Do the Work 

Steven Pressfield & Seth Godin 

Book Overview from the Publisher 

"There  is  an  enemy.  There  is  an  intelligent,  active,  malign  force  working  against  us.  Step  one  is  to 
recognize  this.  This  recognition  alone  is  enormously  powerful.  It  saved  my  life,  and it will save yours." -- 
Steven Pressfield.  
 
Could  you  be  getting  in  your  way  of  producing  great  work?  Have  you  started  a  project  but  never 
finished?  Would  you  like  to  do  work  that  matters,  but  don't  know  where  to  start?  The  answer is Do the 
Work,  a  manifesto  by  bestselling  author  Steven  Pressfield,  that  will  show  you  that  it's  not  about  better 
ideas, it's about actually doing the work.  
 
Do  the  Work  is  a  weapon  against  Resistance  -  a tool that will help you take action and successfully ship 
projects  out  the  door.  Picking  up  where  The  War  of  Art  and Turning Pro left off, Do The Work takes the 
reader  from  the  start  to  the  finish  of  any  long-form  project—novel,  screenplay,  album,  software  piece, 
you name it.  
 
Do  The  Work  identifies  the  predictable  Resistance  Points  along  the  way  and walks you through each of 
them.  No,  you  are  not crazy. No, you are not alone. No, you are not the first person to "hit the wall" in Act 
Two.  Do  The  Work  charts  the  territory.  It's  the  stage-by-stage  road  map  for  taking  your  project  from 
Page One to THE END. 

KEY POINTS COVERED IN THIS SUMMARY: 

1. Resistance -​ The nature of resistance and how it’s preventing us 
from doing our work 
2. Beginning -​ We have to stop doing this thing that’s stopping us 
from beginning our work 
3. Middle -​ How to keep moving forward and making progress amid 
the presence of resistance 
4. Ending -​ Ship your work 
5. Your #1 Ally -​ Find out if it’s your brain or your heart 
6. Start Before You Are Ready ​- Resistance grows with time, so find 
out what you can do 

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1) Resistance 
 
Have  you  noticed  that  when  you  are  going  after  your  biggest  dreams  or  your  biggest 
challenges  or  when  you're  living  on  purpose  or  when  you're  trying  to  live  your  true  calling  or 
when  you're  doing  something  really  important  --  you  find  that  there's  a  critic  inside  of  you 
that's constantly trying to tell you...  
- You're not good enough 
- Who are you to do that? 
- You can't do it.  
- You will fail.  
 
And is it really your true voice?  
 
No, it's not, because it is the part inside of you that is the r​ esistance​.  
 
- Resistance is here to take you down.  
- Resistance is here to stop you.  
- Resistance  is  here  to  say  you  can't  do  it,  you  can't  accomplish  your  dreams,  you  can't 
live  your  purpose,  you  can't  follow  your  true  calling,  you  can't  do  the  most  important 
thing.  
 
Resistance is like clockwork. It will be there every moment.  
 
It's our job to take the fight to resistance. We are in a battle against resistance.  
 
We  have  to  fight  this  ugly  beast  of  resistance  every  single  day  because  it  shows  up  like 
clockwork -- every morning it's there.  
 
Resistance  will  be  there  with  you  for  the  rest  of  your  life  no  matter  who  you  are,  how  old  you 
are, no matter how much you've grown, no matter how far you have come.  
 
EXAMPLE: Henry Fonda  
Henry  Fonda  used  to  throw  up  right  before  going  to  the  stage. Even at the age of 75, when he 
had  accomplished  lots  of  things  and  was  adored  by  millions,  he  was  still  throwing  up because 
the resistance was showing up 
 
But  Henry  Fonda  was  slaying  the resistance. He was killing the beast of resistance every single 
day with every single performance he was doing that.  
 

www.2000books.com 
So  don't  let  resistance  steal  your  dreams  or  to  make you walk away from your calling, from the 
most  important  thing.  We  have  to  fight  and  kill  resistance  every  single  day.  That's  the  key  to 
being able to move forward in our life no matter what. 
 

2) Beginning 
 
When  you  embark  on  doing  something  great  or  the  work  that  you  need  to  do,  there  is  a 
beginning, a middle, and an end.  
 
