“To write something you have to risk making a fool of yourself.”

Dogs
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part XIV - Higgledy-Piggledy

The New York Times interview (1994)

The Successful Woman : How You Can Have a Career, a Husband, and a Family — and Not Feel Guilty About It (1988), p. 18
Context: Don’t fool yourself that you are going to have it all. You are not. Psychologically, having it all is not even a valid concept. The marvelous thing about human beings is that we are perpetually reaching for the stars. The more we have, the more we want. And for this reason, we never have it all.

Variant: Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself

Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

Source: The Rise of the Hotel Dumort

Vorkosigan Saga, Cetaganda (1996)