As we've mentioned before, quitting is great when you can do it quickly, and if you know when to do it you'll save yourself from wasting time. That said—sometimes it's less about quitting a project entirely, and more about knowing when to step away from it. When you're overworked or burnt out on a project, you start making mistakes, and when that happens you're increasing the chances you'll quit in the long run. Blogger rachelbythebay calls this the stupid hour:
It's at that moment that it's often best to just go the f**k home, but sometimes its good to distance yourself even further. In an essay in the Believer, novelist Zadie Smith goes so far as to suggest you take as much time away from a project as humanly possible:
Even though Smith talks about doing this with a novel, it's a piece of advice we can all use for just about anything we create. Sometimes, when you're sitting there pounding your head into a project you're only making it worse. When you delay the work, you're given the opportunity to put a fresh set of eyes on it and make it better.