Steven Pressfield's Blog, page 46

Stories Are About Change

(Today’s post is pulled from the archives, from August 9, 2013, just about this time five years ago.)

In his wonderful book The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves, psychoanalyst Stephen Grosz tells the story of Marissa Panigrosso, who worked on the 98th floor of the South Tower of the World Trade Center. She recalled that when the first plane hit the North Tower on September 11, 2001, a wave of hot air came through her glass windows as intense as opening a pizza oven.

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s Seminal Change Curve is Story-Driven

She did not hesitate. She didn’t even pick up her purse, make a phone call or turn off her computer. She walked quickly to the nearest emergency exit, pushed through the door and began the ninety-eight-stairway decent to the ground. What she found curious is that far more people chose to stay right where they were. They made outside calls and even an entire group of colleagues went into their previously scheduled meeting.

Why would they choose to stay in such a vulnerable place in such an extreme circumstance?

Because they were human beings and human beings find change to be extremely difficult, practically impossible. To leave without being instructed to leave was a risk. What were the chances of another plane hitting their tower, really? And if they did leave, wouldn’t their colleagues think that they were over-reacting, running in fear? They should stay calm and wait for help, maintain an even keel. And that’s what they did. I probably would have too.

Grosz suggests that the reason every single person in the South Tower didn’t immediately leave the building is that they did not have a familiar story in their minds to guide them.

We are vehemently faithful to our own view of the world, our story. We want to know what new story we’re stepping into before we exit the old one. We don’t want an exit if we don’t know exactly where it is going to take us, even—or perhaps especially—in an emergency. This is so, I hasten to add, whether we are patients or psychoanalysts.

Even among those people who chose to leave, there were some who went back to the floor to retrieve personal belongings they couldn’t bear to part with. One woman was walking down alongside Marissa Panigrosso when she stopped herself and went back upstairs to get the baby pictures of her children left on her desk. To lose them was too much for her to accept. The decision was fatal.

When human beings are faced with chaotic circumstances, our impulse is to stay safe by doing what we’ve always done before. To change our course of action seems far riskier than to keep on keeping on. To change anything about our lives, even our choice of toothpaste, causes great anxiety.

How we are convinced finally to change is by hearing stories of other people who risked and triumphed. Not some easy triumph, either. But a hard fought one that takes every ounce of the protagonist’s inner fortitude. Because that’s what it takes in real life to leave a dysfunctional relationship, move to a new city, or quit your job. It just does.

I think it is because change requires loss. And the prospect of loss is far more powerful than potential gain. It’s difficult to imagine what a change will do to us. This is why we need stories so desperately.

Stories give us scripts to follow. It’s no different than young boys hearing the story of how an orphan in Baltimore dedicated himself to the love of a game and ended up the greatest baseball player of all time. If George Herman Ruth could find his life’s work and succeed from such humble origins, then maybe they could became big league ball players too.

We need stories to temper our anxieties, either as supporting messages to stay as we are or inspiring road maps to get us to take a chance. Experiencing stories that tell the tale of protagonists for whom we can empathize gives us the courage to examine our own lives and change them.

So if your story doesn’t change your lead character irrevocably from beginning to end, no one will really care about it. It may entertain them, but it will have little effect on them. It will be forgotten. We want characters in stories that take on the myriad challenges of changing their lives and somehow make it through, with invaluable experience. Stories give us the courage to act when we face confusing circumstances that require decisiveness. These circumstances are called CONFLICTS. What we do or don’t do when we face conflict is the engine of storytelling.

What’s the In? What’s the Out?

 

In the movie biz, there’s a question that studios and development companies often put to any screenplay they’re evaluating:

What’s the in? What’s the out?

What they mean is, “What is this script’s opening image and closing image? Do the two work together? Are they cohesive? Are they on-theme? Are they are far apart emotionally as possible?”

Brandon deWilde and Alan Ladd in “Shane”

This is a really helpful series of questions for any creative person who’s trying to evaluate his or her own work. I use it all the time.

What’s the in? What’s the out?

These questions help if you’re designing a restaurant, writing a Ph.D. dissertation, crafting a speech for a corporate audience. They help for music, for dance, for art, for photography.

And they help for fiction and nonfiction.

