It is as important to decide when to abandon an innovative effort as it is to know which one to start. In fact, it may be more important. Successful laboratory directors know when to abandon a line of research which does not yield the expected results. The less successful ones keep hoping against hope, are dazzled by the “scientific challenge” of a project, or are fooled by the scientists’ repeated promise of a “breakthrough next year.” And the unsuccessful ones cannot abandon a project and cannot admit that what seemed like a good idea has turned into a waste of men, time, and money.

You abandon most readily those works that have no destination other than your own wishes; there is no editor or producer standing there waiting for them... I've told every young writer I know to do the job all the way through even if they think it's no good. Then they'll have the precedent of having finished work.

Don't throw good time after bad work.

It takes confidence to throw work away. You have to be able to think, there’s more where that came from.

Running a close second [as a writing lesson] was the realization that stopping a piece of work just because it's hard, either emotionally or imaginatively, is a bad idea. Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all you're managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position.

Sometime you can do everything right and still lose. It’s all a journey. You do your best, and then you have to let it go. Lots of people preach that, but come crunch time — oops, not so easy to do.

People automatically associate quitting with failure, but sometimes that's exactly what you should do. If you already spent too much time on something that wasn't worth it, walk away. You can't get that time back. The worst thing you can do now is waste even more time.

A long gestation period of intense thinking about the problem may result in a solution, or else the temporary abandonment of the problem. This temporary abandonment is a common feature of many great creative acts. The monomaniacal pursuit often does not work; the temporary dropping of the idea sometimes seems to be essential to let the subconscious find a new approach. Then comes the moment of “insight,” creativity, or whatever you want to call it — you see the solution. Of course, it often happens that you are wrong; a closer examination of the problem shows the solution is faulty, but might be saved by some suitable revision. But maybe the problem needs to be altered to fit the solution! That has happened! More usually it is back to the drawing board, as they say, more mulling things over. The false starts and false solutions often sharpen the next approach you try. You now know how not to do it! You have a smaller number of approaches left to explore. You have a better idea of what will not work and possibly why it will not work.

Abandon” is a good word to describe what happens to a tennis player who feels he has nothing to lose. He stops caring about the outcome and plays all out. It is a letting go of the concerns of Self 1 and letting in of the natural concerns of a deeper and truer self.

No matter what the work you are doing, be always ready to drop it. And plan it, so as to be able to leave it.

Making mistakes is inevitable: no one is perfect. You will make a few decisions that, in retrospect, you’ll wish you hadn’t — count on it. If you could turn back time, you’d try a different approach, but you can’t. There will always be other projects, provided you don’t double down on a risky project to recover your losses. Throwing good money after bad is not a winning strategy.

If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?

Sometimes, there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day.

When you get rid of old material, you push yourself further and come up with something better. When you throw out old work, what you're really doing is making room for new work.