hurts. Breaking the shackles and stretching beyond our own perceived limits takes hard fucking work — oftentimes physical work — and when you put yourself on the line, self doubt and pain will greet you with a stinging combination that will buckle your knees.

...the imagination is unleashed by constraints. You break out of the box by stepping into shackles.

it is hard work to open yourself up to release your burdens like removing thorns from your body, it may hurt at first, but it is ultimately for your highest good

It takes courage to push yourself to places you have never been before... to test yout limits... to break through barriers. And the day came when the risk it took to stay tight inside the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossum.

You break out of the box by stepping into shackles.
From Imagine: How Creativity Works pg 23 (hardcover)

Working with pain and the body to the limit, living with wounds and a mental illness, sleeping awake invaded by night terrors, all this entails a spirit of resistance.

The ties that bind us to life are tougher than you imagine, or than any one can who has not felt how roughly they may be pulled without breaking.

Get out there and expose yourself. Open yourself up and find what makes you happy. Yes, that will mean you’ll probably get hurt. But so what? The best things in life don’t come easily.

Keep stretching beyond the comfort zone.

There is no veil of ease about the extraordinary effort required to be free. Breaking from conformity and pursuing our own dreams will bring some discord upon us. There will be personal struggle and sacrifice, fear and misfortune, as we try to exert ourselves in the world once more. A vital dedication to our genuine nature and our dreams will annoy people or raise their ire; it will injure egos, step on toes, split relationships, and force interventions with those who try to limit us or stop our march. We might have to confront the bullies, break up with the jerks, leave the poisonous work environment, and challenge others to higher standards.

You are hurt the moment you believe yourself to be.

It takes great strength to be vulnerable enough to put your ass on the line, in public, and work toward a dream that feels like it’s slipping away.

Sometimes it hurts the most to be who you are

There can be danger in stretching the body if it’s not done properly. The same is true with the imagination and the chemistry which may give the imagination elasticity, but the soul gives a direction.