A Quote by Bill Bryson

The basic challenge of any book is you know you're going to be working on it for three or four years or more. So you want to have a subject that will keep you engaged. — © Bill Bryson
The basic challenge of any book is you know you're going to be working on it for three or four years or more. So you want to have a subject that will keep you engaged.
Every three or four years I pick a new subject. It may be Japanese art; it may be economics. Three years of study are by no means enough to master a subject but they are enough to understand it. SO for more than 60 years I have kept studying one subject at a time.
The challenge CEOs will face three to five years from now is the same one that they face today. That is engagement. It's hard to keep people engaged in what they are doing. As this generation grows up around social media like Twitter where things are 140 characters, how do you keep them engaged all hours every day at work? How do you keep them focused on the big goals you have?
I feel like I'm one of the many working mothers. And I only have one child. I know working mums who have three or four. It's definitely a challenge but it's a wonderful challenge to be able to do both.
Now, everybody knows the basic erogenous zones. You got one, two, three, four, five, six, and seven. ... OK, now most guys will hit one, two, three and then go to seven and set up camp. ... You want to hit 'em all and you wanna mix 'em up. You gotta keep 'em on their toes. ... You could start out with a little one. A two. A one, two, three. A three. A five. A four. A three, two. Two. A two, four, six. Two, four, six. Four. Two. Two. Four, seven! Five, seven! Six, seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! [holds up seven fingers]
I have this system where if I buy three or four new things, I give away three or four things. Sometimes, it's a very painful system, but shopping is even better when you know that someone else who needs it will be getting. Keep the clothing karma going, I say.
When I want to tackle a story or a subject, I always ask myself three questions: Is it important to talk about that? Will it interest other people than just me? Can I live with that for three or four years because that's how long it takes to do the project, to write the script, and to direct it, and then to do this.
Rio in four years; I've got more inspiration in the last two, three weeks. I'm sure I'm going to get more in the Paralympics in the next coming weeks, so by the end of this season, I'm going to take a month off, and then the next four years is going to be good.
You have to stand every day three or four hours of visitors. Nine-tenths of them want something they ought not to have. If you keep dead-still they will run down in three or four minutes. If you even cough or smile they will start up all over again.
We have to know what is Buddhadharma and what is not Buddhadharma. It needn't go on forever. You don't have to spend 18 years at it. But still, a basic and uncompromised understanding of Buddhist principles is important. Very basic: the three signs of being, the four noble rruths, karma, and so on.
I still want to make more plays, but you know it's going to come. You gotta keep playing, playing hard, continue to study, continue to get myself better, working on my technique, and it will come. Just gotta keep working.
I don't know what's going to happen. I'm flavor of the month at the moment, but somebody else is going to roll around the corner in three months' time. I just want to keep working. I can't stop!
When I'm plotting out a book, I use a storyboard - I'll have maybe three lines across on the storyboard and just start working through the plot line. I always know where relationships will go and how the book is going to end.
What I do is work for three or four years and then I take a year off, and then I come back again and work for three or four years and then take another year off. It is not about just working and then writing for a year. That is not how it is structured. It is about doing very conscious goal-driven activities for four years and then taking a year off in complete surrender to discover facets of myself that I don't know exist and exploring interests with no commercial value associated with them at all.
There was no way I was going back to school to study anything for another three or four years. I was done with that. So I tried working on other people's projects, but didn't find any where I felt I could learn what I needed to learn.
I lived for four years in the 1930s with these individuals and the only time that I wasn't thinking about dealing with physical suffering is when I was working on this book. I've never been more alive as when I worked on this book.
One of the problems with industrialism is that it's based on the premise of more and more. It has to keep expanding to keep going. More and more television sets. More and more cars. More and more steel, and more and more pollution. We don't question whether we need any more or what we'll do with them. We just have to keep on making more and more if we are to keep going. Sooner or later it's going to collapse. ... Look what we have done already with the principle of more and more when it comes to nuclear weapons.
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