The War of Art
Steven Pressfield

Summary

Steven walks through the difference between being a professional and an amateur when you're a creative. Loved his take on confronting your fear and getting over mental block.

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Notes

It’s not the writing part that’s hard, what’s hard is sitting down to write

The enemy is a very good teacher - Dalai Lama

Resistance is the enemy within and it’s always lying and full of shit

Resistance is driven by fear, master that fear and conquer resistance

The danger is greatest when the finish line is in sight

Never forget, this very moment we can change our lives

People who criticize others are probably doing it out of resistance for they are made they have not lived their authentic lives

The counterfeit innovator is widely self-confident, the real one is scared to death

The more scared we are of work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it

The professional knows success comes as a by-product of work

The professional has to love being miserable

Show up every day to work no matter what

Do not over identify with your pain

Nothing is as empowering as real-world validation, even if it’s for failure

The price for being in the arena and not on the sidelines is failure

Any job takes twice as long as you think and costs twice as much. Accept and embrace that

A professional accepts no excuses

The professional cannot take rejection personally because to do so reinforces resistance

Humiliation, like rejection and criticism, is the external reflection of internal resistance

Envy driven criticism is the supreme compliment because the critic hates most that which he would’ve done himself if he had the guts

The most important thing about art is work, nothing else matters except sitting down every day and trying

When we deliberately alter our conscious in any way, we’re trying to get to the self where all our ideas and dreams com from

The real fear is the fear that we will succeed

Don’t operate in a hierarchy. Do your work for your own sake

Operate in a territory:

• It sustains without external input
• It returns exactly what you put in
• It can only be claimed alone 
• It can only be claimed by work

Don’t cheat the world your contribution, give us what you got