“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
―
―
“You like someone who can't like you back because unrequited love can be survived in a way that once-requited love cannot. ”
― Will Grayson, Will Grayson
― Will Grayson, Will Grayson
“Life is made of so many partings welded together”
― Great Expectations
― Great Expectations
“But I could never have done it," he objected, "without everyone else's help."
"That may be true," said Reason gravely, "but you had the courage to try; and what you can do is often simply a matter of what you will do.”
― The Phantom Tollbooth
"That may be true," said Reason gravely, "but you had the courage to try; and what you can do is often simply a matter of what you will do.”
― The Phantom Tollbooth
“For you often learn more by being wrong for the right reasons than you do by being right for the wrong reasons.”
― The Phantom Tollbooth
― The Phantom Tollbooth
Chantal’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Chantal’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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