In other words, any act that rejects immediate gratification in favor of long-term grown, health, or integrity. Or, expressed another way, any act that derives from our high nature instead of our lower. Any of these will elicit Resistance.

Don't wait for someone else to validate you. Validate yourself.

A writer writes with his genius; an artist paints with hers; everyone who creates operates from this sacramental center.

The essence of professionalism is the focus upon the work and its demands, while we are doing it, to the exclusion of all else.

It is a commonplace among artists and children at play that they're not aware of time or solitude while they're chasing their vision. The hours fly. The sculptress and the tree-climbing tyke both look up blinking when Mom calls, 'Suppertime!'

It's one thing to lie to ourselves. It's another thing to believe it.

The opposite of fear is love - love of the challenge, love of the work, the pure joyous passion to take a shot at our dream and see if we can pull it off.