When I write, I feel like an optometrist, constantly flipping between lenses and asking, 'Is this better? Is this?' Slowly, the work comes into focus.
Interpretation
Writing is a process of refinement that requires careful adjustment and evaluation.
In this quote, Nell Scovell compares the act of writing to the work of an optometrist, suggesting that writers, like eye care professionals, must continually adjust and refine their work to find clarity and focus. The metaphor highlights the iterative process of writing, where constant testing and reassessment lead to the final polished piece, emphasizing patience and precision in creative endeavors.
In practice
In a writers' workshop to encourage a friend who is struggling with their draft.
I think, in all fields, there's this motherhood pay penalty where, the second you become a mother - and this is true whether you give birth or adopt - you're perceived to not be as committed to your job. Whereas men are perceived as breadwinners who now need more money and promotions because they're fathers.
If women who don't help women get a special circle in hell, I think women who do help women should get a special cloud in heaven.
There is a false modesty, which is vanity; a false glory, which is levity; a false grandeur, which is meanness; a false virtue, which is hypocrisy, and a false wisdom, which is prudery.
Anger is a signal that you're distracted by judgmental or punitive thinking, and that some precious need of yours is being ignored.
The philosophies of one age have become the absurdities of the next, and the foolishness of yesterday has become the wisdom of tomorrow.
I prayed for Faith, and thought that some day Faith would come down and strike me like lightning. But Faith did not seem to come. One day I read in the tenth chapter of Romans, 'Now Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God'. I had closed my Bible, and prayed for Faith. I now opened my Bible, and began to study, and Faith has been growing ever since.
Whoever resorts regularly to the lessons of Holy Scripture as an apt pupil will take the Savior into her group, and the children will perceive that He is present and that He assists in their work; thus, He will take possession of their souls.
Societies in decline have no use for visionaries.
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