Steven Pressfield, The War of Art.
From the author of The Legend of Bagger Vance and Gates of Fire, Steven Pressfield writes of more than just the secrets to artistic success in The War of Art, and its sequel, Turning Pro. A veterans’s toolbox or a tricks-of-the-trade pass from a master is expected. Identifying the enemy within however is this author’s candid wisdom for personal growth.
“Invisible, internal, insidious,” resistance, says Pressfield, is also “implacable, impersonal, and universal.” It “never sleeps, plays for keeps, and is fueled by fear.” The force that raises itself against you when you determine to be more than you have been seeks one thing, your destruction.
“Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands resistance.”
Resistance is the wall that throws itself in front of you whenever you dare to set goals that will enrich your life and the lives of others. Fashioned in the image of God, the Supreme Creator, each person is called to a greater future, a higher (hypostatic) order of existence. The use of the creative faculties is an intimation of this beatified reality and human dignity.
It is a profane matter therefore to turn away from the good that could be, rather than fight an enemy whose strength to conquer lies only in its power of deception. Breaking through appearances is easier than you might think once you begin to believe and trust in God’s providential care.
Pressfield tells us that although everyone has the capacity through daily hard work to actualize many latent talents, the compulsion to self-destruct lives within, too. He writes about the yetzer hara, from the Jewish mystical tradition, the “the sole aim [of which] is to block us.” The yetzer hara actively seeks to holdback the soul’s development from any activity that would bring it to goodness.
In the Christian tradition, we know this evil to be the inner wound of original sin, and outwardly, the demonic. “A self-sustaining and cunning intelligence,” resistance wants you dead. All of its energy is directed towards a single goal of preventing your life from blossoming; from becoming a mirror of the divine Beauty and Truth that gives the soul, moment to moment, its life.
Facing down the wall of resistance is a task of “identifying the sin” and “eliminating it,” says Pressfield. Between these two moves however can lay entrenched dependencies that require a heavy-handed, zero-tolerance approach to correcting. Whatever bad habit, dysfunctional lifestyle choice, or deceitful compromise that holds you down must be torn down. In this spiritual battle there can be no concessions.
There is a clean, rejuvenating feeling experienced when we cut through the lies that steal enthusiasm and motivation. Like making reparation for a bad decision, the aching stops. New strength begins to flow into the body, and suddenly the horizon opens up. The mind breathes free again to work masterly upon life as its highest art.
“Man shall not live on bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” (Matthew 4:4)
