Modern WisdomHow To Turn Pro | Steven Pressfield | Modern Wisdom Podcast 220
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
120 min read · 24,093 words- 0:00 – 1:01
Turning pro as an antidote to modern malaise
- SPSteven Pressfield
A lot of the modern maladies that we all suffer from, anxiety, depression, isolation, et cetera, et cetera, that we blame ourselves for, right? We- we put a judgment on ourselves. We say that, you know, either we're weak or we're... There's something wrong with us or we're sick or something like that. I think a lot of those problems are really just about the difference between being an amateur and being a pro, and just having... Flipping that switch in our mind. And, uh, the pro is hard on themselves. Not down on themselves, but hard on themselves, and an amateur is usually pretty easy on themselves. The professional's world is a lot more rigorous mentally.
- CWChris Williamson
I'm joined by Steven Pressfield. Steven, welcome to the show.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Great to have- to be here, Chris. Thanks for having me.
- CWChris Williamson
Absolute pleasure to have you on. So we'll have some people listening whose lives could be changed forever by turning pro. Can we make that happen within the next hour, do you think?
- SPSteven Pressfield
We'll give it our best shot here. (laughs)
- 1:01 – 3:09
Why Pressfield wrote Turning Pro + Chris’s resistance in writing vs podcasting
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) That would be a pleasure. So as a tiny bit of background, I read both The War of Art and Turning Pro this year, and they had a very profound impact on how I view the things that I do in my life. And I wanted to kind of gift the audience hopefully with the same insights that your book gave me. Uh, so first off, why did you write Turning Pro?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Um, you know, it was just a- a follow up to The War of Art because I... You know, in The War of Art there is a section, as you know, called Turning Pro. It's the middle section. But I felt like, uh, I hadn't really said everything that I wanted to say and that it needed, you know, a little amplification, so, um, you know? So I just kind of amplified it a little bit.
- CWChris Williamson
It's another sequel, right?
- SPSteven Pressfield
But let me ask you something, Chris, before we even start. How does, uh, the concept of- of resistance in The War of Art, how does that- how does that affect what- what you do? Where did it, uh, impact your life?
- CWChris Williamson
So resistance, thankfully, in podcasting is not as much of a burden to bear. Reason being that you naturally are on this treadmill with the other person. You have this external accountability, right? So I c-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Right.
- CWChris Williamson
... I can't just stop this conversation if resistance arises-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... because you're there and you can't stop this conversation 'cause I'm here and I'm here to help you. I'll ask you a question, you'll help me. So resistance to me, um, manifests much more when I'm writing newsletters, which again-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- CWChris Williamson
... your experience is writing book, sitting down, blank page in front of you-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... and you struggle. Um, but it's interesting to- for me to have that dichotomy, and there may be people listening as well, for whom they have resistance that manifests very strongly in certain areas of their life and then doesn't in others. And I certainly think-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... things that you can do with other people, uh, team sports. Um, you know, you turn up to training for rugby and the resistance kind of doesn't really seem to be there. You turn up to do a solo session in the gym and you're just swimming in resistance, right? So that's something-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
That was an insight that I gained this year.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh. Okay, great.
- 3:09 – 5:19
Defining the amateur: weekend warrior behavior and quitting under adversity
- CWChris Williamson
So yeah, that was something that I saw. I absolutely adored the idea of Turning Pro. So how do we define an amateur? Let's start, before we even get into professionals, how do we define an amateur?
- SPSteven Pressfield
One of the ways, I think, is an amateur as a- um, as a- as a rule, is kind of a weekend warrior. And, uh, an amateur, when they hit, uh, adversity, are going to- going to quit, you know? Um, that's probably the- the ultimate sign. And I lived for years as an amateur, you know? And dropping a ball or fumbling the ball on the one-yard line, to use an American football analogy, that kind of thing, being unable to finish something. Whenever adversity would- would strike, I would cave into it. Um, and, uh, an amateur... There are many other aspects of an amateur, but an amateur usually does a lot of talking about what they're going to do, whereas the professional usually just shuts up and does the work. Um, and, uh, I think, uh, a lot of the modern maladies that we all suffer from, anxiety, depression, isolation, et cetera, et cetera, that we- we blame ourselves for, right? We- we put a judgment on ourselves. We say that, you know, either we're weak or we're, you know... There's something wrong with us or we sick or s- or that we're sick or something like that. We have some neurotic, you know, issue, whatever it is. I think a lot of those problems are really just about the difference between being an amateur and being a pro and just having... You know, flipping that switch in our mind. And, uh, you know, we'll get into this a lot, I'm sure, but a pro is- is, um, hard on themselves, you know? Not really- not down on themselves, but hard on themselves. Um, and an amateur is usually pretty easy on themselves. Um, the pr- the professional's world is a lot more rigorous mentally and- and emotionally, psychologically.
- 5:19 – 6:57
Pressfield’s pre–turning pro life: chaos, avoidance, and “shadow activities”
- CWChris Williamson
How did being an amateur, before you took the- the step to becoming pro... You say you've got two stages to your life, before and after you turned pro. How did the amateur lifestyle manifest for you before you made that change?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Kind of like what I was just- just talking about, Chris. Like, uh, um, my life was pretty chaotic, you know? Not- not necessarily in a bad sense. I mean, there was a lot of kind of adventure going on, a lot of drama and stuff like that. And, uh, I met a lot of people that turned out to be (laughs) interesting people and went with a lot of places that turned out to be interesting places, but I wasn't getting anything done and- and I was feeling worse and worse and worse about it. And in general, I was sort of...... i- in one form or another, running away from my, my real work, my real calling, in, you know, running away physically, going to different places, and running away, you know, in different activities that were, um, what I call in t- the book shadow activities, not the real activities. They were close to them, but they were not really them. Um, and at the moment that, uh, you know, I finally did (laughs) turn pro, I really just decided, look, th- this is my calling, this is what I wanna do, which is writing. And I just, I have to organize my life in such a way that I can do it. I can't allow chaos to dominate everything and, and my, you know, um, and, and my resistance be defeating me every mo- every morning, you know, procrastination and all that kind of stuff.
