PNTV: The Artist's Journey by Steven Pressfield

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Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another episode of Philosopher's Notes tv. Today we have another great book, the Artist's Journey by Steven Pressfield. The Artist's Journey, subtitled the Wake of the Hero's Journey and and the Lifelong Pursuit of Meaning. This is Steven Pressfield's 19th book. It's the 10th book of his that I've read and the fourth one that we've done a note and a TV episode on. Check out a link below on YouTube where we've got the other books we featured. A link to a place where you can find our notes on and episodes on the War of Art. Phenomenal book. The book, what is it? Do the Work and then turning pro. So those are the three we've done so far. This is our fourth. We've got another one coming up soon. I'm a huge fan of Pressfield. Both his novel, fiction work and his nonfiction self help books are just phenomenal. So he's kind of an interesting hybrid of super prolific creative writer and a creative master who teaches us what he does to actually show up. This book is about, as per the title, the Artist's Journey. We'll talk about what that means in a second. As always. We've got a philosopher's note, a bunch of my favorite big ideas and five of them we're going to discuss here today. First, the Artist's Journey. Pressfield tells us that we all have an artist's journey and we also all have a hero's journey. Often many heroes journey in a well lived life, as Joseph Campbell says. But he says we go on our hero's journey. We leave the comfort of the known. We answer the call, cross the threshold, get support, fight our dragons, win the prize, and then come back to the world. Basic hero's journey in a nutshell. He says. Then what? Then we live our artist's journey. And the artist's journey is all about discovering our unique voice, who we are, what we're really here to do and give to the world. Then we create a body of work tapping into that deepest truth and expressing ourselves authentically. That's the Artist's journey. The book is all about how to help us do that. Which leads us to our first big idea here. And the most important job of the artist, Steve tells us, is to tap into our super conscious. So we have our normal consciousness. Then we have our unconscious or our subconscious. He says, no, those are the wrong terms. It should be called the superconscious because that's where all the power comes from. And our whole job as artists in our particular domain and as artists in our lives is to tap into that best within us, that super conscious, more and more consistently. Heidi Grant Halvorsen, one of the world's leading scientists studying success and goal setting, et cetera, she says that the normal consciousness is kind of like a post it note in terms of its processing power, which, whereas your subconscious, or superconscious, is like a NASA supercomputer. And Pressfield, again, his whole point, he says the number one job of an artist is to shuttle back and forth between your normal consciousness and this super consciousness. And really, that's the whole point of all of our work together. All of these algorithms we're writing, all these habits that we're creating are to chip away at the stuff that's getting in the way of the best within us coming through more and more consistently. Another way Pressfield describes it is open a pipeline to your muse. Now, the way I've described it in the past is entheos, God within. Before we changed our name to Optimize Enterprises Public Benefit Corporation, our company was called Entheos Enterprises, Public Benefit Corporation. Right? Entheos, God within. The two words that make up enthusiasm, that's our whole job. That's the ultimate reason we do what we do. Tapping into the superconscious, shuttling back and forth. Now, Steve also tells us about our daimon. He talks about our daimon all the time. We're going to talk about destiny, acorns. But first our daimon. So the superconscious, another way you can describe the superconscious, you can call it your muse, you can call it the goddess, you can, you can call it your daimon, which is your inner soul. And Pressfield tells us we all have our inner soul. And he reminded me that's a Greek word, Daimon. Right, Soul. Aristotle tells us the whole point of life is to have a good soul, a eu daimon. Then you experience eudaimonia, that really deep sense of flourishing and happiness, right? Greek word, daimon. Well, the Romans in Latin, they had the same concept, only they called the daimon your soul, your genius, which is pretty awesome. And everybody in ancient Roman times was said to have their own genius, a guiding spirit. And Pressfield says that daimon, that spirit, whatever you want to call it, knows your destiny. It's right there whispering in your ear, moment to moment to moment. And again, our job is to simply open the pipeline so that version of us can be expressed more and more consistently. And he says it's kind of like an acorn within an acorn is all of the potentiality of the oak tree, which is pretty astonishing when you take a moment to think about it. There is a latent force and potentiality within that tiny little acorn that will become this enormous oak tree if given the right environment. Right. And the right conditions such that it can flourish. It's a really astonishing thing and I've been experiencing it personally. We have converted our backyard into a part Spartan training setup with a rope climb and a Herculean hoist and a spear throw and some wall traverses. And then in the rest of our backyard, we've got a little backyard. We live downtown, so we've got a little bit of space, but in the back we have this micro farm, I like to call it, where every other space is taken up with like, I think we have over 75 varieties of seeds planted now, tons of different vegetables, leafy greens, cruciferous, etc. Right. Target 101. Anyway, I share that because it literally, I've never done any gardening in my life before, but it's absolutely astonishing to me how you can take a seed out of a packet and look at that seed and. And it's in the packet. Nothing's going to happen to it while it's in the packet. Yet there's this potentiality within each of those seeds. You simply