Dani Shapiro Quotations | Page 2

Writers are outsiders. Even when we seem like insiders, we're outsiders. We have to be. Our noses pressed to the glass, we notice everything. We mull and interpret. We store away clues, details that may be useful to us later.

I was raised in an observant Jewish household, so for me, Hebrew prayers - the sounds, the sunlight streaming in from the stained-glass windows of a synagogue - bring my father back to me as surely as if he were sitting next to me, my head pressed against his shoulder.

We secretly believe that if only we achieve some elusive goal - fitting into a pair of skinny jeans, or redoing our kitchen or getting that promotion - that it will make us happy. But the pain of our insecurity is hidden in all that racing around.

If there's anything weirder than an introverted writer going to lots of social functions, it's an introverted writer being converted into an accidental guru.

I did want to feel like life's all of one piece.

I think so much about how we read, about the nature of solitude, and of community, is changing in ways that none of us yet understand.

I found myself doing so much public speaking, more and more and bigger and bigger.

We're all simultaneously separated and connected by our devices, staring into our little screens, and also hungry for experience and community.

Open your hearts. Deep inside ourselves, we are all one and the same.

You have to believe in yourself before the world has given you any indication that you should believe in yourself as a writer.