The classic Hollywood example of a great “in” and an even greater “out” comes from the 1953 Western, Shane, starring Alan Ladd, Van Heflin, Jean Arthur, Brandon deWilde and Jack Palance, directed by George Stevens and written by A.B. Guthrie, Jr. and Jack Sher from Sher’s 1949 novel (that he wrote as Jack Schaefer.)

Here’s the in:

A lone rider (Alan Ladd) descends from a mountain pass into a gorgeous Wyoming valley, circa 1870. In the audience we can tell from the rider’s fringed buckskin jacket, from his horse’s silver trimmed bridle, and from the six-gun on his hip that he is not your ordinary cowpuncher.

The camera cuts ahead to a small ranch-a-building (apparently a sodbuster’s claim), where a tow-headed boy of six named Joey (Brandon deWilde), looks up and sees the rider approaching. Even at a distance the horseman cuts a figure of romance—and the boy responds to it.

JOEY

Somebody’s coming, Pa!

Van Heflin plays Joe Starrett. It’s his little ranch that Alan Ladd is approaching.

JOE STARRETT

Well, let him come.

 

Now the out:

The same lone rider now exits the valley. It’s night. He’s been wounded, shot in the side after gunning down the three prime Bad Guys (including Jack Palance as the archetypal black-hatted gunslinger, Wilson), who were “putting the run on” the honest, hard-working sodbusters.

Shane clearly doesn’t want to leave. He is compelled by his own fate.

SHANE

Joey, there’s no living with a killing. There’s no going back from it. Right or wrong, it’s a brand. A brand sticks.

JOEY

But, Shane, we want you! Mother wants you, I know she does!

Shane tousles Joey’s hair in farewell. He rides out of the valley, the exact way he came.

JOEY

Shane, come back! Shane!

 

Even if we know nothing of what came between these two scenes (by which I mean the entire body of the movie), we get a pretty good sense of the narrative just from this “in” and this “out.”

What’s yours?

If you’re designing a restaurant, what’s the first impression people get when they enter? What’s the last thing they see when they leave?

What’s the first song on your album? What’s the last?

What’s the entry action in your videogame? What’s the exit?

[We’ll get into this subject of “ins” and “outs” a little deeper over the next few weeks.]

BTW, Shane was picked by the American Film Institute as the #3 US Western of all time, behind The Searchers and High Noon.

Myself, I would put it at Number One.

Thank You Bob Danzig

I had the honor of knowing and being mentored by Bob Danzig for 21 years.

He always asked about my kids and my husband and my work, and then I’d push through because I always wanted to talk about Bob.

Bob led an extraordinary life and my favorite conversation with him related to Opportunity.

Did Opportunity knock on some doors more than others? Or was it that some of us are better at recognizing opportunity and taking action?

During one of our last phone calls, Bob told me about a musician he’d met, who has still waiting for his “big break.” Bob wondered why Opportunity had visited him more often than the musician.

I had a theory about Bob.

Adversity was his constant companion throughout childhood, so he was forced to develop compensatory skills to manage it. By the time he was an adult, Adversity had been around so long that it didn’t stop him in his tracks.

We talked about the foster homes he grew up in—about half a dozen different homes by the time he was 12.

We talked about the foster mom who chased him with a belt in hand, chomping at the bit to beat him.

We talked about the family that locked him in the attic and the time he escaped and spent the night huddled next to the schoolyard dumpster.

We talked about the black garbage bag he used to carry his few possessions and how he felt so like the trash being taken out during the moves from one foster home to the next.

We talked about the Valentine’s Day cards he wrote to himself because he didn’t want his classmates to know he didn’t have any friends. He was so often the new kid at the school.

We talked about the time he did make a friend and how the friendship ended just as quickly as it began. He went to knock on his friend’s apartment door and was met by an empty apartment and an eviction notice.

We also talked about the kindness that came later.

We talked about how the woman who interviewed him for the office boy position at The Albany Times Union was struck by the hat Bob wore into the office. When she asked why he didn’t take it off, he told her that a friend said he looked young and that he should wear a hat to the interview. He’d never had a hat, so he didn’t know the rules about taking it off inside.

His innocence and honesty won her over. She hired him—and then about 20 years later he became publisher of the paper, and then even more years later moved to NYC to take on the roles of CEO of The Hearst Newspaper Group and VP of The Hearst Corporation.

Throughout it all, he drew people to him and was able to diffuse difficult situations because he knew Empathy. He understood the pain others felt.

