He uses an analogy of a rice paddy, or rice farmers, specificially. They spend 3,000 hours a year working! They care about the work; they cultivate the fields, and growing rice is almost an art form. Here's his point:
Bill Gates was addicted to his computer as a child...The Beatles put in thousands of hours of practice in Hamburg...Working really hard is what successful people do, and the genius of the culture formed in the rice paddies is that hard work gave those in the fields a way to find meaning in the midst of great uncertainty and poverty.
Success is less about talent than it is about opportunity, preserverence and good ole' fashioned hard work. So what does this have to do with a writing life? Everything. We have to be willing to get up at 4:30 in the morning and tap away on the computer, to write and revise and revise again. We enter into a contract of sorts with ourselves, knowing that if we work x-amount of hours more at Activity A, we'll be x-percentage better than we were a year before.
Saying that, here's the kicker and a point he makes in the book: Even the grounds is fallow for a season. You've got principles to live by, maybe even a personal mission statement. Make writing a part of your life, not your life. It may take you longer to reach the 10,000 hour plateau, but sacrificing family, faith, community, etc. will hurt in the long run because your life will be out of balance.
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