Steven Pressfield's Blog, page 129

The Saturation Point

To recap our hypothetical auction from last week, our agent has guided her client to create the best possible narrative nonfiction proposal she can. Putting her years of experience in book publishing to work, the agent has submitted the work to publishers and there is enough interest in the project that she's set a closing
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Resistance and Addiction

Have you ever noticed that addicts are often extremely interesting people?
Addiction itself is excruciatingly boring, in that it's so predictable. The lies, the evasions, the transparent self-justification and self-exoneration. But the addict himself is often a colorful and compelling person. His story reads like a novel, packed with drama, intrigue, conflict and heartbreak. If the
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"Take Me To the Wizard Files!"

Below are some of the dusty tomes I studied in writing The Warrior Ethos. Does the word "arcane" ring a bell? Reading these is like getting beaten up with a bag of ball bearings. Trust me, if the library at Quantanamo Bay contained nothing but these books, there would be no need for "enhanced interrogation
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Undulating Curves of Shifting Expectations

Steve Pressfield and I have worked together in one form or another for almost fifteen years. I've been his editor, his publisher, his manager/agent, and his business partner. In that time he's written ten books—seven novels and three works of nonfiction.  In all of those years, he's been in the dark about exactly how an
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Seth Godin on the Domino Project

The Domino Project is a partnership between Seth Godin and amazon.com, in which together they find, commission, edit, design, print, advertise, market and distribute a specific type of book/audio/eBook that Seth calls a "manifesto." The first such piece, published two months ago, was Seth's Poke the Box; the second, two weeks ago, was my Do
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The Warrior Archetype

Chapter 28   The Warrior Archetype
Jung was a student of myths and legend and of the unconscious. He discovered and named the Collective Unconscious, meaning that part of the psyche that is common to all cultures in all eras and at all times.
The Collective Unconscious, Jung said, contains the stored wisdom of the human race,
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It's Not Easy Being Free

(Another CrossFit-related post for you up front, but stick with me for a bit and the big picture point about giving it away makes it into the post.)
Each time one of Steve's books left the table, my son reached in a box, pulled out another book, and topped off the stacks.
We were at the NoVa
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"Pizza for Everybody!"

First, I want to thank everyone who helped make last Wednesday's launch of Do The Work such an overwhelming success.
I sent pizza to the gang at Seth Godin's Domino Project (thanks, Pizza Grill in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY)—but I also want to give a shout-out to everyone who downloaded the free Kindle version, ordered the hardback or
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The War Inside Ourselves

Chapter 25   The War Inside Ourselves
The Bhagavad-Gita is the great warrior epic of India. For thousands of years, Indian caste structure has been dominated by two elite social orders—the Brahmins (poets and holy men) and the Kshatriyas (warriors and nobles).
The Bhagavad-Gita is the story of the great warrior Arjuna, who receives spiritual instruction from
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The YES Sign

The Domino Project team should go with a YES sign—if it ever considers ditching its domino symbol.
The NO sign greeted everyone entering the retirement community my husband and I lived in just out of college.
We were young, broke, starting our first jobs and planning a wedding, so my husband's grandmother pulled a few strings with
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