The amateur tweets. The pro works.
STEVEN PRESSFIELDLong-term, we must begin to build our internal strengths. It isn’t just skills like computer technology. It’s the old-fashioned basics of self-reliance, self-motivation, self-reinforcement, self-discipline, self-command.
More Steven Pressfield Quotes
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Research can become Resistance. We want to work, not prepare to work.
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Do you love your idea? Does it feel right on instinct? Are you willing to bleed for it?
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Those who will not govern themselves are condemned to find masters to govern over them.
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Don’t cheat the world of your contribution. Give it what you’ve got.
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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.
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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.
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It is one thing to study war and another to live the warrior’s life.
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A cavalryman’s horse should be smarter than he is. But the horse must never be allowed to know this.
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Slay that dragon once, and he will never have power over you again.
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Stay stupid. Follow your unconventional crazy heart.
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The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.
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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.
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The critic hates most that which he would have done himself if he had had the guts.
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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.
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It’s one thing to lie to ourselves. It’s another thing to believe it.
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It’s better to be in the arena, getting stomped by the bull, than to be up in the stands or out in the parking lot.
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The most important thing about art is to work. Nothing else matters except sitting down every day and trying.
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We fear discovering that we are more than we think we are… That we actually have the guts, the perserverance, the capacity… because, if it’s true, then we become estranged from all we know.
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Be too dumb to quit and too stubborn to back off.
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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.
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When we see others beginning to live their authentic selves, it drives us crazy if we have not lived out our own.
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Don’t prepare, do. Don’t let Resistance sucker you into wasting months on background, foundation, planning. All that can come later.
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