The War of Art by Steven Pressfield is a book about fighting Resistance with a capital R – the most dangerous force that any creative person can encounter. Pressfield spent most of his life doing odd jobs while working on his writing. While life forced him to take several paths that were unrelated to his passion, he never gave up. He waited for decades to be able to make money from his work. Today, he is well-known for writing books for creators (War of Art, Do the Work).
The premise of becoming good at a creative enterprise is simple, but it must be drilled into your head in a million different ways for you to believe it. This is essentially what Pressfield does.
Resistance (capital R) is what keeps you from doing what you know you must do. It stops you from going to the gym, it stops you from starting your business, writing a book, or making your music. It casts a dark cloud of doubt above all your creative endeavors, reminding you that you are not talented enough to succeed. The goal of Resistance is to keep you in stasis, it wants to preserve the status quo.
Resistance is like a universal force, like love and destruction, it is an instinct, and it is eternal. Do not fool yourself into belittling its power.
While you may sometimes have the upper hand on resistance through sheer will power or desire, rest assured that Resistance will find a way to sneak back into your life, when you momentarily have your guard down.
Pressfield suggests that the best antidote to Resistance is consistency, it is to make a schedule and stick to it. If you follow this schedule for long enough, your new habit becomes a powerful weapon against Resistance.
It is a mistake to wait for inspiration. Hard work is far more important. Inspiration is fickle, it will come and go, and sometimes it will disappear for a long time. This allows Resistance to much more easily penetrate your armor – unlike hard work.
People often have dreams and devote a few hours towards them here and there, but they don’t take their dreams seriously enough. Consider the employee who dreams of becoming a musician. She may wake up every single day at 6 am to go to work, but when it comes to playing music, she only spends a few hours a week if it’s convenient. This approach towards her dream will not lead anywhere.
You must treat your passion like it’s a full-time job, you must put in the hours. If you don’t take your dream at least as seriously as you take your job, and devote enough time to it every day, then it will betray you by not giving you what you want.
Don’t listen to Resistance, don’t let self-doubt control your life. Guard your passion with everything you have.