Big Idea Daily | Put Your Ass Where Your Heart Wants to Be
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by Steven Pressfield |
“Here’s my frame of mind as I sit down to work: This is the day. There is no other day. This is the day. In other words, I release every thought that smacks of, ‘Maybe we can do this some other time.’ There is no other time. Today is the Super Bowl. Today is the day I give birth. Today is the day I die.”STEVEN PRESSFIELD |
BIG IDEA
Resistance With a Capital R
FROM THE BOOK“What is Resistance?
It’s our own tendency—yours and mine and everyone’s—to yield to procrastination, self-doubt, fear, impatience, self-inflation, self-denigration, distraction, laziness, arrogance, complacency, and perfectionism. It’s our inability to focus, our incapacity to press on through adversity. It’s our terror of finishing and exposing our work to the judgment of the marketplace. It’s fear of failure. It’s fear of success. Fear of humiliation. Fear of destitution. It’s our inability to defer gratification, to acquire and act with self-discipline, self-validation, and self-reinforcement.”
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Brian's Notes
That’s from the “Note to the Reader” with which the book begins.
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We’d be wise to both name our enemy and be honest with ourselves that it exists.
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Steve calls that part of us that does all of the above mentioned things (and more!), Resistance. With a capital R.
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Phil Stutz calls it Part X.
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We often call it your Demon.
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Remember: The words demon and daimon are related. Demon is the diminutive of daimon. It’s the part of each of us that wants to do the vicious thing while the better part of us is whispering in our ears encouraging us to do the virtuous, noble thing.
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So...
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How do we deal with our Resistance?
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In the nine words of the book’s title, Steve tells us: Put your ass where your heart wants to be.
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We could also say: Put your mind and body and spirit where your daimon (your soul!) KNOWS it should be.
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If we can muster the Wisdom and Self-Mastery (and Love and Courage and Gratitude and Hope and Curiosity and Zest!) to get ourselves to more and more consistently close the gap and show up as our best selves, we will win the ultimate game. And, as a result, over the long run (!), we’ll win all the other games we want to play.
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If we DON’T do that? Well then... It doesn’t really matter what else we do—we may win some smaller little games once in a while but we’ll miss out on the real prize.
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Resistance.
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It will ALWAYS be there.
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Pay attention to its presence.
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Then ignore it as you put your mind and body (and ass!) where your heart and soul KNOWS it should be.
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Not someday.
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Not even Today.
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All day. Every day.
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Especially...
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RIGHT NOW.
Big Ideas
01: RESISTANCE
02: DID I SHOW UP?
03: ASS = COMMITMENT
04: UNTIL ONE IS COMMITTED
05: THE SPIRITUAL PLANE
“Let’s declare further that the artist’s skill (above and beyond the technical prowess of dancing, playing the piano, or crafting a work of fiction) is simply the ability to access that Higher Dimension.”STEVEN PRESSFIELD |
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