The Nightly News by Jonathan Hickman is my favorite comic series; I have a hardcover collecting all six issues. For some reason, though, I never managed to see this bit in the back until my last read-through; it seemed like it might fit here, so I reproduce it in its entirety for you.

Personal Committment:

It was October 2nd, 2004. I was sitting alone, bawling my eyes out, in a little Greek restaurant about half a block from the hotel where I was attending a Robert McKee seminar. I was reading Steven Pressfield’s book, THE WAR OF ART.

It’s a book about overcoming obstacles that stand in the way of creative undertakings. It’s about realizing the only thing preventing you from succeeding is yourself. It’s about becoming the person you are meant to be.

Here’s an excerpt:

“We don’t even know what hit us. I never did. From age twenty-four to thirty-two, Resistance kicked my ass from East Coast to West Coast and back thirteen times and I never knew it existed. I looked everywhere for the enemy and failed to see it right in front of my face.”

From twenty-four to thirty-two… I was that guy.

Pressfield uses the word resistance to identify that thing within every creative person that keeps us from actually creating: Doubt, procrastination, fear, etc.

You know what I’m talking about.

A couple months earlier I’d decided to try and make a go of making comics, but it was that night I stopped being a dabbler and became a creator. I went back to my hotel, sat down and wrote myself a reminder. Now, I read it everyday before I start work:

I am my own Enemy, Resistance is my Nature.

I am aware of Resistance And it prevents me from achieving the life I am Meant To Have.

Resistance is Self-Generated, Self-Perpetuated. It Lies and Seduces. Its goal is my Utter Destruction. Every day is a battle for my soul.

This Moment, This Day, I change my life.

Help me to defeat myself, And realize fate.

Now, is all of this a little too spiritual? Is it too much new age, feel good, self-actualization?

Maybe, but am I committed?

Absolutely.