He didn’t grow up with a family, so his colleagues became his family, and with them he encouraged cultures of teamwork and collaborations. He placed a high value on nurturing those around him.

His thinking wasn’t shaped from years of being told to do something a certain way. He’d grown up alone, with little guidance beyond his heart.

So little time had been afforded him as a child that he gave so much of his time to others. He had patience and would sit for hours and listen to the problems of those around him.

And because he had been through the gauntlet so many times as a child, when Opportunity came knocking, he saw it for exactly what it was—and was willing to put in the hard work that Opportunity dictates.

Bob died this week, on August 8th, all of 85 years old.

Also on August 8th, Steve wrote about “The Artist’s Journey in the Real World.”

Bob’s life is the perfect example of the artist in the real world. He was both hero and artist, forging, fighting, creating, and inspiring.

As I type, I can hear him saying, “Well isn’t that dandy?”

Thank you, Bob.

The Artist’s Journey in the Real World

 

I described in The War of Art the moment when my own artist’s journey began. It was in New York City. I was supporting myself driving a cab. I sat down one night in my sublet at 84th and York and tried for about two hours to write.

It worked.

For the first time in nearly a decade of trying, the act pulled me together instead of breaking me apart.

I knew I had turned a corner.

I knew I would be all right.

But here’s the key question:

 

            What happened after that?

 

Did I immediately achieve “success?” Did I instantly bang out a novel and sell it?

Here’s the real-world chronology:

I keep driving a cab.

Six months later I find a job in advertising.

I work for two years, save my money, quit, write a novel, can’t sell it.

In other words, I’m now four years into my artist’s journey with no money and no recognition to show for it.

I go back to advertising. Two more years. I quit again. Write another novel. Can’t sell this one either.

Eight years now.

I move to Los Angeles to try to write for the movies.

Four years, nine spec screenplays. Can’t sell any.

Thirteen years now.

My agent teams me with an established screenwriter/producer. I work for four years that way. For the first time, I’m actually paying the rent.

But, in artist’s journey terms, I still haven’t found my voice. I’m still not writing from my real center.

Seventeen years.

My writing partner and I split up.

I work as a solo writer for three more years.

Two or three scripts come out in my actual voice. But I can’t sell them.

I bail from screenwriting, try another novel.

It sells.

So do #2, #3, #4, etc.

I’m supporting myself at last.

I’m writing from my real center.

Elapsed time from start of artist’s journey: twenty-one years.

(Not counting the eight years preceding that, before I turned the corner.)

The writer’s life—or the dancer’s or the filmmaker’s or the entrepreneur’s—is a lifetime commitment.

The artist’s journey lasts as long as we live.

It may take forever to pay off.

It may never pay off at all, at least not in dollars and cents. Maybe never in critical terms either.

This is the artist’s journey in the real world.

Can we sustain it? Can we keep it going in the face of adversity, of contempt, of rejection, or worse, of self-contempt and self-rejection?

Can we believe in our destiny when no one else does?

Can we take satisfaction in the process?

Can we believe in the journey itself?

 

The Loser’s Journey Revisited

In The Artist’s Journey, Steve includes a section related to the artist’s skills. Here are a few:

The artist learns how to start.

The artist learns how to keep going.

The artist learns how to finish.

The artist learns how to hang on.

The artist learns how to let go.

The artist learns how to be alone.

The artist learns how to work with others.

The artist learns how to handle rejection.

The artist learns how to handle praise.

The artist learns how to handle panic.

The artist learns to give up.

The artist learns to go beyond what she knows.

The artist learns to be brave.

The artist learns to keep the pressure on.

Often, my daily goals resemble Steve’s skills:

Start.

Keep going.

Finish.

Hang on.

Let go.

Be alone.

Work with others.

Handle rejection.

Handle praise.

Give up.

Go beyond what I know.

Be brave.

Keep the pressure on.

When my daily goals look like Steve’s skills, I know I’m stuck in my hero’s journey, which feels like the zero’s journey.

Do you know the following quote from Kurt Vonnegut?

Do you realize that all great literature—Moby Dick, Huckleberry Finn, A Farewell to Arms, The Scarlet Letter, The Red Badge of Courage, The Iliad and The Odyssey, Crime and Punishment, the Bible, and “The Charge of the Light Brigade”—are all about what a bummer it is to be a human being?”

