Dani Shapiro Quotes

I'm really happy when I'm actively creating things. When I'm frustrated and not excited, it's because I haven't written anything in a month or so.

When I am angry I can write, pray, and preach well, for then my whole temperament is quickened, my understanding sharpened, and all mundane vexations and temptations depart.

The real payoff is the writing itself, that a day when you have gotten your work done is a good day, that total dedication is the point.

If you love something - and there are things that I love - you do want more and more and more of it, but that's not the way to produce good work.

I haven't stopped writing which is good. I'm scared to stop completely otherwise it might lead to stagnancy.

I love to go to the studio and stay there 10 or 12 hours a day. I love it. What is it? I don't know. It's life.

If you love something - and there are things that I love - you do want more and more and more of it, but that's not the way to produce good work. So as an author, I need to write what I need to write.

I don't feel so alive if I'm not being creative.

There's no writer's block; there's only distraction.

I feel that my work comes alive all the time.

Throughout my life, there's just periods when I write and periods when I don't. I don't feel like anything's really blocked. It's just not where things are at right now, and it's just a matter of time until there's something going on where I feel compelled to write.

I'd advise all you songwriters out there, if you're getting into it for the business, go home and get a job digging ditches or something. Get a life. You'll learn a lot more, and you won't write a lot of rotten poetry.

When you are in the field of creativity, you lose track of time. Only the flow exists.

When you're writing something and you know it's good, you get flushed, you can feel the blood coursing through your veins, you feel alive, all your nerve endings stand up, something just clicks.

...I feel more alive when I'm writing than I do at any other time--except when I'm making love. Two things when you forget time, when nothing exists except the moment--the moment of writing, the moment of love. That perfect concentration is bliss.

When I sit down at my writing desk, time seems to vanish. I think it's a wonderful way to spend one's life.

Better to write twaddle, anything, than nothing at all.

Writing doesn't require drive. It's like saying a chicken has to have drive to lay an egg.

Write even when the world is chaotic. You don’t need a cigarette, silence, music, a comfortable chair, or inner peace to write. You just need ten minutes and a writing implement.

Write while the heat is in you.

If you do not love what you do, if you are not appropriately grateful for the chance to create something magical each time you sit down at the computer or with a pencil and paper in hand, somewhere along the way your writing will betray you.

I'm 44 now; I feel better than I did when I was 34. I've got more clarity now. I wake up in the morning, and I write my blog, and then I go upstairs, and I work on music. And I do that every day. That's what I do. I don't check in once a week and think, "Oh, I've gotta come up with something now." I'm always writing. I was just in a coffee shop in Chelsea last night, just killing time, waiting for a friend, and I sat and wrote enough for three good songs. I love it. This is my life. It's all I do.

If life ever stops inspiring us to write, it's time to stop doing what we do.

No matter how much crap you gotta plow through to stay alive as a photographer, no matter how many bad assignments, bad days, bad clients, snotty subjects, obnoxious handlers, wigged-out art directors, technical disasters, failures of the mind, body, and will, all the shouldas, couldas, and wouldas that befuddle our brains and creep into our dreams, always remember to make room to shoot what you love. It's the only way to keep your heart beating as a photographer.

Inspiration does not always precede the act of writing; it often follows it.