How an Artist is Like an Athlete by Nadia Shahbaz
After leaving the corporate world and embarking on a creative journey, two things have become evident—and unexpectedly so.
One, creative writing is a process of discovery.
C.S Lewis famously said, “I do not sit down at my desk to put into verse something that is already clear in my mind. If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it. We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.” I’ve found any writing of mine that’s been published or nominated for an award has come after months, if not years, of digging, crossing out, revising, and often, if I’m being honest, giving up on it and then, slowly coming back to it with a looser definition of what it needs to be.
On this discovery path, it’s also become clear that writing is sport-like.
Traditionally, we assume artists and athletes are a different breed of people. One airy-fairy, the other dogged and competitive. I think this is a misconception and a harmful one. If we really think about artists and athletes, the similarities are uncanny.
Artists & athletes are both:
Obsessed by their craft
Driven to push past a limited way of seeing and being, which, Dr. Tomi Wahlström says, “helps humans evolve, physically and psychologically”
Intrinsically motivated. They must possess an inner drive to begin, continue, and persevere when success and financial gain are rare and usually small
Willing to see their own limitations and try new things to expand their capabilities. They pursue self-awareness work to move through this (more on this below).
Comfortable with discomfort, or some might say….suffering :)
ATHLETES HAVE COACHES, ARTISTS ARE BEGINNING TO
I once had a wonderful writing coach. You may not be surprised to learn it was Chelene Knight (a creative balance writing coach) ☺.
Every week for six months, Chelene held me accountable to my goals, helped me pinpoint where I was getting stuck, and provided techniques to keep me positive and on task. It was a game-changer for a creative project that has been anything but linear and short.
I’m in year seven of working on my novel. In that time, there have been days where I’ve felt possessed by magic and others where the self-doubt has been crippling. Three years ago, after an author and agent assessed my novel, I realized I needed to write a different story, which was both devastating and liberating. Many authors I admire speak of these twists and turns that define the creative process. Min Jin Lee shared that it took her 30 years to write the award-winning novel Pachinko. Anthony Doerr wrote the brilliant All the Light We Cannot See in 10 years.
But how did Min Jin and Anthony keep going as the years of failure and uncertainty dragged on? How do artists and athletes maintain a passionate devotion and exhaustive commitment that flies in the face of a culture pressing the individual to be efficient, and focused on achieving financial gain and upward mobility?
At the moment, I’m in a self-doubt period with my story and process. My obsession feels more foolish than bold.
THE ENDURANCE MINDSET
Thinking about athletics and art as close siblings is helping, and so too are the words of Chelene, who made clear that writing a novel was an endurance sport. She added that, while the craft of writing will get easier with time, the mindset part will get harder. To press on, she said, one has to set boundaries, be transparent, and constantly evaluate what’s working and what’s holding you back.
In other words, going the distance and keeping in the game of any creative project requires constant “resets” of the mind, wherein (hopefully) honest and loving conversations of the self occur to notice tendencies and where it’s necessary to subtract something you’ve outgrown while on the journey.
But it’s a war, says Stephen Pressfield in his famous book The War of Art. What is holding you back is called Resistance, he says, and you have to face that dragon head-on to move forward.
Have I done that? Have I slayed my dragons? Some, yes. Some, I’m still unaware of. And some have recently entered into my consciousness and I’m in that fight.
What does that look like?
It’s not sexy, it’s not glamorous but it changes you. A certain level of self-doubt falls away, Pressfield points out. And it’s true. Of course, you/I have to do the grueling work, and it’s 2-fold, I think.
There’s the mindset (emotional) work, that helps you move more easily through the Resistance, which likes to tell you you’re not capable, you’ll face humiliation, disappointment, etc.
And then there’s the physical component, that’s all about grinding it out, day after day, like an athlete. In Pressfield’s interview with ultra-athlete and podcaster Rich Roll earlier this year, they discussed how creative ideas often draw us closer to our authentic selves. Pressfield likes to think of this energy as an underground river running through us. It’s mystical, it’s cosmic, but you cannot get into that river through mystical means. To flow in this river you have to “bust your ass”, day after day, in obscurity, with dogged consistency…just like an athlete.
Thinking this way is helping me. The process doesn’t feel complex or beyond me. It’s simple, it’s human, it’s collective. Though I will say, I do still like to picture the artist as the unveiler of mystical truths with disheveled hair and no sense of time or order—and perhaps both things can be true.
Nadia Shahbaz is a writer of Afghan and Italian heritage. Her work has been published in a variety of magazines, nominated for a Pushcart Prize and illuminated on buildings in New York City. She is currently working on a novel on her Sicilian family’s fascist past. She also runs a community writing studio. Find nuggets of momentum that keep her and others writing and making art at her newsletter The Dormer Window on Substack. You can also find her on Instagram @nadiashahbaz_writer.