That bummer, buzz kill, wet blanket extinguisher of all hope is what the loser’s journey feels like—just muddling through the crap, no Emerald City in sight, flying monkeys all over the place.

Start is easy.

Keep going is tough.

Finish is near impossible some days.

Hang on makes me want to scream—as does let go.

Be alone is never a problem.

Work with others is sometimes a problem.

Handle rejection is always a problem.

Handle praise can lead to problems.

Give up happens a lot.

Go beyond what I know . . . How do I know what I don’t know?

Be brave is a coin toss between being strong and breaking.

But on the days when I can nail all of them?

Artist all the way.

The difference?

Experience.

Sleep.

Caffeine.

Sugar.

Exercise.

Vampires.

The difference between zero, hero, and artist is 1) having the experience to nail the artist’s skills—and knowing that we’re working on multiple tracks, so while we’re an artist on one, we might be a zero hero on the other (think John McClane: hero as a pro and zero with family)—and then 2) having enough sleep, exercise, and good food to ward off the toxic personalities that suck out the life when caffeine, sugar, and lack of sleep and exercise dominate.

I know artists who drink and/or do drugs—and artists who work on little sleep and lots of drama. Not me. I can’t do it.

When the structure fails, so do the skills.

Steven Soderbergh and the Artist’s Journey

In 2007, Steven Soderbergh won the Academy Award as Best Director for Traffic. I remember his acceptance speech almost word for word. Here’s the link to the video. (It’s better to watch it than to read it [even better to do both] because he delivered his message in such a humble and heartfelt manner):

Suddenly, going to work tomorrow doesn’t seem like such a good idea. My daughter Sarah’s asleep in London. She’s missing this, unfortunately. There are a lot of people to thank. Rather than thank some of them publicly, I think I’ll thank all of them privately. What I want to say is — I want to thank anyone who spends part of their day creating. I don’t care if it’s a book, a film, a painting, a dance, a piece of theater, a piece of music . . .  Anybody who spends part of their day sharing their experience with us. I think this world would be unlivable without art, and I thank you. That includes the Academy. That includes my fellow nominees here tonight. Thank you for inspiring me. Thank you for this.

Steven Soderbergh could have bounded onto that stage and offered any number of charming, funny, even egomaniacal pronouncements about himself, his movie, his hard times, everybody that helped him, his wife, his kids, his mom, his dad.

Instead he took those two minutes to speak to you and me.

The artist’s journey can be pursued on an hour a day. I can do it. You can do it. We don’t have to quit our day jobs. We don’t have to move to a fourth-floor walkup in Williamsburgh or a garret in Montmarte.

The journey is the journey.

If you’re on it, you’re an artist.

 

A New System

Last week’s “What It Takes” post was about Systems.  A new one was left out.

Black Irish Books turned to Vellum before the release of The Artist’s Journey by Steve and Running Down a Dream by Tim Grahl. (Thank you Joanna Penn for the recommendation.)

After uploading the manuscript for The Artist’s Journey, I realized that learning how to use Vellum (which was easy, by the way) wasn’t the first step.

I needed a style guide—and I’m not talking about the Chicago Manual of Style or Associated Press Stylebook here.

This is about those pieces specific to Black Irish Books.

Though many of Black Irish Books’ titles have a similar layout—more specifically those in the “Resistance” line—we don’t have a guide for a standard treatment.

I went through The War of Art, Turning Pro, and The Authentic Swing, to determine the treatment for The Artist’s Journey and Running Down A Dream.

The following is some of what I found—and what I e-mailed Steve and Shawn after going through the three books.

Headers

It’s tempting to want to insert a natural line break for the longer headers, but I avoided doing so because the various screens will change in their length on their own. For example, if I view a long header on an iPad, it might all fit on one line, but if I view it on an iPhone it might be on two lines. For individuals that like to read large print, the headers might appear on three lines. For this reason, I avoided adding an extra line break, which might muck up the layout at different font sizes and screen sizes.

Leading

I chose the loosest leading available in Vellum, since WOA, TP, and TAS all have extra space between the lines. If you think it is too much, I can tighten it.

Half title page

1. I didn’t include your name on the half title page, although it is included in the manuscript provided. WOA and TP don’t have your name on this page, and most of the books on my shelf don’t have the author’s name on the half title page. The exception is TAS, which does have your name on the half title page.

