These are serious fears. But they're not the real fear. Not the Master Fear, the Mother of all Fears that's so close to us that even when we verbalize it we don't believe it. Fear That We Will Succeed...
There’s no mystery to turning pro. It’s a decision brought about by an act of will. We make up our minds to view ourselves as pros and we do it. Simple as that.
There's no mystery to turning pro. It's a decision brought about by an act of will.
The years have taught me one skill: how to be miserable. I know how to shut up and keep humping. This is a great asset because it's human, the proper role for a mortal.
The warrior and the artist live by the same code of necessity, which dictates that the battle must be fought anew every day.
The sword master stepping onto the fighting floor knows he will be facing powerful opponents. Not the physical adversaries whom he will fight (though those indeed serve as stand-ins for the enemy). Th...
The sure sign of an amateur is he has a million plans and they all start tomorrow.
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. The professional de...
The professional cannot take rejection personally because to do so reinforces Resistance. Editors are not the enemy; critics are not the enemy. Resistance is the enemy. The battle is inside our own he...
The professional arms himself with patience, not only to give the stars time to align in his career, but to keep himself from flaming out in each individual work. He knows that any job, whether it's a...
The opposite of fear is love - love of the challenge, love of the work, the pure joyous passion to take a shot at our dream and see if we can pull it off.
The next few chapters are going to be about those invisible psychic forces that support and sustain us in our journey toward ourselves. I plan on using terms like muses and angels. Does that make you...
The critic hates most that which he would have done himself if he had had the guts.
The creative act is primitive. Its principles are of birth and genesis. Babies are born in blood and chaos; stars and galaxies come into being amid the release of massive primordial cataclysms. Concep...
The artist must be like that Marine. He has to know how to be miserable. He has to love being miserable. He has to take pride in being more miserable than any soldier or swabbie or jet jockey. Because...
The amateur tweets. The pro works.
The amateur plays for fun. The professional plays for keeps. To the amateur, the game is his avocation. To the pro it's his vocation.
That was when I realized I had become a pro. I had not yet had a success. But I had had a real failure.
That fearsome emotion that animates the female in all-female groups (called outere in Amazon and gynekophoitos in Greek)
Some heavy shit is coming down, brothers, and we’re going to go through it.