Steven Pressfield quotes - page 3

The greatest commanders never issue orders. Rather, they compel by their own acts and virtue the emulation of those they command. The great champions throw leadership back on you. They make you answer: Who am I? What do I seek? What is the meaning of my existence in this life? (Steven Pressfield)
I approve of all you say, gentlemen. The fleet's needs are many and urgent. One, however, must take precedence. This item the men need before all, and we must get it for them without fail and without deferral. We must get the men a victory. View quote
Steven Pressfield
I could be counted upon to perform the mission they had assigned me, or, if that was unworkable, to improvise and turn my men's exertions upon a secondary undertaking as good as or better than the first. View quote
Steven Pressfield
A youth loathes nothing more than his own callowness. Experience is his object. Experience, however ghastly, for the lad longs before all for the lined face and the chiseled squint of the vetern. View quote
Steven Pressfield
At Athens and Athens alone, a new stamp of person was being born, neither baron nor yeoman, but a man of the city. A citizen. View quote
Steven Pressfield
One act I will never stand for is leaving our fellows behind. Bugger military protocol, or lofty notions of honour. I can't live with running out on a pal, and I won't let any of you do it either. View quote
Steven Pressfield
Why have I nominated you, lady, to bear up beneath this most terrible of trials, you and your sisters of the Three Hundred? Because you can. View quote
Steven Pressfield
These are armed enemy, who have hastened to this site with one object only: to take the lives of my comanions and me. I must take theirs first. No truth could be plainer. Yet at the same time nothing can alter the fact that beneath the fascist insignia of their uniforms, these men are fathers, husbands, sons. View quote
Steven Pressfield
This aspis was my father's and his father's before him. I have sworn before God to die before another man took this from my hand. He crossed to the ranks of Thespians, to a man, an obscure warrior among them. Into the fellow's grasp he placed the shield. View quote
Steven Pressfield
If you think this is funny, wait 'till you get into combat. You'll think that's hysterical! View quote
Steven Pressfield
There is something I must tell you. When Leonidas selected you for the Three Hundred, I went to him in private and argued strenuously against your inclusion. I thought you would not fight. [...] I was wrong. (Steven Pressfield)
Bear your command with humility. Lead, do not condescend. Remember, these are great events and men will rise to them. Treat every man as a Soldier. He may surprise you and be one. View quote
Steven Pressfield
I have always found the spear to be a rather inelegant weapon. View quote
Steven Pressfield
I love a guy who knows how to bitch. Any moron can gripe about chow or rotations, but someone who can get exercised over architecture is my kind of dude. View quote
Steven Pressfield
I had always wondered what it felt like to die. View quote
Steven Pressfield
The more important a call to action is to our soul's evolution, the more Resistance we will feel about answering it. But to yield to Resistance deforms our spirit. It stunts us and makes us less than we are and were born to be. View quote
Steven Pressfield
The amateur tweets. The pro works. View quote
Steven Pressfield
No industry is immune and no occupation is safe. All of us need to begin to think in terms of our own inner strengths, our resilience and resourcefulness, our capacity to adapt and to rely upon ourselves and our families. View quote
Steven Pressfield
I wrote in the 'War of Art' that I could divide my life neatly into two parts: before turning pro and after. After is better. View quote
Steven Pressfield
It is a terrible thing to be a king, especially a great one, for one must serve ideals of the spirit at the price of lovers of flesh and blood. Who profits from a king's fidelity save generations a thousand years unborn, and which of his works will they recall at that remove, or care? View quote
Steven Pressfield
Nothing relieves Irish despair. The Irishman's complaint lies not with his circumstance, which might be rendered brilliant by labour or luck, but with injustice of existence itself. Death! How could a benevolent Deity gift us with life, only to set such a cruel term upon it? Irish despair knows no remedy. Love fades; fame is fleeting. The only cures are booze and sentiment. That's why the Irish are such noble drunks and glorious poets. No one sings like the Irish or mourns like them. Why? Because they're angels imprisoned in vessels of flesh. (Steven Pressfield)
You English are loath to embrace the virtues of the warrior. Such an act embarrasses you. You prefer to see yourselves as civilians summoned reluctantly to arms, as-what is the word?-'amatuers.' But you are warriors, you English. You are, Chapman. Trust me, who has faced you in the field. View quote
Steven Pressfield
In the end the American dream boils down to what? I'm getting mine and to hell with you. View quote
Steven Pressfield
Don't cheat the world of your contribution. Give it what you've got. View quote
Steven Pressfield
Research can become Resistance. We want to work, not prepare to work. View quote
Steven Pressfield