How to destroy your writers block
By: Sterling Scott
Tags: Steven Pressfield, Fear Of Failure, Writers Block, Creative Process, Do The Work

What is Resistance?

According to Stephen Pressfield author of Do the Work and the Art of War resistance is an insidious force that keeps us from sitting down to do our creative work. It will show up as fatigue, being too busy, not having the right workspace, and a million other ways.

In my personal opinion I think resistance is us trying not to stand out. It’s evolutionary. It’s the same reason why we want to eat the wrong foods. Our bodies were programmed to live off of the land. We didn’t come across sugar very often so when we did we ate it in order to keep our fuel reserves up. This is the reason why we consume it now even though it’s in abundance everywhere.

What does this have to do with creative work? Everything. I’m deeply interested in what holds us back in every area of life. This means that as we learn to overcome resistance we get better in a multitude of ways. This is a long cry from the starving artist, or the drug addicted artist.

This is another place where resistance shows up. As artists and creatives, we are very passionate about freedom and self-expression. How many of us realize that we’ve been programmed with beliefs of being the dysfunctional artist? This should offend us and piss us off. Often times though we become victims and feel like were misunderstood by society.

The Myth of the Dysfunctional Artist

For years I thought that I couldn’t create art unless I was suffering. I watched an interview with David Lynch who said that nothing could be further from the truth. He finds that he’s his most creative when he’s in a good space mentally. This doesn’t mean not to create unless we think that everything is sunshine and rainbows. What it does mean is that the idea that creativity only comes from darkness, depression and suffering isn’t true.

Most of us are much more nuanced than we give ourselves credit for. We grew up in tribes many years ago and it’s important to remember that our brains are still operating from that very old perspective. The neo cortex which is the newest part of our brain isn’t nearly as developed as the lizard brain (amygdala.)

This leads us to want to avoid putting ourselves out there because we don’t want to be seen as different by the other tribal members. I also feel that the reason that there’s such a reward for having flat abs or doing creative work is because we as a society are looking to evolve beyond this basic conditioning and evolve as a species.

So, What Do we Do about resistance?

I’m a huge fan of David Goggins the Navy seal. He speaks about the need to suffer. What he means is we have to do those things that we don’t feel like doing. This is applicable not only in the gym but in our creative efforts. Quite often times as creatives as we feel that we are exempt from discipline. But as Jaco Willink author and former Navy seal says discipline equals freedom.

What this means is that we have to have the discipline to sit down and do our work. As a professional artist we don’t wait for the muse to appear. We show up and we begin.

The Curse of Perfectionism

Perfectionism is just another form of resistance. It tells us that until we have all the right resources, we can’t begin our work. Nothing could be further from the truth. Constraints actually help us to be more creative. Chuck Close a famous visual artist began painting his famous large scale grid paintings because his eyesight was failing. He uses a big magnifying glass to paint his pieces one grid at a time. He had trained this mindset in. Even before he began to lose his eyesight, he would sometimes only work with one color or apply similar creative constraints to his artistic process.

Too Many Options

In a world that tells us to specialize, some of us are polymaths. Enjoy doing more than one thing. If you want to make music make music, if you want to make film make film. Whatever is going to get you into your creative flow is great. Psychologist and author of Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi says that what we’re all really looking for is that flow state, that transcendent state where we lose our self in the task. While it’s great to specialize don’t allow that to become a barrier to getting to work done.

Concerned about the opinions of others?

Everyone on the planet experiences resistance. When you see the finished version of others work you don’t understand their own inner battles and challenges. Don’t compare your insides to other people’s outsides. This is a great reason to go quiet on social media and spend more time focusing on your creative efforts.