put it in the soil, give it some water and some light, and boom, within days, it's sprouting to life. That potentiality is always there. Within the seed, within the acord, within you, within me. We simply need to create the conditions to allow that force to come through destiny. Acorns, your inner guide, your inner spirit. That voice within you that's always whispering in your ear, your daimon genius, whatever you want to call it. I call mine optimus. Right? Latin for the best. The root of optimize. It's there. We just need to pay attention. And then the third idea is, okay, all that's nice, but how do I tap into that power? And Pressfield says, don't make it complicated. Show up. You want to write, right? You want to paint. Paint. You want to dance, Dance. He references Twyla Tharp, who wrote the Creative Habit, one of the greatest choreographers alive ever, and he talks about her rituals. She's all about creative rituals and creative habits. And oftentimes we can get deluded into the idea that you just need to wait until inspiration strikes. Well, as we discuss in all of our creativity notes. Inspiration is for amateurs. The professionals show up day in, day out. For Twyla Tharp, it's working out. But even more fundamentally, it's simply hailing the cab such that she's on her way to the workout. So for you, what is it you're here to do? What is your artist journey? What are you here to give to the world? We need you to come to life and to give that to us. Are you showing up or are you waking up and then immediately going into reactive ville and wasting your best time? The most creative time, which for most people is first thing in the morning when they're fresh. They just come out of that restorative sleep. They can do their great work, Go deep, reduce the inputs, lead yourself first style, right? And do your best work. Show up, whatever it is for you, right? Or are you turning on your phone or turning on your email and immediately reacting? That's not going to do the job. Even Stephen Covey said this in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Rule number one, habit number one, be proactive. Before you're reactive, you got to go deep. You got to show up. Our fourth big idea is a fun one. Jay Z showing up in his studio. Pressfield tells us that Jay Z, when he shows up in his studio, he has 10,000 micro heroes journeys. 10,000 times he's called to adventure that little daimon, right? The best part of him whispers in his ear. A creative vision, something he could do, some way that he could express himself authentically. The superconscious is there, whispering, do this. This is what you need to express what's most authentic. Now, he can either choose to follow that and express it authentically and powerfully, or refuse the call, Answer it or not, answer it or not. 10,000 times. Pressfield tells us in any given studio session or any day, Jay Z is called to either step forward and express that or not. Of course, we're all the same. We have those micro heroes journeys, not just in our studio, in whatever sense, whether that's the traditional art or an HR office, right, where you're coming up with a new program to optimize your employees well being, et cetera. We're called again and again and again to express our authentic selves or not. I talk about this a lot as plus one minus one. And I used to write it like that, right? Beginning of the day, you can go forward or you can go backward, right? Plus one. Well, it goes like this. Forward, backward, forward, backward, forward, backward, all day, every day. You have a choice. Step Forward into growth, back into safety, to use Maslow's language. But the more appropriate way to look at it, I think now is you're going forward, right? And up or backwards. Same basic thing. And you know how you feel at the end of the day when you don't respond to the call, when your inner soul whispers to you, hey, this is what you could do right now. And again, not just creatively, but let's step back and apply it to our lives. When you can eat a certain way or move your body a certain way, or meditate or go to bed at a certain time and get up when you know you want to get up. Each of those is a microhero's journey. You're stepping forward into growth or back into safety. We want to spiral up rather than spiral down. Answer the call like Jay Z 10,000 times in your studio today. And then our fifth big idea is Ready or not. Steven tells us you're called Ready or not. You're called. And this impulse to express the best within you, he says it's more alive within you than your own blood. That's how real this is. And you can dismiss it. You can say, ah, this isn't true. You can outwardly actually reject. It doesn't matter, it's still there. That impulse is still going to beckon you. And another way I like to write it, just to make sure we have a ton of images going on here, is that pyramid. So it's Maslow's hierarchy. Right? And this need to express yourself. Maslow called it self actualizing. Right. And you go beyond that to self transcending, where you're just committed to giving yourself to the world as an expressed, actualized human being. I like to think of that as soul oxygen. That's not a oh yeah, it'd be nice if I actualize my potential kind of thing. As I say all the time, it's a real fundamental need. So as Pressfield says, ready or not, you're called. The question is, what are you called to do? What are you going to make your life's work? Do the hard work, reduce the inputs, create the space such that your superconscious can come through. You can listen to your inner daimon and genius more consistently. Tap into that latent potential that exists within that acorn that is you. How do you do that? You show up consistently. Are you showing up? How can you show up a little more consistently and masterfully Check out optimizing algorithms. 101 habits 101 willpower 101. We talk about this all the time. And then remember Jay z and his 10,000 micro heroes journey. Remember, moment to moment to moment to moment to moment. You're making a choice. You're stepping forward, answering the call from the highest within you. Or not. Let's choose wisely today. Have fun on your artist's journey. Make today an awesome day. See you.

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