Steven Pressfield Quotes

I wake up sometimes with an idea and then I write it down. It's not necessarily easy, but when you focus on something it comes.

Weirdly, often the more I write, the more ideas I have.

I try to stay focused on my creativity.

Most people have their best ideas when they take their minds away from problems they're trying to solve.

You don't disrupt genius at work.

I'll stop when I run out of ideas.

Never listen to music when you're trying go come up with a Big Idea.

I can't really say - if I've run out of ideas until I've had my next set of ideas.

My way of working was different years ago. I used to wait until an idea came to me. Now I go half-way to meet it, though I don't know whether I find it any the quicker.

[...] beer results in ideas, which results in new code.

When we sit down each day and do our work, power concentrates around us... Ideas come. Insights accrete.

You can't have good ideas unless you have lots of ideas.

Don't stop. Narrow your focus to one idea, and make it work. That will give birth to all of the others. All you can do is plant the seed and water it.

All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself. Things occur to you.If you're sitting around trying to dream up a great idea, you can sit there a long time before anything happens.But if you just get to work, something will occur to you and something else will occur to you and something else that you reject will push you in another direction.

I write about two hours a day, and I write in fits and spurts - 45 minutes here, a half-hour there - and when I get stuck, which happens often, I take the dogs for a walk. But during the time when I'm not actually writing, I'm thinking.

I wish somebody had given me the news that ideas don't just fall on your head like fairy dust. You have to treat that like a job. You have to spend hours each day, where you're just like, 'This is the part of the day when I'm looking for an idea.'

I often find that having an idea in my head prevents me from doing something else. Working is therefore a way of getting rid of an idea.

When the ideas are coming, I don't stop until the ideas stop because that train doesn't come along all the time.

Sometimes I write with music on, and if I'm in a good flow, I don't even hear it.

Night time really is the best time to work. All the ideas are there to be yours because everyone is asleep.

Ideas aren't magical; the only tricky part is holding on to one long enough to get it written down.

Many of the cognitive enhancement drugs serve to increase focus and concentration. But 'letting your mind wander' is very often an important part of the creative process.

Inspiration is some mysterious blessing which happens when the wheels are turning smoothly.

If I were to try and find a unifying emotion that kept me calm and focused while I was dancing or writing or solving a math problem, I think the one unifying thing about all those that keeps my interest is creativity.