I had a stressful couple of weeks, with a trip in the middle. Through it all I kept coming back to a quote from the war of art:

“I made myself sit there, torturing out some trash that I chucked immediately into the shitcan. That was enough.

I put the machine away. I went back to the kitchen. In the sink sat ten days of dishes. For some reason I had enough excess energy that I decided to wash them. The warm water felt pretty good. The soap and sponge were doing their thing. A pile of clean plates began rising in the drying rack. To my amazement I realized I was whistling. It hit me that I had turned a corner. I was okay. I would be okay from here on.

Do you understand?
I hadn’t written anything good. It might be years before I would, if I ever did at all. That didn’t matter. What counted was that I had, after years of running from it, actually sat down and done my work.”

Steven Pressfield, The War of Art

We are all avoiding doing the tasks that are truly important. We put off the call. Wait for the perfect moment to work. We wait to kiss the girl.

We only feel truly alive when we do the very things we avoid.

This week I struggled to find the time to do meaningful work. Thursday night I finally sat down at 7 in the evening and did something. And you know what? It only took 40 minutes.

Here’s what I wrote after that:

“I’m genuinely proud over this. And I can feel that “succeeded with the project” emotion that I love so much.”

Jesper Bylund

It was a two week period of hard work. High stress. And I was getting no where. Spinning in my tracks.

It’s not always easy to know what it is you’re avoiding. But it’s worth doing. In fact it’s the only thing worth doing.

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