2. In the manuscript, the half title page is included a second time, before Book One. WOA has it appearing a second time, too, but TP, TAS, and the majority of the books on my shelf don’t have it appearing twice. For this reason, I didn’t include it here.

Also By

In the manuscript, TP, and WOA, the Also By page is included after the half title page and before the full title and CIP pages. In TAS, the Also By page is included after the CIP page.

Also By

In the manuscript, WOA, and TAS you have Also By Steven Pressfield on one line and in caps. TP has Also By on one line and Steven Pressfield on the second line. I went with what is in the manuscript, WOA, and TAS. In the manuscript, WOA, and TAS, Also By Steven Pressfield is in a serif font, but in TP it is in a san serif font. I went with a serif font.

In WOA, TP, and TAS Fiction and Nonfiction are in a smaller san serif font, so I went with the smaller san serif font.

CIP Page

WOA, TP, and TAS, use a smaller, bold, san serif font, so I used that format.

Dedication

TAS has it in a script font, in italics. TP and WOA have “for” in an italicized script font and the names in a regular font. The manuscript has a regular font for everything. Vellum doesn’t allow for a script font, so I went with italics on everything.

Epigraph

WOA and TP have em dashes before the names in quotes, so I included one here. The opening quote in TP is centered. I went with the left, justified alignment in the manuscript since the quote is longer than the TP quote.

Introduction headers

WOA and TAS use a bold, san serif font, no underline. I went with this format

First page of each book within TAJ

Vellum doesn’t allow for manually adding larger font sizes. However, it does have a format for adding “parts” within a book, which is the format you see here. In its parts layout, the automated format comes with larger fonts. I can’t change the I to a One. It’s an automated feature that they use.

Headers for each chapter

Headers in WOA and TP use all caps, a serif font, and are underlined. TAJ uses all caps, a san serif font, and no underline. I went with all caps and a serif font, with a line between the header and the text.

Numbering

WOA has numbers listed with a half parenthesis after them: 1)

TP and the manuscript have numbers listed with a period after them: 1.

I went with TP and the manuscript and have periods listed after the numbers.

In the manuscript, you have numbered items indented on pages 24, 75, 115, 134, 169 They are not indented on pages 19, 20, 21, 166, 167, 168 I went with indented throughout.

First letter of the first sentence of each page

TP and WOA use a drop cap that is the size of the first two lines. TAS uses a large cap that is the size of the line it is on, plus the equivalent of the empty line above it. I went with the WOA/TP version.

Lists of songs/movies

These are all italicized and indented as they are in the manuscript.

Quotes

In TAS, quotes were indented, justified, and italicized, with one exception. The story from Ander Crenshaw is not italicized. The quotes in WOA and TP aren’t italicized either. I chose to go with the indented and justified version, that is NOT italicized.

The above is far from being a complete style guide, but it was a place to start, and saved me time when I turned to Running Down A Dream. I didn’t have to flip through chapters to remember how an element was treated the first time it appeared. There was also the time saved on decision making. Might seem like a small thing, but in the course of laying out a book, the decisions needed  add up in time.

I would never call myself a book designer, but Vellum put the power of designing in my hands. The style guide ruled Time and Continuity.

More on Vellum to come.

The Prodigal Son and The Artist’s Journey

I remember when I was a kid reading the Biblical story of the Prodigal Son. I never really got the point of it. I found myself siding with the elder son.

“My son was lost, but now he is found.”

“Hey, Dad, what’s the story? My younger brother takes his inheritance early and bolts from the farm. He swaggers into the big city, blows every penny on gambling and fast living and then comes crawling home begging for forgiveness. The kid’s a bum! Yet here you are, Pop, breaking out the fatted calf and rejoicing at your wayward child’s return, when I, the Responsible One, have been here all along, busting my butt to make this farm pay. It ain’t fair!”

I didn’t get the father’s explanation either.

 

            “My son was lost, but now he is found.”

 

I was thinking of this the other day and I realized the story is the perfect expression of the hero’s journey/artist’s journey metaphor.

The prodigal son’s life of dissolution, his adventures in the fleshpots of the wicked city was his hero’s journey.

He left the Ordinary World, crossed the threshold into the Inverted World; he encountered enemies and allies; he suffered. Finally he hit bottom. He did what the hero classically does—he returned home. But not as the same person he had been when he left. His ordeal had changed him. He came back, whether he knew it or not, bearing a “gift for the people.”

