In his 112-page manifesto titled Do the Work, Steven Pressfield writes “when an idea pops into our head and we think, ‘No, this is too crazy,’… that’s the idea we want.”
A perfectly reasonable person might ask the perfectly reasonable question: “why on Earth would someone pursue an idea so crazy that most people wouldn’t bother giving it the time of day?”
Rory Sutherland, who serves as Vice Chairman and head of the behavioral sciences group at Ogilvy, writes the perfect response in his book Alchemy: “the fatal issue is that logic always gets you to exactly the same place as your competitors. Our mantra [at Ogilvy] is, ‘Test counterintuitive things because no one else ever does.”
To be the same, do the thing that everyone will.
To be different, be willing to try the thing that excites you that no one will.
Interesting that you're citing
I still can't seem to get through War of Art -- not sure why I'm fine with Do the Work haha.