- 6:57 – 11:50
Shadow careers in the real world: adjacent jobs, assistants, addictions, and becoming a “character”
- CWChris Williamson
So you mentioned there one of the, the key points that kind of self-identifies an amateur, which is these shadow activities or even shadow careers. How can someone work out if they're going through with a shadow activity or a shadow career?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh, it's a... Well, let me see if I can define it first, Chris, and then, um, c- it's all obviously nobody can make that judgment except the person themselves. And it's very, very hard a lot of times, but like, uh, I worked in the movie business in, in LA as a screenwriter for, you know, about 10 years or so, 10 or 12 years, and one of the phenomenons that you see there, phenomenon that you see there a lot is there's such a thing as entertainment lawyers. You know, there are entire law firms that are about negotiating deals, and if you're an actor, if you're a director, if you're a writer, you have an entertainment lawyer. And, uh, the entertainment lawyer, you know, uh, sometimes will actually find work for you and cer- certainly will negotiate all the deals for you. And it's sort of a commonplace there that a lot of entertainment lawyers wanna be writers or wanna be producers. And I think that, uh, and I've talked to people and they admit it, they laugh and they admit it, that they sort of chose being a lawyer because it was kind of adjacent to the creative field. You know, they didn't chose to be, like, oil and gas lawyers or corporate lawyers. They chose to be entertainment lawyers. And, uh, I think this applies sometimes to agents as well. They're sort of in a field that's adjacent to a creative field, but is not really, is not really that field. And, um, I can understand. It makes a lot of sense. You figure, "Well, if I go to law school, I'm gonna have a degree. I'm gonna have something I can fall back on. I'm gonna have an actual, uh, job that pays me, whereas if I just plunge in being a writer or actor or director, God knows what'll happen." Then another, another kind of manifestation of this is, Chris, is, um, this is more... I don't wanna be sexist here, but it's more women that kinda fall into this, and that is to sort of... But men too, so women that... Don't get mad at me. People will be somebody else's assistant. They'll kind of sign up to work for a musician or, uh, a director or a producer or something like that, and what they really wanna do is they really wanna produce themselves or they really wanna be a musician themselves. And so they have this kind of shadow career, and, um, I know that you're doing a thing of six months sober and stuff like that, and I think that, um, a lot of times, addictions are shadow careers. Um, uh, I could get into this in great detail, but I think that a lot of times people will, um... If they get into alcohol, they get into drugs, they get into heroin, they get in- into, you know, all the things you can get into, their life as a d- alcoholic or their life as a, as a drug addict becomes their shadow work of art. And rather than write the book that they were gonna write or, or produce the movie or whatever it is they were gonna do, they create this, their own sort of personality, their own drama. Their own, their life becomes like a m- like a movie. You know, it's, it's got everything, right? It... Sometimes it e- (laughs) you know, it, it even has violence and God knows what else. Um, so I'm probably wandering on too long, but there's also-
- CWChris Williamson
Not at all.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... another-
- CWChris Williamson
Keep going.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... there's another phenomenon in America, in the States, particularly in the South, particularly in a place like New Orleans, and maybe the UK, you guys have this too, where people will become, quote-unquote, "characters." You know, the crazy old lady that has 33 cats or, you know, the guy with the hat that wanders around the French Quarter, whatever. And what they're sort of doing there, and not that there's anything wrong with being a colorful character, but they're, to me, rather than writing their novel or b- or starting their business, they create this image, this thing of them- themselves, this personality of themselves, that that becomes their own sort of work of art. But, um... And in some cases, I guess that's cool, but not if it's eating you up inside and you, and you really know on some level, "I should be doing, I should be doing more with my, with my life than that," you know?
- CWChris Williamson
I spent a little bit of time last year in New Orleans, and I know precisely the characters that you mean. There's a-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- CWChris Williamson
... a lady that I saw at one of the parades with... She looked like Mary Poppins. Purple hat, uh, f- green feather boa, like, two walking sticks, dancing crazy to the, the jazz music outside.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- 11:50 – 15:50
Ego armor and the addict/amateur overlap: avoiding vulnerability to avoid real stakes
- CWChris Williamson
So I know exactly that. Um, I had Aubrey Marcus, who I know that you're a friend of, uh-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... I had Aubrey on the s- on the show last year, and he said something that really stuck with me and I think it ties in with what you're talking about here, and he talks about how people protect themselves by building up charicats- caricatures of themselves by, uh, wrapping themselves in ego. And he says the reason for that is without vulnerability.... you don't ever actually have to put anything on the line. Because if the ego or the character that you're playing fails, "Well, that's not me. I didn't fail, the character I'm playing fails."
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- CWChris Williamson
But the converse of this, which he identified, and I absolutely love, was that he said, "The ego is incapable of receiving love, it can only receive praise." And I think that distinction is really important. The fact that when you play this metacognizant character, you're not you fully open and actualized. You're some analog of that. You're all of the-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... you're all of the veneers of it, but none of the core of it. Um, the praise... The, the failures that you get don't hurt, but the praise that you get doesn't feel like love because you know that it's not you. And I can attest to this as someone who played kind of a big name on campus party boy for a long time.
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
I realized that that veneer a lot of the time was because I was, um, insecure or ashamed about the fact that I had particular, uh, interests and curiosities that I didn't think other people would think were cool. So I didn't-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- CWChris Williamson
... I, I, I thought I had to talk about partying, and girls, and booze, and blah, blah, blah, because I couldn't talk about the Fermi Paradox, or what consciousness is, or why it is that we have sexual selection. Do you know what I mean? Like, there were all of these things.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
And maybe the... a lot of the listeners who are a- attuned into this as well, I think everyone has elements of amateurs in them, right? Everyone's an amateur in probably some area of their life.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes. Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
Um, you touched on something that I really love. What do amateurs and addicts have in common?
