In The War of Art, author Pressfield discusses the process of doing one’s work every day, and little by little, following a routine, achieving success that the discipline of writing every day brings. That’s how you’ll overcome the art of self-sabotage or procrastination.įirst, though, we have to admit that we, as writers, sometimes want the aura of being a “writer” without any of the suffering that the title entails, all the hard work and self-doubt and isolation of being a writer. Set the timer on your cell phone or your microwave, and give yourself permission to write just one sentence. Take on the challenge of doing a writer’s work. Take five of these words and incorporate them into whatever form you’re tackling today – poetry or prose, fiction or non-fiction. Unrequited.Ī portion of my seventh grader’s vocabulary list. My middle school child studying for her vocabulary quiz is right, too, when she said: “Stop watching TV and go do your work.

Resistance is a waste of time and energy. Today instead of writing, I watched Bugs Bunny cartoons and Marvin the Martian came on to say “Resistance is futile!” And for a cartoon character hell-bent on destroying the planet to get a better view of the moon, he’s right. Resistance, as Pressfield calls it, comes in many forms, including but not limited to: fear, self-doubt, self-dramatization, victimhood, isolation and general unhappiness. Thanks to a recommendation from an old friend, I’ve been reading Steven Pressfield’s really great book, The War of Art, which talks about resistance and how we as writers get sucked in to the war of Doing Anything But the Writing That is Most Important to Us. It happens to some writers every solstice, every month, every fortnight. Happens to everyone at one point or another.

Again but better