendipity reinforces our purpose.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Day Force Mystery Purpose Start
The more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul.
STEVEN PRESSFIELD

Enterprise Fear Feeling Growth Important Ourselves Soul

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