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs) Um, well, I, I think that they're, they're both artists, you know? That they both have, um... And that's why so many musicians are addicts and so many artists are addicts. It, there's, it... You know, it's not an accident. Um, I think that they have the, and they feel within them a self that wants to be born and work that wants to be produced, that wants to be brought out into the world. And, um, and it terrifies both people. It terrifies the artist and terrifies the addict. And I think what you were just saying, what Mark, what Aubrey said, was that, um, rather than be vulnerable, rather than really express that thing, which is of course really hard 'cause then you're really letting yourself up for being, you know, particularly these days, you know, massacred, um, you will, uh, uh... Someone who goes into an addiction, that's really sort of what you were just talking about. It's a, it's a second self that's not really the self. So that, you know, whatever happens there, how, wa- any bad consequences that come from that are not as bad, it's a protective thing, are not as bad as really trying to be the artist or to speak of or to follow the, the things that you really wanna f- that you really are interested in, you really do wanna pursue and you're afraid you won't be cool. You're afraid that people will think, you know, "What kind of a, you know, what kind of a guy is this guy interested in this stuff? He should be interested in rugby and that kinda stuff." So, and, and of course, that's, that's part of growing up too, you know. When you're young, peer pressure is tremendous and it, you know, very few people have the guts to, to really be themselves. It only takes, I think, a lot of pain living that artificial self before the moment comes where you finally say, "I just can't do this shit anymore, you know. I've just gotta, I gotta be, you know, I've gotta, I gotta be me," whatever, you know? (laughs)
- 15:50 – 18:23
The boring truth: addiction is Groundhog Day; real work looks boring from the outside
- CWChris Williamson
I really loved... There was an example you used. I think you used Charlie Sheen as one of the examples. And you said that the addict's life is really boring. Um, from the outside-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... it looks, it looks super colorful. But in reality, it's the same boring excuses, the same boring turning up late to work, the same boring story about how many drugs or whatever it was that you had last night. There's no trajectory, right? It's Groundhog Day over and over. And I'd never-
- SPSteven Pressfield
It is Groundhog Day, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I'd never heard that said about addicts before because you see... And it almost gets romanticized in movies and popular culture as well, you know.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
The addict lifestyle. Rock'n'Rolla, if you've seen that wonderful British film, um, has this almost super romanticized view of how the addict spends their time. He's a dying artist, but he's so blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you're like, "Yeah, that, that is true." But it isn't in place of art. It's instead of art. It's not as if you, you can substitute the art for the addiction and it still is beautiful. It's everything that takes up the space of the addiction with none of the beauty.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes. And it's funny that when you turn pro and you start really doing your work, then your life from the outside really does look boring, you know? It's all of a sudden, you know, you're getting up early, you're going to the gym-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
... you're going to your studio or whatever it is. And somebody looking from the... one of your old buddies that used to know you in your addicted days, you know, they'll say, "What happened to you, man? I mean, you used to be fun."
- CWChris Williamson
So much fun.
- SPSteven Pressfield
"You used to, I could hang out with you. Now, look at you. All you're doing is practicing ballet steps in your studio," or whatever it is. But, um, so it, it is interesting how what we do think is, is, is exciting is really boring as hell, and what we do, what looks to be boring on the outs-, of course, it's not boring. You know, like people used to say to me, I think I even wrote this in Turning Pro, that I used to work in this office here where I am right now, that my desk used to face the other way, facing into that wall. And people would say to me, "Well, you know, don't you wanna have a view outside? How can you, how can you look like that?" But the, but the answer is, "I'm living up here, you know? The world that I'm inhabiting or the world that the artists is habi- inhabiting in their studio may look pretty dumb from the outside, but inside, a lot of stuff is going on." It's, you know, Game of Thrones is going on inside there. So you're... And, and if, and if you're really doing your work, then you are getting traction. You're not just spinning your wheels constantly.
- 18:23 – 24:01
Tribe pressure, social media “meta lives,” and the cost of being different
- CWChris Williamson
It feel, you talk a lot about tribes and about how the, uh, social imperative, the, the social influence of other people, um, can cause us to compromise and dilute down our, uh professionality, I suppose, and our, uh, ability to overcome resistance. And it makes total sense with this, right? Like why wouldn't you want to do the thing that everyone else thinks is cool that-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... just looks like so much fun? "Oh, he's leading this life." And that's been turned up to 11 with Instagram and F- Facebook and TikTok and-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... YouTube now.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
You know, people live these meta lives where they exist only to create the content. They go on holiday purely to film the content, to make-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... to put ... Do you know what I mean? This is the, we're going-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... back to this sort of meta life that people have, um, and that happens in, again, small parts for everyone. Um, but I, I really think the bravery to be able to be called boring is a-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... or, or weird or different is a, a powerful mechanism because as my good friend George McGill says, "Ordinary people get ordinary results. Extraordinary people get extraordinary results."
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
The closer that you get to normal, the closer you regress to the mean of the results everyone else gets.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ah.
- CWChris Williamson
Like that's precisely-
- SPSteven Pressfield
I never heard that before.
- CWChris Williamson
... the way it works.
- SPSteven Pressfield
I like that. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
It's wonderful. So think about-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... anyone. Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, these guys don't have normal work ethics even in an environment of super normal humans. They're still-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... standouts. Tiger Woods, um, uh, his, the relationship he had with his dad was so crazy when he was growing up, but look at what the result was on the back end of that. You know-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... you have to have extraordinary effort gets extraordinary results. And, um, yeah, I think casting off the tribe is an important part of that.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. Another way of looking at that, and I just actually heard this the other day from a friend of mine, Scott Mann, who is a retired l- lieutenant colonel in the, um, Green Berets. And he was talking about it's sort of like the Maslow pyramid, you know, where you at the, at the bottom of the pyramid is, is sort of the tribal, uh, c- which of course we were, where peer pressure is everything, you know, to conform and to be one of the, one of the gang. And of course, we evolved as, you know, in a tribal environment, you know, for hundreds of thousands of years as like the primitive hunting band. But then you're at kind of in the lower end of the thing. But when you get to this top part of the, of the, of the pyramid, then you're getting kind of that, that Maslow area of self-actualization or of individuation, you know, where you kind of have cut free from the, the, um, the demands of the tribe and the, and the expectations of the tribe. And you're really becoming whoever it is that you were born to be, whatever your individual essence is. And it's of course, it, like with Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant, it's lonely up there, you know? Um, and that's just, that's part of the price.