Consider the father in the story. Who is he? He’s God. He’s the Self, the soul, the Muse.

He understands, even if the elder son doesn’t at first.

When the father considers his younger son, returned at last to the place from which he set out, he reckons three things.

The younger son will never leave again.

The lad has sowed his wild oats. He has learned his lesson. The temptations of diversion and empty self-amusement no longer hold allure for him.

The younger son has found (or begun to find) his true identity.

The youth knows where he belongs now. He has shed a thousand alternative identities. He has come home in the deepest and most telling sense of the phrase.

The younger son’s creativity is about to be unleashed.

The Bible story doesn’t tell us what happened after “happily ever after.” But let’s venture an educated guess:

Two months after the son returns home, he comes to his father and says, “Pop, much as I enjoy tending the sheep and goats, the real area I’m drawn to is the olive groves. I don’t know why but I have a feeling I can make them grow better. That bare, stony patch up the hill? Would you let me plant some seedlings there and see if I can make them flourish?”

Fast forward to twenty years later. The prodigal son has become the Olive Whisperer of the province. Grovers come from miles around to learn his secrets of cultivation and propagation, care and tendance, etc.

In other words, he has found his true identity.

He has located his gift.

He has become himself, to the benefit not only of his own life and that of his wife and kids (yeah, he found a nice girl and got married), but to the whole farm, including the share owned by his older brother.

The younger son’s hero’s journey ended when he hit bottom in Sin City and came home to the farm.

At that point, his artist’s journey began.

Of course the family in the story is a metaphor for you and me, for a single individual.

The father is the soul, the Muse, the Self. Each son is a part of the whole—the stay-at-home, hard-working brother and the wild child who crossed the threshold to the Inverted World and lived out his saga of Resistance before finally identifying his true journey and beginning to live it.

If you’ll forgive me for quoting myself, here’s a passage from Turning Pro, the chapter titled “Three Cheers for the Amateur Life”:

 

Before we begin ruthlessly deconstructing the amateur life, let’s pause for a moment to give it its due. The amateur life is our youth. It’s our hero’s journey.

No one is born a pro. You’ve got to fall before you hit bottom, and sometimes that fall can be a hell of a ride.

So here’s to blackouts and divorces, to lost jobs and lost cash and lost self-respect. Here’s to time on the streets. Here’s to years we can’t remember. Here’s to bad friends and cheating spouses—and to us, too, for being guilty of being both.

Becoming a pro, in the end, is nothing grander than growing up.

 

And here’s to you, if you’re reading this, and your own term of prodigality. Don’t shortchange it. It’s your initiation. Your self-initiation. You paid for it and it’s yours. Keep it. It’s okay to flash back to it from time to time while you’re out there with your sons and daughters tending the olive trees on that once-bare-and-stony patch that is now flourishing.

Dad understands. He always did.

And so, in the end, does your elder brother.

 

 

 

 

#4 Forging the Artist’s Essentials

Before I get started with this post, today is the last day to order the special “Resistance Digital Bundle” (audios and ebooks) of Steve’s The Artist’s Journey and Tim Grahl’s Running Down A Dream , both of which were released last week by Black Irish Books.

The Odyssey opens with Homer’s call to the Muse, to sing to him of “the man of twists and turns driven time and again off course . . . “ and of the man who fought “to save his life and bring his comrades home,” but who ultimately failed to “save them from disaster, hard as he strove—the recklessness of their own ways destroyed them all . . . and wiped from sight the day of their return.”

The recklessness of their ways . . .

That’s a hallmark of the hero’s journey.

In The Artist’s Journey, Steve wrote:

In the mythology of the hero’s journey, the hero at the conclusion of her ordeal returns home safely from her wanderings. But she does not arrive empty-handed. She returns with an “elixir,” a “gift for the people.”

This gift is the product of the hero’s solitary suffering. It may be wisdom or queenly command. It may come with fire or the sword, driving out the evil forces that have infested the kingdom. Or it may come gently, as poetry or music that heals and restores harmony to the land.

How does the hero do that?

She has systems in place.

To obtain her goal, she knows the actions she has to take and she knows the exact order in which those actions must be taken.

Dorothy wears the ruby slippers during her entire hero’s journey, but it isn’t until she reaches the end of her yellow brick road that she realizes that the shoes she’s been wearing all along are her system for getting home.

The hero has to go through the process of identifying the system and then once in place, the artist steps in.

