Steven Pressfield's Blog, page 105

Good Guy Speeches

We were talking last week about Villain Speeches. But there are some great Good Guy speeches too. I’m not even sure what to call these. Here’s one from Ron Shelton’s Bull Durham.
In the story, Nuke Laloosh (Tim Robbins), the clueless but athletically gifted pitcher, has just been called up to the major leagues, “the Show.”
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Play Like a 15 Seed

Anything can happen during March Madness, and we root for the underdog, but how many go so far as to put the underdogs within their final brackets?
How many had 15 seed Florida Gulf Coast University going this far? Doesn’t make sense. There’s never been a 15 seed to make the Sweet Sixteen . . .
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Start With the Villain

I’m a huge fan of Villain Speeches. There’s nothing better in a movie or a book than the moment when the stage is cleared and Satan gets to say his piece.
The villain in Gunga Din, played by the great Italian actor Eduardo Ciannelli, is called simply “the Guru.” He’s like Gandhi, if Gandhi had traded non-violence
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The Best Bad Choice

We face two kinds of decisions in our lives.  These decisions define who we are as human beings.
Accomplished novelists/storytellers have a deep understanding of how to move their fictional characters to these two types of crossroads. It’s the same skill narrative nonfiction writers must have in their arsenal. Instead of creating events, the nonfiction storyteller
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A Natural Life

Being a writer is not a natural life. Of course it’s not natural working in a coal mine or a cubicle either.
What is a “natural life” anyway? Is it living in alignment with evolution? Is it the nomadic life, the hunter’s life, the farmer’s life? If we live in the city, have we cut ourselves
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How to Respond?

The past few days, I’ve followed the storm swirling around an article journalist David Wood wrote for The Huffington Post. As I read the responses in the comments section of the post, as well as full blog posts replying to David’s article—and then the many more comments to those posts—I was reminded of Steven Pressfield’s
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Giving Notes

Giving notes is the phrase used in the movie business to mean reviewing or critiquing a screenplay or treatment or even a short pitch. Getting notes is when you’re the one on the receiving end. Both positions are really hard.
I’ve lost friends. People have stopped talking to me. For a while I simply refused to
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The Difference Between Self-Discipline and Self-Flagellation

I have a difficult time determining whether or not my internal insistence that I bang out xxx number of words in a  day—no matter what!—falls within the realm of constructive self-discipline or destructive self-flagellation.

There’s no easy answer. The words don’t magically type themselves.
I asked Steve about this when I was in LA a couple
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The Difference Between Self-Discipline and Self-Flaggelation

I have a difficult time determining whether or not my internal insistence that I bang out xxx number of words in a  day—no matter what!—falls within the realm of constructive self-discipline or destructive self-flagellation.

There’s no easy answer. The words don’t magically type themselves.
I asked Steve about this when I was in LA a couple
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Principals and Profiles, Part Two

This is an edgy subject and maybe I should stay away from it, but I feel like I want to squeeze it a little more, so here goes.
To review quickly, we were saying a couple of weeks ago that sometimes a public figure or personality (the “principal”) will be stalked or cyber-stalked or just plain
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