- CWChris Williamson
How do people swallow that price then? How do people learn to pay it? Is it getting used to being cast off by the tribe a little bit more each day? How do they do it?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh, you know, I'm not sure that I can really speak to being in that tribe. (laughs) Uh, I'm trying to be, but I don't know. But I do think that you... I'll just speak from my own experience. You, um, first of all, it's, to me, it's not a sacrifice at all. I feel much happier being in that, in that place up there because I feel like I'm really, uh, in my own skin and doing, you know, serving my own muse, whatever that is. But the other thing is that I think as you do evolve into that, into that place, you sort of leave people behind in a way. I know that sounds kind of egomaniacal or, you know, but they're, they're, um, um ... I'm thinking of David O. Russell movies like The Fighter and Joy, if you remember that one, and also, uh, Silver Linings Playbook. He talks about this a lot where he'll have a character like, uh, Mickey, I forgot his name, played by Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter, who is in this family where everybody, you, you know, he wants to be a fighter. That's his thing. His brother was a fighter, et cetera, et cetera. Um, in the movie Joy starring, uh, Jennifer Lawrence, she plays this gal that started the mop, the Miracle Mop on this home shopping network. And both of them were embedded in families where the family was sabotaging them. You know, the family, uh, like The Fighter, they, his mom was his, his, his booking agent. And she would, at the start of the movie, she books him into this fight where the guy outweighs him by 15 pounds and just massacres him, you know? It's like, "What are you putting me in?" You know? And so, in other words, when you sort of, if you leave people like that behind or you just disengage from them, it's not a bad thing, (laughs) you know? You feel like, "I got rid of something that was really holding me back." So, um, it's kinda painful. I'm a guy that feels guilty and is very loyal, you know, like, (laughs) uh, to a fault, but sometimes you do have to move, follow your own star wh- wherever it goes. And not everybody wants to go on that same path with you.
- 24:01 – 27:26
Changing your tribe, raising your standards, and the Michael Jordan problem
- CWChris Williamson
There's this wonderful quote by James Clear, "Changing your habits often requires you to change your tribe. Each tribe has a set of shared expectations. Behaviors that conform to the shared expectations are attractive. Behaviors that conflict with the shared expectations are unattractive. It's hard to go against a group. Often changing your habits requires you to change your tribe." I love that.
- SPSteven Pressfield
I think it's absolutely true. And one of the things there is your level of aspiration. I mean, a lot of times, it isn't that you've changed, um, your outlook or anything like that. It's just you wanna be better. You know, you just... you won't accept the level of achievement or commitment or whatever that people around you are very comfortable in, you know? And, like Michael Jordan is a classic example of that, you know, where he had to be really rough on his teammates, you know-
- CWChris Williamson
He was a tyrant, man. He was an absolute tyrant.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... and that was the only way he knew how to do it. Yeah. Um, and you could see, I mean, I guess we're both talking about watching The Last Dance. Have you seen... That's it?
- CWChris Williamson
Wonderful.
- SPSteven Pressfield
You know, where he would... Actually you could see on camera when he was being interviewed where he got, uh, he would get upset, you know, like that one thing where he goes, "Break," and he gets up from this chair and ends the interview, because I guess he felt a little bad about how hard he was on people. But he wanted to be at... his level of aspiration was different than the tribe, and he had to bring them with him-
- CWChris Williamson
When you look at it in the-
- SPSteven Pressfield
... or he wanted to.
- CWChris Williamson
When you look at it in the cold light of day with perspective, the choice really is between being less than you can be to appease other people, or being all that you can be and perhaps upsetting someone. And like for me, uh, it takes a lot of bravery to do that, you know? And you're right as well about the age thing. Um, as a younger person, guy or girl, you just... that confidence to go against the group, you know, everything's new and novel and the world's scary and big. Over time, it's everyone's dad or everyone's uncle, right, you know the uncle that just doesn't give a shit. Like, he'll-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... fart at, farts at dinner and-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... decides to go play golf four, four times a week, or do... he, he does his thing. Um, and I think that, like, that level of uncle-ness is something that we can all aspire to have.
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs) Yes. I'm all for that. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) Um, final thing before we move on to what a pro is and, and the difference between that and an amateur, how can someone self-diagnose if they're an amateur who's chomping at the bit to turn pro? How can someone identify the things? We've got the shadow activity. We've potentially got the addiction. Is there anything else?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Well, I would think anybody that's listening to us talk right now and is in that state, it's probably very obvious to them- to themselves, you know. I know if I were listening to this, my former self, I would say, "Holy shit, that's me."
- CWChris Williamson
They're talking about me.
- SPSteven Pressfield
You know what I'm doing.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
That's, that's exactly what I'm doing, you know? And I think we, we all do know that, you know?
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- SPSteven Pressfield
It's very clear to us. We're sort of running away from it, you know, all day long, trying to keep that, that perception from breaking through. So, yeah, I, I think it's, it's more obvious than-
- CWChris Williamson
Plain and obvious. Good. Good. In that case, we've done-
- SPSteven Pressfield
... you know, to, to the person themselves, you know?