What does that look like for the rest of us?

In Tim’s Running Down A Dream, Tim’s #4 tool is “Create Systems for the Essential.” He wrote:

First, and foremost, systems save time. By putting your keys in the same place every day or cooking the same thing for breakfast every morning, you save time in planning, preparation, and doing. You never lose your keys. You always know what you need at the grocery store, etc.

Second, systems save mental energy. You no longer have to decide what to do. Your system takes care of it for you. Also, you stop forgetting to do things because your system always tells you what to do next.

For someone like Thor, a system is the use of his hammer. In a fight? Go right to the hammer. No time spent on considering options. The hammer works. Use it. Hammer gets destroyed? Hell breaks loose and time is wasted sorting out another system.

For this mortal, I have a contract that I paid a publishing industry attorney to develop for me. The language is standard. I don’t have to recreate the contract with every job. I just have to change language unique to specific customers.

I have a mileage form to track business-related travel. I don’t have to recreate the form every month. I just have to check with the IRS every year for the allowable mileage rate. I make that change and the form stays the same.

I have an expense form that I use to track expenses each month and a folder sitting on top of my desk that’s specifically for receipts. If I make a purchase, the receipt goes in the folder and the purchase is recorded on the expense form.

This is kin to doing proactive maintenance on your car or your HVAC unit or having an annual physical done. The more proactive check-ups and systems you have in place, the less likely you’ll find yourself blindsided.

How did I come to doing these things?

In the first few years I started my business, I only wanted to do the creative work. I didn’t want to do the un-fun, non-creative bits. This meant that I was awful about tracking mileage and expenses on a daily basis, which led to a time suck when I sat down to hammer through it. I still want to do the creative work over the clerical crud, but . . .  Both are important to running a business, so both have to get done. I enjoy one and have a system in place to help me avoid hating the other.

With a system in place—and as long as I follow the system—there’s no problem. However, when the system isn’t being followed . . .

About four years ago my family and I moved to a new home. Within the first year or so, the master bath leaked into the dining room below, the AC in the attic broke and flooded the bedrooms below it, the water line to the fridge broke and flooded the basement, a hail storm hit and did damage to the roof, and some kids playing in the woods behind my home thought it was a good idea to fill the uncovered manhole with rocks and branches, which resulted in a sewage backup and crap overflowing into the woods and creek.

At the time I was’t following systems because the move had thrown me off—and then I spiraled out as one thing after another occurred. Work suffered. Family suffered. I stopped going to the gym. I ate on the go. I barely slept.

I’m not saying that all those things happened because I wasn’t following my systems, but . . . The universe has a way of nailing you when you aren’t doing what you’re supposed to be doing. I know that Drama visits more often when I’m not following my systems.

That’s the difference between the hero’s journey and the artist’s journey.

With the hero, even the slightest disruption blows him of course. With the artist, she has systems in place to get home—even if those around her are the ones at fault for opening Aeolus’ bag of winds.

Good Will Hunting and the Artist’s Journey

First, let me say thanks to everybody who stuck with these blog posts through the serialization of The Artist’s Journey. And a special thanks to everybody who actually ordered the book. I hope it’s helpful.

Matt Damon expressing Will Hunting’s gift in Good Will Hunting

But let’s get to Good Will Hunting. I watched the movie for probably the tenth time on TV a few nights ago. I thought, Wow, this is the Hero’s Journey/Artist’s Journey exactly.

Do you remember the movie? (It came out in 1997 and launched Matt Damon’s and Ben Affleck’s careers. As co-writers they won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay that year.)

Here’s a quick recap:

Matt Damon is Will Hunting, a “wicked smart” prodigy at math. We know this because he solves with ease a problem that has been stumping the best minds at M.I.T.

But Will is a janitor. He works at the university with a mop and a floor buffing machine.

And he solves the problem anonymously. Will posts his solution on a public board in the hallway of the Math Department, but he doesn’t sign his name or leave any indication that he is the genius responsible.

Talk about “Refusal of the Call.”

Further, Will is a fierce adherent of the blue-collar, South Boston Irish street ethic of being a tough, chip-on-his-shoulder, bar-brawling kid.

In other words, he has buried his gift beneath layers of denial.

His artist’s-journey-in-potential is so far underground Will doesn’t even know it’s there.

Then two things happen.

