It is important to talk about your writing. Since I have returned to my dissertation writing this year, I still long for the novel whose research started it all. I started talking about the story, how it informed my dissertation writing process and vice versa. I did volunteer work in the setting of the novel and it changed me in unexpected ways--the reason there's a PhD in the works, not an MFA...

And in both writing processes, feedback I have received from committee members and friends: calm down. I am passionate about my work; making it matter and the life of those in the story. But I need to let the pages breathe, explain why they're important. I need to give them the room necessary to grow and, in the case of the fiction, interweave the connections in a manner that makes one out of many. The calm in fiction is not the calm in dissertating. In the contrast, being calm and building the bridge between both strengthens them. Even if it means taking a break from both at the same time to look at the world around me; listen to other stories. There are quiet lessons there too.