- CWChris Williamson
We've done our, we've done our job in the first half. So okay, how do we-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- 27:26 – 34:58
What makes a professional: habits, aspiration, and identity clarity (plus the “many projects” trap)
- CWChris Williamson
... define a professional? How are they different from an amateur?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Well, one of the things that I do say is that, just sort of like what you were reading there, um, a pr- a professional has professional habits and an amateur has amateur habits. And so if we kind of look at the... if we look at the way we live our day, you know? Um, do we get up at a certain time in the mo- in the morning, you know? And do we always get up at, at that time or something like that? Do we... do we have a- an aspiration, you know? Are we aiming at something? Um, are we... are we ruthless with ourselves, you know? Are, uh... will we not allow ourselves to slack off or, you know, or only once in a while have a cheat meal or something like that? Or, or are we, um, just, just so easy on ourselves, you know? That we're just kinda bouncing around to this, to that, to the other thing. Um, I, I, I think a professional is usually defined, I think, by, by their aspiration. What it is they're trying to do, you know? If you... if you ask a writer that's a... that's a real pro writer, "What are you... what are you trying to do?" They could probably tell you the, the book they're working on, they know exactly what it is they wanna do. They probably know the next one after that and the one after that, and if they don't, they know that they want... at least they know the path that they wanna be on, you know? Whereas, I'm thinking about my own amateur days. If you ask me what I, what I wanna do, I wouldn't have a clue, you know? I would bounce from one thing to another. Another thing is, I think... I remember, you know, I used to live in, in a, in my, in my Chevy van, you know? I used to... you know, I didn't think of it as homeless at the time, but I used to live in that kinda situation. And I remember when I would wake up in the morning, you know, in my mattress in the back of my van, wherever the hell I was, I would sort of have to have like a five-minute session with myself just to tell myself who I was and what I was trying to do with the day, and I had no clue, you know? Unless I was in some, some scene, you know, where there were people and I knew I had to, you know, meet so-and-so or whatever. But, in other words, that was... that was a total amateur situation, where I had no real... no goal, no aspiration, nothing that was, uh, that was internal, that was driving me from my heart. I was not in con- I was not in con- in touch with, uh, my muse or whatever you wanna say, whatever that inspiration is. I don't know. I'm probably babbling a little bit here, Chris, but-
- CWChris Williamson
Not at all, Steven. I, I absolutely love this and it's so insightful. Um, something that I've just realized there, going back to the addict thing, I wonder whether having multiple projects or having a lot of different...... um, pathways on the go is a form of addiction. So myself and a number of friends I know, um, we rationalize doing lots of things as hedging.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
And we say that by, by having that, I'm spreading risk. I've got multiple streams-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... of whatever it might be. But that's just a form of resistance as well. That's just a form of fear from going all in on the one thing-
- SPSteven Pressfield
I think that's absolutely right.
- CWChris Williamson
... that you know you should do.
- SPSteven Pressfield
I would absolutely define it, I would absolutely define it as a form of resistance. And bel- I get a lot of letters from people li- like that, where people will say, "I've got so many ideas, I d- I just don't know which one t- to follow," you know? And it's resistance throwing these shiny objects at us, you know, like, uh, what do they call it? Chaff? Like when a, a missile is trying to track an airplane, the airplane will release this, these, uh, you know, uh, what aluminum foil shiny objects, and the missile doesn't know what to do and it gets lost, right? And I think we will create those shiny objects ourselves to distract ourselves, you know? And I think a lot of times when you read, uh, the biographies or you listen to somebody like a Bob Dylan or somebody like that talking about their life, there was no plan B, you know? That they were, (laughs) they were all in for whatever it was. So, um, yeah, I think if, uh, when I find myself having, like, a bunch of projects, I will really try to sit down and, and whittle those away and just kinda be ruthless in throwing the... uh, it's not so easy to do. It's hard to do. In fact, I'm in a place like that right now, (laughs) where I've got two or three things and I'm not sure which one to go. It's very hard. But I do, I do think that that, the idea of hedging your bets is not such a great idea.
- CWChris Williamson
I think you're correct. And s- you know, to continue to sing Michael Jordan's song, Michael played golf as a way to calm down, but he wasn't trying to be a pro golfer whilst he was trying to be a pro basketballer.
- SPSteven Pressfield
No, that's true. Exactly, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
He was all in on basketball. Uh, hilariously, I didn't know that he'd gone and played baseball, um, which is like just (laughs) such a fun-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
But even when he played baseball, he was all in on baseball, you know? He wasn't, "I'll-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... keep one foot in the door with this thing." Like, he was, he was all in. And I, I definitely think that that's one of the more pernicious m- ways that resistance can manifest, because it looks like productivity, it looks like achievement, both internally and externally. And what were we just saying about the way that the tribe and this kind of socialized reward is important? "Oh, Steven-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... you've got so many things on the go. Like, you've got three books to be-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... writing and the podcast and you have YouTube and the blah, blah, blah," and you think, again, "What is it? It's boring." Like, it looks from the outside in really exciting and varied, but from the inside out, you're not getting the work done. You're just constantly spinning these plates, desperately trying to-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... stop any of them from falling down.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. Now, I would, I might disagree with you, Chris, on the Michael Jordan playing baseball thing.
- CWChris Williamson
Interesting.
- SPSteven Pressfield
And of course, we would, we wou- we won't know if until we have him here and he would tell us.
- CWChris Williamson
Oh, I'll get him eventually.
- SPSteven Pressfield
But if, if you remember... Now, I've watched this thing, like, five different times, so I was very familiar with The Last Dance. If you remember, his dad died, was murdered right before that. And I think maybe for him, baseball was just sort of a way of taking some time out. 'Cause his dad always wanted him to play baseball, and, and of, of allowing that grief to process itself. 'Cause when the time was right, he went back to basketball, you know? Um, and of course we-
- CWChris Williamson
So was baseball-
- SPSteven Pressfield
We-
- 34:58 – 40:39
Ruthlessness vs compassion: off-seasons, peaking, and not grinding forever
- CWChris Williamson
I think that's a really good insight. And that's something I would be very impressed if you have the answer for this. (laughs) How do you determine when you've been ruthless enough with yourself? Basically there's always a challenge between being sufficiently compassionate when you've hit your limit and pushing yourself hard enough to find where it is.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. I'm gonna disappoint you, Chris-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... 'cause I (laughs) am not gonna have an answer here. I, I really, all I could say is it's, it's really hard to know, you know? Um, I know for me, there certainly have been times where I really did back off and just let things go. And, um, and a lot of times that was good. Um, but I'm not sure why. I don't know, I wouldn't, I wouldn't know how to define it, you know?