In  the  beginning,  one  thing  that's  going  to  stop  you  the  most  is  ​research.  ​This  is  the  idea  that 
you need to figure out everything before you get started, before you get going.  
 
The  key:  We  must  ​start  acting  before  we  even  think  we're  ready  to  move  forward,  rather 
than to keep on researching. 
 
Research  is  a  form  of  resistance.  It’ll  stop  us  from  taking  any  action.  So  we  have  to  stop 
research and instead attack and take action. 
  
When  we  start  moving  forward,  what  we'll  find  is  there  will  be  heartaches,  challenges,  and 
pain. 
 
But  we  have  to  get  comfortable  with  the  challenge,  with  the  pain,  with  the  problems  that  are 
coming our way. That's the only way anything great is started.  
 
We can't be playing small when we are going after our great work. 
 
We have to go for the home runs. We have to hit big. 
 
In  the  process,  we  will  fail  a  lot.  But  we  must continue to push the boundary and go for the big 
hits rather than play small.  
 
Playing  small  can  become  a  habit  and  we  get  stuck  in  that  process.  So  in  the  beginning  we 
must go right away for the big hits. Go for the big ones.  
 
Another  problem  in  the  beginning  is  that  when  you  are  moving  forward,  there'll  be  all  sorts  of 
resistance from other people 
- People will say: Don't do it 
- People will ask: What if you fail?  
- Your family and friends probably won’t support you.  
- Some of them will try to cut you down.  

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In  Australia  there  is  this  thing  called  the  ​tall  poppy  syndrome  which  means  that  in  a  poppy 
field,  it's  the tallest poppies that get cut. If you are going to be a tall poppy, then you will get cut 
down  by  other people. ​When you are going after your greatness, you will be someone who is 
like a tall poppy and people will try to stop you.  
 
People  will  try  to  cut  you  down.  They  will  tell  you  “what  if  you  fail?  They'll  tell you not to work 
on this thing that you think might be your calling.  
 
But  you  have  to  push  through  that  boundary.  You  have  to  go  forward.  You  will  see  these 
problems,  you  will  see  these  challenges,  but  you  have  to  push  on.  You  must  begin.  That's  the 
only way forward.  
 

3) Middle 
A  lot  of  the  times,  we  get  complacent  because  we  think  we've  beaten  resistance and we think 
we can move forward, but the truth is: 
 
Resistance never stops.​ It's always on. It's always there. It's just waiting. It's lurking. 
 
We  have  to  realize  we  will  never  be  free  of  resistance.  We  have to constantly slay that demon 
of resistance every moment because it’s always there. 
 
We  also  have  to  understand that in the middle, we might feel like our work is not good enough. 
It's  imperfect.  It  might  not  be  good enough for you to feel like you want to show it to the world. 
But we have to act.  
 
We  have  to  continue  to  produce  and  reflect  later  on  that  work  rather  than  let  reflection  get  in 
the way of action.  
 
We  have  to  have  a  bias  towards  action  and  towards  production.  We  just have to just get stuff 
done  no  matter  how  imperfect  it  feels  ….no  matter  how  bad  it  feels….  no  matter  how  bad  it 
looks to you. 
 
If you continue to reflect while you're doing the work, you will not be able to make progress.  
 
The thing that will always kill resistance: m ​ omentum 
 
Waiting around and not doing stuff will actually grow resistance.  
 

www.2000books.com 
Momentum  is  the  answer  every  single  time.  No  matter  where  we  are,  if  we  take  action,  if  we 
start  producing  and  if  we  don't  let  reflection  get  in  the  way  of  doing  things,  then  we  can 
continue to produce great work.  
 
Another  interesting  thing  about  the  middle  is  that  there  will  be  a  crash.  You  will  find that after 
you have moved up for a while -- 
- you will come crashing down  
- there will be failure 
- there will be heartache 
- there'll be challenges  
- you might feel like you are a failure 
 
But  you  have  to  realize it's not about you. It's not about your personal self but instead it's about 
the endeavor you are going after. Don't take it personally.  
 
There  will  be  a  crash,  there  will  be  failures.  But  we  as  people  who  are  going  after  great  work, 
have to grow in this. We have to get bigger in this process. That's the key.  
 
