Turning Pro

by Steven Pressfield

that we have earned our battle scars and learned from our wayward ways

What ails us is that we are living our lives as amateurs. The solution, this book suggests, is that we turn pro.

tread in blood

What we get when we turn pro is, we find our power. We find our will and our voice and we find our self-respect. We become who we always were but had, until then, been afraid to embrace and to live out.

Ambition, I have come to believe, is the most primal and sacred fundament of our being. To feel ambition and to act upon it is to embrace the unique calling of our souls. Not to act upon that ambition is to turn our backs on ourselves and on the reason for our existence.

book by Jack Kerouac called On The Road.

The difference between an amateur and a professional is in their habits. An amateur has amateur habits. A professional has professional habits.

Turning pro is an act of self-abnegation. Not Self with a capital-S, but little-s self. Ego. Distraction. Displacement. Addiction.

"A tramp is an itinerant worker. A hobo is an itinerant non-worker. A bum is a non-itinerant non-worker."

All addictions share, among others, two primary qualities. 1. They embody repetition without progress. 2. They produce incapacity as a payoff.

Stanislavsky's famous three questions: Who am I? Why am I here? What do I want?

Resistance hates two qualities above all others: concentration and depth. Why? Because when we work with focus and we work deep, we succeed.

What you and I are really seeking is our own voice, our own truth, our own authenticity.

The Gnostics believed that exile was the essential condition of man.

The amateur identifies with his own ego. He believes he is "himself." That's why he's terrified. The amateur is a narcissist. He views the world hierarchically. He continuously rates himself in relation to others, becoming self-inflated if his fortunes rise, and desperately anxious if his star should fall. The amateur sees himself as the hero, not only of his own movie, but of the movies of others. He insists (in his mind, if nowhere else) that others share this view.

The amateur allows his worth and identity to be defined by others. The amateur craves third-party validation.

The amateur prizes shallowness and shuns depth. The culture of Twitter and Facebook is paradise for the amateur.

Too much ain't enough, and too soon is too late.

The payoff of living in the past or the future is you never have to do your work in the present.

The sure sign of an amateur is he has a million plans and they all start tomorrow.

When we turn pro, we stop running from our fears. We turn around and face them.

Carl Jung said that a person might have five "big" dreams in her life — dreams that provoke a shift in consciousness

Krishna said we have the right to our labor, but not to the fruits of our labor.

The professional does not wait for inspiration; he acts in anticipation of it.

When we do the work for itself alone, our pursuit of a career (or a living or fame or wealth or notoriety) turns into something else, something loftier and nobler, which we may never even have thought about or aspired to at the beginning. It turns into a practice.

To "have a practice" in yoga, say, or tai chi, or calligraphy, is to follow a rigorous, prescribed regimen with the intention of elevating the mind and the spirit to a higher level.

A practice has a space, and that space is sacred.

When we convene day upon day in the same space at the same time, a powerful energy builds up around us. This is the energy of our intention, of our dedication, of our commitment.

practice be focused. It must possess intention.

We may bring intention and intensity to our practice (in fact we must), but not ego. Dedication, even ferocity, yes. But never arrogance.

We know what we have to do.

You and I can do it, too. We can work over our heads. Not only can we, but we must.

Good things happen when we trust the Mystery. There is always something in the box.

Two key tenets for days when Resistance is really strong: 1. Take what you can get and stay patient. The defense may crack late in the game. 2. Play for tomorrow.

3. We're in this for the long haul.

The hero wanders. The hero suffers. The hero returns. You are that hero.