Dani Shapiro
Dani Shapiro
Daneile Joyce "Dani" Shapiro is the author of five novels and the best-selling memoirs Slow Motion and Devotion. She has also written for magazines such as The New Yorker, The Oprah Magazine, Vogue, and ELLE...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth10 April 1962
CountryUnited States of America
spiritual pain heartache
Part of my spiritual work is learning to live with the knowledge that we can't protect our loved ones from pain and heartache.
running haunting theme
I started realising that the themes running through all of my novels were really haunting and obsessing me about my own life.
kissing joy breathe
All there is to do, right at this very moment, is to breathe in, breathe out, and kiss the joy as it flies.
We don't choose what's going to wake us up.
book support mind
When I near the end of a book, it feels as if the entire universe meets me more than halfway and supports me. The whole world seems to shimmer when I find the words. My mind quiets.
You can start your day over anytime.
important
Courage is more important than confidence
moments possibility divine
Recognize the possibility of the divine in any given moment.
distance character able
It is only with distance that we are able to turn our powers of observation on ourselves, thus fashioning stories in which we are characters.
uplifting memories moving
With tremendous clarity and wisdom, Daniel Tomasulo has crafted a memoir at once heartbreaking and uplifting. Layers of time and memory—childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle age—are so beautifully revealed here, a trenchant reminder that our pasts are alive inside of us. There are psychologists who can write, and writers who can psychologize, but rarely have the two met on the page with such moving, profound results.
running home journey
In a creative journey, it is essential, no matter how far one runs, to examine that which is closest to home.
country lonely husband
In the country, I stopped being a person who, in the words of Sylvia Boorstein, startles easily. I grew calmer, but beneath that calm was a deep well of loneliness I hadn't known was there. ... Anxiety was my fuel. When I stopped, it was all waiting for me: fear, anger, grief, despair, and that terrible, terrible loneliness. What was it about? I was hardly alone. I loved my husband and son. I had great friends, colleagues, students. In the quiet, in the extra hours, I was forced to ask the question, and to listen carefully to the answer: I was lonely for myself. [p. 123]
dream writing breathing
Writing well involves walking the path of most resistance. Sitting still, being patient, allowing the lunatic dream to take shape on the page, then the shaping, the pencil on the page, breathing, slowing down, being willing–no, more than willing, being wide open–to press the bruise until it blossoms.
moving hands pages
I'm most connected to myself when I'm alone in a room, moving my hand across a page. That's when I feel most like me.