- CWChris Williamson
It's in- it's intuitive, isn't it? It's, it- it's a question-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... I've asked. You're not, you must be like the 10th guest that I've asked that question to, and it is-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Ev- everyone has the same answer, which is essentially that it's just an intuition. It's a, a notion. You feel it, you sense it. Um, and you know when you've gone too far. There's been some times where I've pushed myself so hard with work that I've not been able to get out of bed for a couple of days. You know, you just snap-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... you have, like, a miniature breakdown, and I'm just tired-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... and lethargic and I can't think-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... and my thoughts are muddy. And then I come, I snap out of it and I'm like, "Wow, I guess I did a little bit t-" And it's always after an intense period of work. You know, you do two weeks, three weeks of, like, just nonstop bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. And then that happens and you think, "Okay, that's my limit." And again, what we're talking about over time we get older-... we understand our tolerances a little bit more, we're able to s- see and feel and use intuition a little bit more-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... more adaptively. So, yeah, I think that's-
- SPSteven Pressfield
I mean, I, th- there's another thought, the, the, the whole sort of concept of an off season. You know, that, uh, you know, in certain sports, you know, and practically all sports before people became a year-round fitness kind of thing, there would be an off season, right? And maybe that's makes sense. I mean, if you think about, uh, the primitive hunting man that we're, that's, we're, we're living that, that's our, our guts, right? That's our DNA. I'm sure they sort of went out, they hunted, they chased, uh, mastodons, you know, again, an insane thing. Then they brought the f- f- food back, the bacon back to the cave. And I'm sure they took a couple of weeks off, you know?
- CWChris Williamson
Feast and fast.
- SPSteven Pressfield
And maybe that is kind of a rhythm that we might, you know, emulate a little bit ourselves, 'cause we can drive ourselves crazy trying to get to the top of the, that pyramid, you know, and self-actualize and all that. You know? It's a, it's a good question. I wish I had, you know, a meter that I, you know, could, you know, a switch would go off and say, "Time to take a break."
- CWChris Williamson
Like a thermometer. Yeah, yeah, I get it. Exactly.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Uh, it's a David Allen-ism where he says, "Your ability to deploy power is directly proportional to your ability to relax." Um-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Oh, really? That's good too, huh?
- CWChris Williamson
Wonderful. Yeah. He's, um-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Huh.
- CWChris Williamson
And that, again, like is that a form of addiction, an addiction to constantly doing the same thing, the inability to let go? And what we're seeing here is that the tighter and tighter circles of, uh, nuance and complexity that we're talking about as you pivot from being an amateur to being a professional, when you commit to something, the problems don't necessarily go away, they just get more nuanced and more subtle.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh. But, you know, the other thing is I think being a professional doesn't mean that you have to be grinding every m- minute of the day, you know? Like if, if you and I were, uh, if the Olympic games were three years away and we were whatever, an athlete that was gonna compete in such a thing, and, uh, and we had a brilliant coach like a Phil Jackson or something like that, I'm sure that w- he would break those three years up to a, for us into periods of intense effort and then a break, you know? And the whole thing aiming to, to peak at that time, you know, three, three years from now. So I think being a professional does not necessarily mean you're grinding every minute of the day.
- CWChris Williamson
I really like, we, we keep on coming back to it because it's an easy analogy to use when we talk about athletics and about sports stars.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- 40:39 – 47:47
Different ways to peak: Bobby Jones, presence, and avoiding self-sabotage
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah, that's true. Now I'm gonna take the opposite side of that, Chris. So no, you (laughs) you, you, um, do you know who Bobby Jones the golfer is? Does that ring a bell at all?
- CWChris Williamson
No.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Bobby Jones was an American golfer from Atlanta who won the Grand Slam in 1929. I think it was US amateur, British amateur, US Open, British Open-
- CWChris Williamson
Wow.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... as an amateur. He was a, um, just kind of a, he founded the Masters, you know, he, just, um, anyway, one of the all time great players ever. And he was an amateur all the way through. And, um, that was back in the days when amateur meant something different. But he was a lawyer, and he worked full-time as a lawyer.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
And the way his year would go is, um, when winter came around, he was from Atlanta, you know, he would just go to work as a lawyer. D- wouldn't touch a club all winter long. And then when the, when it started to get warm in the spring, he would sort of, the phrase he used was "Play himself back into shape," and he would just kind of get in by the time. But somehow he was able to do it where he just beat everybody, like the great, these golfers of their day who at that time was Walter Hagen, Gene Sarazen. These names I'm sure don't mean anything to you. But during his period, Bobby Jones' period, these other guys never won a major tournament that Bobby Jones was in. He... Anyway, so the point I'm trying to make here is that there's a, there are different ways to peak. Now the other thing about Bobby Jones they said about him was that in a four-day tournament, he would lose between 12 and 18 pounds just from burning it off in the... And it was ro- y- you played in neckties in those days.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
And it was routine. They would sweat-... that he had to like cut the necktie off with a knife at the end. So in other words, at the, the level that he was performing was at the Kobe Bryant level, but he did not have, you know, the coaches and the, all that sort of thing. So I'm, I'm not lobbying for one way or the other, but there are different way, definitely different ways to do it.
