When my fear of writing gets too strong I procrastinate by looking for interesting articles on Facebook. I follow groups, people and organisations in various creative fields, and at least one of them always delivers. I find exactly what I need to read – in that moment – to get me going again. This Steven Pressfield guy is dynamite!
I can’t remember how I found this, but Steven Pressfield has written three books about being creative: The War of Art, Do the Work and Turning Pro. Someone recommended one of them or had posted a quote. I don’t know.
What I do know is this. A guy called Brian Johnson makes short film clips on YouTube, and explains different books in the areas of psychology, philosophy and “optimal living”. This is what it says on his page:
OPTIMIZE with Brian Johnson features the best Big Ideas from the best optimal living books.
More wisdom in less time to help you live your greatest life.
Well, yeah… Anyway that’s where I found the Pressfield clips. In Do The Work he describes the resistance we feel whenever we are trying to start a project, fulfill a dream, or change our lives in some way, for example starting to eat more healthy.
The bigger the dream, the bigger the resistance.
That made something click in my head. An epiphany. I’m not alone. Everybody feels the same way. It’s part of the human experience. And I can choose to keep thinking like an amateur – or ”turn Pro”.
By turning pro he means to take writing (or whatever) seriously, to work, work, work. It doesn’t necessarily mean you get paid. But you mean business. It’s about attitude, and to fight the resistance through persistence, patience and courage.
Writing is hard, it’s scary, but sometimes you have no other choice. Write, write, write.
Here you can watch the clip with Brian. (He talks about resistance about 1 minute in.)