Will is compelled into psychotherapy with Dr. Sean Maquire (Robin Williams) as his down-to-earth, just-as-tough-as-he-is shrink.
Will meets the beautiful, brainy Harvard undergrad Skylar (Minnie Driver) and falls for her.

Both these characters represent models and mentors that Will could follow to initiate his passage out of denial. They see his gift and passionately encourage him to embrace it.

But Will will have none of it.

In hero’s journey terms, Will is smack in the middle of the ordeal of initiation (or self-initiation).

He resists.

He denies.

He rejects.

The school year ends. Skylar heads cross-country to Stanford Medical School. Will breaks up with her.

He knows what he should do.

He can see the end of his hero’s journey and the start of his artist’s journey. They’re staring him in the face, thanks to Sean and Skylar.

But he’s stuck in the South Boston code of street honor.

He can’t and won’t break free.

Ben Affleck plays Will’s Southie best bud Chuckie. Chuckie knows Will better than he knows himself. One morning, in the most powerful scene in a movie packed with powerful scenes, Chuckie unloads on his friend.

The scene takes place beside a pickup truck with the pals’ hard hats sitting on the hood and the construction project they’re laboring on in the background. Both drink beers from cans as the scene unfolds.

Chuckie asks Will what happened to his girl. Meaning Skylar.

“She left for California,” says Will. “Medical school. A week ago.”

The pals talks for a few more beats. Will says he has no plans to follow Skylar (i.e. pursue his own destiny.) Instead, he says, his intention is to stay here in Southie. He’ll keep hanging with his buds, get married eventually, have kids, take them to ball games and do everything over the next twenty years that Will and Chuckie have always done.

CHUCKIE

Look, you’re my best friend, so don’t take this the wrong way.

But in twenty years, if you’re still livin’ here, comin’ over to my house

to watch the Patriots games, still workin’ construction, I’ll f**kin’ kill

you. That’s not a threat, that’s a fact. I’ll f**kin’ kill you.

 

WILL

What the f**k are you talkin’ about?

 

CHUCKIE

Look, you got somethin’ that none of us—

 

WILL

Oh, come on! Why is it always this, I mean, I f**kin’ owe it to myself

to do this or that? What if I don’t want to?

 

CHUCKIE

No. No, no, no. No, f**k you. You don’t owe it to yourself. You owe it

to me. ‘Cause tomorrow I’m gonna wake up and I’ll be fifty. And I’ll

still be doing this shit. And that’s all right, that’s fine. I mean, you’re

sittin’ on a winning lottery ticket and you’re too much of a pussy to

cash it in. And that’s bullshit. `Cause I’d do anything to f**kin’ have

what you got. So would any of these f**kin’ guys. It’d be an insult to

us if you’re still here in twenty years. Hanging around here is a

f**kin’ waste of your time.

 

WILL

You don’t know that.

 

CHUCKIE

I don’t?

 

WILL

No. You don’t know that.

 

CHUCKIE

Oh, I don’t know that. Let me tell you what I do know. Every day

I come by to pick you up. And we go out we have a few drinks and

a few laughs, and it’s great. But you know what the best part of my

day is? It’s for about ten seconds from when I pull up to the curb to

when I get to your door. Because I think maybe I’ll get up there and

I’ll knock on the door and you won’t be there. No goodbye, no see

you later, no nothin’. Just left. I don’t know much, but I know that.

 

A few more scenes intervene and then we see Chuckie and his buds pull up behind Will’s house in their beat-up cruiser. It’s early. The guys are picking Will up for work, just like every other morning.

Only this time when Chuckie knocks, Will is gone.

Cut up the interstate and Will’s equally beat-up Chevy Nova, heading west for California and Skylar.

In other words, Will’s hero’s journey has ended.

His artist’s journey is about to begin.

The thing about movies (and novels too sometimes) is they end when the hero’s journey ends.

The artist’s journey is relegated to what happens after FADE OUT. After The End. After Happily Ever After.

Why, I wonder.

I suspect it’s because the artist’s journey is not cinematic. It’s internal. In Will’s case it’s him continuing his evolution as a mathematician, which is . . . what? A guy in an academic setting toiling over formulas and equations.

That’s my life.

And it’s yours too.

The hero’s journey is dramatic. It’s theatrical. It makes a great movie or a novel.

But for Will Hunting, and for you and me, the real journey starts when that Chevy Nova makes it to California.