- CWChris Williamson
Even in that situation, what we're seeing is someone who is incredibly present when they're doing it, right? You know, if you're losing-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Absolutely, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... 18 pounds over four days, it's because you-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... every fiber, every cell in your body is focused on the task.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes. That he was able to really bring it, you know, when, when, uh, when, when it counted. In fact, this is off the subject a little bit here, but in the year that he won the Grand Slam, his main cha- challenge was not to screw it up. It's like from the start of the year, he sort of knew, "I can win all four of these things," you know? "All I have to do is show up and be my, and, and bring my game." You know? And he, he talked about... I'm gonna wander off a little bit here-
- CWChris Williamson
Keep going.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... but there were like, uh, he heard of one other player, might have been a baseball player who was shaving back in the days when you had razor blades that went into a, into a thing, and he dropped the blade and his reflexes were so sharp, he grabbed it and he cut his hand and he couldn't play, you know, whatever it was, baseball is. And so part of Bobby Jones' day was, "Don't do that." You know? (laughs) "Don't do anything that's gonna happen." And, uh, anyway, I don't know, that's apropos of nothing, but just-
- CWChris Williamson
Well-
- SPSteven Pressfield
... I love this, I love to read about Bobby Jones and talk about him.
- CWChris Williamson
His, um, uh, y- a lot of the stuff that we do, we self-sabotage, right? Both consciously and unconsciously, but avoiding-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... doing stupid things. (laughs) I, I-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... literally did a tweet. It's so dumb. Uh, three days before I snapped my Achilles, I did a tweet that said, "Avoid stupidity, don't chase-"
- SPSteven Pressfield
Ugh.
- CWChris Williamson
"... uh, don't chase success." Uh, and then obviously (laughs) a couple of days later, I managed to rupture my Achilles. Um, but yeah, like...
- SPSteven Pressfield
How did you do that, Chris? What ha- how, wh- what were the circumstances?
- CWChris Williamson
Playing cricket.
- SPSteven Pressfield
If you don't mind my asking.
- CWChris Williamson
Playing cricket, which is the most British way that you can rupture an Achilles.
- 47:47 – 58:36
Symbolic commitment: Rosanne Cash’s dream, pilgrimages, and identity claims you must earn
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh, you know, I'd, I, I, I never have like checklists or anything like that because it's so, it's so, um, uh, unique to each individual. Like in Turning Pro, there was a passage a- about Rosanne Cash, the singer, and the dream that she had. Can I tell that story here for your, uh-
- CWChris Williamson
Yes, please.
- SPSteven Pressfield
This to me was like the, kinda the ultimate Turning Pro moment. Rosanne Cash is Johnny Cash's daughter, and she had a career, at the start of her career, that was quite successful, kind of as a, you know, she had a bunch of hits and, um, as a singer, but she always had, she always wanted to be a songwriter and a singer. She wanted to do concept albums that really came from her heart rather than, um...... you know, picking songs that other people had written. So she had a dream, and it's really important that- that this is a dream because it shows it's coming from a part of her, right? And in the dream, uh, she... one of the people that she idolized was Linda Ronstadt, the singer. So in the dream, she was at a party and she was sitting at a bench, and it wa- Linda Ronstadt was on one side, she was on the other. In between them was an older man that she somehow knew. His name was Art, capital A-R-T. And Art was in intense conversation with Linda Ronstadt in the dream. And Rosanne was kinda trying to get into their conversation, you know? And suddenly, this guy turned to her, Art, and looked her up and down with utter contempt and said, "We don't have anything to do with dilettantes." And Rosanne, as she describes this in- in her book, Composed, she said, "I woke up from this dream shaken to the core," because she felt like she had really been called out. This was really the truth. And she says, "From that moment on, I changed my life. I changed everything about my life. I changed the way I wrote... I- I attacked music. I started studying painting. I started getting in shape physically. I started, you know, getting working out. I started studying voice," and this and this. And she started attacking certain habits that she had. Like she... one of the things she said was she had a habit of daydreaming, of just kinda getting off into a fog. And she said she would, like, teach herself to snap back out of that. And she also had a habit of, like, not working as hard as she could on some... settling for something like that. And also o- of writing a song or- or preparing a song that was good enough, you know? But it wasn't... it didn't have the element of madness to it that she was looking for. So that's kind of a case where she herself decided. She just knew. She knew, "I've gotta change. I've gotta... I can't keep going the way I'm going." So she sort of invented what- what the changes were that she was gonna make. She was gonna study this and study that, and get up earlier, and eat better, and all that sort of thing. So in other words, I think that once we kinda make that commitment, we'll know. We'll know what we're s- what we're supposed to do. We'll know where we've been sloughing off, eating sugar or whatever it is, like, you know, that kind of thing.
- CWChris Williamson
That's a beautiful story. I really, really love that. And then you yourself, was it the- the first time that you turned pro you locked yourself in a- a- a hut in the woods for, like, um, $15 a week-
- SPSteven Pressfield
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... or something like that and- and you just... (laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
Wow, that is great. That's great 'cause the way people see it... You know what? But I'm really thinking back over it, 'cause I have been thinking back, I probably have had maybe 15 turning pro moments, you know? There wasn't just one, you know? Um, but what I did then was I- I saved enough money and moved to a small affordable house, a little house before I got a bigger house.
- CWChris Williamson
A cabin in the woods, Steven. It was a cabin in the woods, so call it small or whatever. (laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
It was... it was in the woods, sort of. But- but yeah, so I really just sort of locked myself in this underwater thing where I couldn't leave, because I knew that my resistance was so strong that I would quit otherwise. So anyway... but we do have a bunch of these turning pro moments, not just one.
- CWChris Williamson
Do you think that something symbolic like that is, uh, a potential tool that people can use to-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes, definitely.
- CWChris Williamson
... to commit to manifesting into the real world?
- SPSteven Pressfield
'Cause you know, the mind works symbolically. Yeah. I mean, look at Rosanne Cash's dream, you know? Here's a guy called Art. I mean (laughs) you know? Really, that's the way that the mind works, so yeah. I mean, I wonder if your Achilles injury wasn't a- a way of making you focus on, you know, the podcasting and stuff like that.
