Occasionally things come to you just when you need them most. The theologian might call these God’s miracles, the spiritually inclined might cite this as evidence of the universe communicating with us. I think both fail to recognize the other side. It’s been said that only fifty percent of a conversation is defined by what the speaker says, the rest is determined by the perception of the listener. In our society, resources abound. It’s up to us to recognize them and, when necessary, pick them up.
You could say this was the case in my most recent neglect of my responsibilities as a student and as a blog writer. Regardless, here I am and here is something: Resistance. That is the name of the artist’s enemy as defined in “The War of Art,” a nonfiction by Steven Pressfield. On the cover, Esquire declares the book “a vital gem...a kick in the ass.” I couldn’t agree more.
Pressfield paints a vivid picture of the abstract. He unmasks the monsters that haunt the creative types, particularly those who struggle with sitting down to create. Sitting down to create, he reminds us, is the hardest part of creating. By stripping bare the mystery of ‘Resistance’ and presenting a more concrete interpretation of the phenomenon that plagues creators, myself included, he removes its power over us.
I’m about a quarter of the way through it and I already feel a surge of motivation and empowerment. I’m clearly not the first, based on many glowing reviews. For the tools to identify and overcome resistance, I highly recommend The War of Art.
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