Make sure your family and loved ones don’t interrupt you during your_x000D_ writing time. If you’re a lawyer or doctor, friends don’t just stop by the office to chat or interrupt you from your work. But for some reason, people think writing is different. It isn’t, and you need to make clear that this is sacred time.
Interpretation
Writing, like any profession, requires undisturbed time to be productive and should be respected as such.
In this quote, Douglas Preston emphasizes the importance of protecting one's writing time from interruptions, akin to how professions like law or medicine are respected. He argues that writing is a serious endeavor deserving of the same level of respect and focus, highlighting the need for boundaries to foster creativity and productivity.
In practice
In a writing workshop, I shared a quote by Douglas Preston to stress the importance of focused writing time.
A human being creates complexity by writing a novel on the surface of paper; a weather system creates complexity by writing waves on the surface of an ocean. What is the difference between the information carried in the words of a novel and the information carried on the waves of the sea? Listen, and the waves will speak, and someday, I tell you, you will write your thoughts on the surface of the sea.
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People had always vaguely mentioned that when you have children, how part of your life would stop. But they don't say that some other extraordinary part of your life opens up.
I’ve come to realize that being a mother makes me a better executive, because motherhood forces prioritization. Being a mom gives you so much more clarity on what is important.
My mother praised me when I did something good, and then the next moment, she would say, 'Don't float.' She put me in a balloon and then pricked it.
Parents aren’t the people you come from. They’re the people you want to be, when you grow up.
I now see that is a woman's God-given role to tend to the home and take care of the children: it's just that the entire planet is our home, and every child on it is one of our children.
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