The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.
Interpretation
Fear can indicate the importance of a task, suggesting we should confront it.
This quote by Steven Pressfield highlights the idea that fear often accompanies significant challenges or callings in our lives. Instead of avoiding what scares us, we should recognize fear as a signpost directing us toward the work we are meant to undertake, encouraging personal growth and fulfillment through facing our anxieties.
In practice
This quote can inspire students to tackle challenging subjects they dread.
Late at night have you experienced a vision of the person you might become, the work you could accomplish, the realized being you were meant to be? Are you a writer who doesn't write, a painter who doesn't paint, an entrepreneur who never starts a venture? Then you know what Resistance is.
It is one thing to study war and another to live the warrior's life.
The amateur believes he must first overcome his fear; then he can do his work. The professional knows that fear can never be overcome. He knows there is no such thing as a fearless warrior or a dread-free artist.
When we sit down day after day and keep grinding, something mysterious starts to happen... Unseen forces enlist in our cause; serendipity reinforces our purpose.
You know, Hitler wanted to be an artist. At eighteen he took his inheritance, seven hundred kronen, and moved to Vienna to live and study... Ever see one of his paintings? Neither have I. Resistance beat him. Call it overstatement but I'll say it anyway: it was easier for Hitler to start World War II than it was for him to face a blank square of canvas.
Itβs better to be in the arena, getting stomped by the bull, than to be up in the stands or out in the parking lot.
We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.
If you hold your fire until you see the whites of his eyes, you will never know what hit you.
So long as our Corps fields such Marines, America has nothing to fear from tyrants, be they Fascists, Communists or Tyrants with Medieval Ideology. For we serve in a Corps with no institutional confusion about our purpose: To fight! To fight well!
There's not an American in this country free until every one of us is free.
I've been through everything. I always said I was like those round-bottomed circus dolls β you know, those dolls you could push down and they'd come back up? I've always been like that. I've always said, No matter what happens, if I get pushed down, I'm going to come right back up.
The experienced mountain climber is not intimidated by a mountain - he is inspired by it.
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