Growth i​ s what is important when we are faced with these crashes and failures.  
 
In  the  book  ​Obstacle  is  the  Way,  Ryan  Holiday  talks  about  the  fact  that  ​any  obstacle  that 
comes our way is actually the way forward.  
 
A crash is your opportunity to grow and to go faster and to do your great work. 
 
The  crash  that  might've  happened  is  the  way  forward.  It's  helping you rather than hurting you. 
You just need to find how it has helped you. 
 

5) Ending 
In the end -- 
● We have to close. 
● we have to ask for the sale.  
● We have to ship the product.  
● We have to get out our work to the world.  
● We must develop our killer instinct to go after what is important and not wait.  
● We can not dilly-dally at this point.  
 
What happens very often is we fail at that  
● People don't buy.  
● People don't like what you share. 

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 ● You feel like you've been rejected by the world. 
● There'll be people who will make fun of you.  
● You feel humiliated. 
 
But  that's  part  of  becoming  a  pro  -- because you knew that you could fail. You knew there was 
no guarantee of success, but you did it anyways. You are a pro.  
 
Now  you  can  keep  on  doing  it. Now you can keep on improving it and keep on getting better at 
it. 
 
The  key  is  to  ship  it  and  to  get  the  product  out  of  the door and to sell whatever it is that needs 
to  be  sold  and  to  close  the  deal  well  and  to  produce  no  matter  what  and  to  get  it  out  into  the 
world.  
 
You will do this no matter the chances of failure. You will continue to get better.  
 
So become a professional when it comes to doing the work. Ship it. 
 

6) Your #1 Ally 
 
Your  #1  ally  in  this  game of achieving greatness and trying to do your greatest work is not your 
brain.  Your  logic  tells  you  it's  going  to  be  hard,  it's  going  to  be  challenging,  it's  not going to be 
possible.  
 
Your  #1  ally  is  your  heart.  It’s  your  heart  that’s  saying  anything  is  possible.  It's  your  heart  that 
says  you  can  do  it,  no  matter  how  hard  it's  going  to  be.  Your  heart  says  that  even  though  it's 
not  feasible  right  now,  we're  still  going  to  go  after  the  dream  and  we'll  do  the  work  because 
greatness is calling us.  
 
Even  though  the  brain  or every piece of logic might say that it's not possible, the hearts says go 
after it. You can make it. You can make it possible.  
 
So  you  have  to  listen  to  your heart. You are to follow your heart and not wait for your brain and 
your instincts and your logic to stop you. That's the key. 
 

7) Start Before You Are Ready 

 

www.2000books.com 
One  of  the  fundamentals  of  being  able  to  beat  resistance  and  do  your  highest  quality  work  is 
this idea:  
 
Your most important work is to start before you are ready, 
 
What that means is the resistance will always be there.  
 
It'll always tell you  
● you are not yet ready  
● you should wait 
● you should do all these things first 
● you should take this checklist 
● you should read this 
 
All of these will keep on preventing you from moving forward.  
 
But the key for us to beat resistance is to realize that r​ esistance only grows with time.  
 
The more time we give to resistance, the larger it's going to get.  
 
Therefore,  we  have  to  cut  the  resistance  ASAP  because  once  we  give  it  too  much  time  for 
waiting, for preparation it becomes too big.  
 
We've got to start killing the resistance as soon as we see it.  
 
We  can't  wait.  We  have  to  do  it  even  before  we  are  ready.  We  just  have  to  take  action  no 
matter what. 
 
There  is  a  story  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte  when  he  was  in  war.  One  of  the  generals  came  up  to 
him  during  a  battle  and  said,  “Sir,  the  conditions  are  not  right,  so  we  should  not  attack.  We 
should delay our attack.”  
 
Napoleon  got  furious  and  said,  “Attack.  I  say  attack  right  now.  I will not wait for circumstances 
because I make the circumstances.”  
 
So go and attack.  
 
That's  all  that  matters  and  that's  what  we  need  to  do  as  people  who  are  trying  to  accomplish 
great  things.  We  have  to  start  before  we're  ready  because  the  monster  of  resistance  is 
constantly  getting  bigger  every moment. We cannot wait for that monster to get so big that we 
basically cannot do anything at the time. 
 
 

www.2000books.com