- CWChris Williamson
Very well might be, so I-
- SPSteven Pressfield
But don't let me psychoanalyze you.
- CWChris Williamson
Hey, I- I- I would love it. Um, one thing, an example that the listeners will be familiar with, um, from last year for me was I've had a- a s- (laughs) a back injury as well, um, a couple of bulging discs, and I read a book by the world's expert on, uh, spinal pain, a guy called Dr. Stuart McGill. I had him on the show. I really enjoyed him, um, and I thought, "I keep on going to different physios. Nothing really seems to be working. I'm gonna make a commitment. I'm gonna make a pilgrimage to go and see him in Canada." So I'm in America. I've done this, uh, uh, road trip that I mentioned where I went through New Orleans and Nashville and a bunch of other places.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
And at the end of that, as opposed to... I'd already booked my flight home, but Stu very- very kindly said, "If you come out fishing with me and you catch a fish, I'll do your consultation for you." Um, and I decided to, um, sack the flight off that was going home, so that was, you know, maybe 700 pounds. Um, I flew from, um, Norfolk to, uh, Toronto, then rented a car, then drove for two hours north on my own to go and see this, like, crazy white mustached m- man, uh, and met him and his wonderful wife and their dog, and stayed- stayed with them and spent the evening, and he did this, like, brilliant assessment, and that to me was a symbolic pi... it was like a pilgrimage, right? It was like a-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... a journey that I made. And as soon as I came back, my compliance on the things that he told me to do was maniacal, monomaniacal. I did...
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
If he said it, I did it. And part of that was the pilgrimage, this symbolic gesture that I'd made to him and myself.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes. Yeah, that's a great thing. You know, there's, uh... we're probably running out of time. I'll see if I can cram this in here.
- CWChris Williamson
Oh, we've got loads of time. Keep going.
- SPSteven Pressfield
There's a wonderful book about interpretation of dreams called Inner Work by Robert Johnson, which I highly recommend to anybody. He's a Jungian, and one of the things he said is, "When you have a dream that's a pow- a real powerful dream, do something physical..."... in your life to, to, uh, memorialize that. And so your trip to Canada, that was that. And I think there's, there's a lot to be said for that. Like here, I don't know if you can see this. You know, I had that dream, and I talk about it in The War of Art, called Larg. Can you see that?
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Largo.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Where I was, I was a character called Largo in a dream. And anyway, so I, I, I had a little-
- CWChris Williamson
You got a name badge called Largo on your jacket.
- SPSteven Pressfield
... ID tag put on there.
- CWChris Williamson
That's amazing.
- 58:36 – 1:03:13
Resistance never dies + the spiritual frame: serving the muse and closing the gap
- CWChris Williamson
You've touched on something there, which was a question I had, is it possible to fully defeat resistance? And it feels like a bank account that you need to put money into every day to overcome. It feels like that's what we've-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah, never, never defeat it, you know. It's sort of, I always... Resistance really gives meaning to life, just like the devil gives meaning to, you know, any pursuit of anything. If, if there, if it wasn't there, you know... So it's, it's a good thing that it is there, that we do have to slay that dragon every morning.
- CWChris Williamson
The same thing with death, right? Like, the reason that life has meaning is the fact that it's going to end.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. Yeah. We might not be happy about it, (laughs) but, you know.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. True.
- CWChris Williamson
That's the way it works. Um, I have final question-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... for you, which I was listening to you on Lex Fridman's podcast, I highly recommend anyone who's listening-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Uh-huh.
- CWChris Williamson
... to go and check that episode out. Uh, and your description was that we're spiritual beings trapped in a physical form. What did you mean by that?
- SPSteven Pressfield
Um, well, I'd certainly... That's not original with me, you know. (laughs) But I, I absolutely do feel that, that we're, um... that life exists on two levels, you know. That there's the material level that we are on, you know, where the everyday world where we have a body, but then there's a higher level above us. And the artist is trying to reach that, that level, you know, so is the athlete, so is anybody that's trying to reach that sort of flowed sort of state, you know. And, and I think, um, that we, on this level, we sort of remember that level. We have, you know... We can't put our finger on it, but we know that, you know. And I also think that when we see some... When we're on the material plane and we see somebody act according to the rules of the higher plane, it moves us tremendously. You know, somebody that, uh, runs into a burning building to save a child that they don't even know that, you know, that kind of thing. Um, so yeah, I definitely think that we are, uh, we're spiritual be- I don't know why we're in bodies. You know, God must have some plan, you know, there must be some concept we're doing penance or we're trying to learn something or I don't know what, but, um-... but definitely, um, I always define my... People say, "Well, what is your- what is your job?" And I just say, "I'm a servant of the muse." And what I mean by that is I'm, I'm serving this level, I'm trying to communicate to that level and, and play according to the rules of that level as much as I can.
- CWChris Williamson
They say that true hell is when the person that you are meets the person you could have been. And I suppose-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... that that gap between the-
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yeah. Exactly.
- CWChris Williamson
... the physical and the astral or the, the, the literal and the, the spiritual, I suppose that's the gap we're all trying to close.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes, I think so.
- CWChris Williamson
All the gaps-
- SPSteven Pressfield
That's where all the pain, anxiety-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- SPSteven Pressfield
... all that comes, where addiction comes from is that gap.
- CWChris Williamson
All the fun stuff.
- SPSteven Pressfield
That's it. Yeah, yeah. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
And I suppose that's also the gap between amateur and professional. So it all maps on.
- SPSteven Pressfield
Yes, I think so. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Steven, today's been wonderful. When can we expect you back on to talk about this new book? Is it gonna be 2021? Is it gonna be 2022?
- SPSteven Pressfield
I'd love to do it. Uh, uh, the book comes out in March, um, and, uh-
- CWChris Williamson
It better be- you better get a shuffle on then.
- SPSteven Pressfield
There it is. It's called A Man in Arms, and it's a novel.
Episode duration: 1:03:13
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Transcript of episode qNA9-mKpx-Q
