Dani Shapiro

On Inwardness

August 18th, 2010

I've long understood that I need to spend a certain number of hours a day alone.  If I'm not by myself, in a quiet room, reading, writing, thinking, doing yoga, staring into space, taking baths, for the better part of each day, I start to feel all jumbled up.  Uncomfortable.  Awkward and irritated, as if something is chafing me from the inside.  I am almost always running a monologue in my head--something I've learned, in my meditation practice, is often nothing more than detritus and noise.  But in order to move past the running dialogue, I require a great deal of solitude.  I've learned, over the years, to be able to move in and out of isolation, into family life, social life, community life, and then back out of it, back to the cave where I do my work.

But.  (You knew there was a but coming, didn't you?)  I had the recent realization that inwardness doesn't always serve me well.  It's necessary, crucial for a writer to be inward-looking (and by this I don't mean navel-gazing, but rather, the capacity for intense, interior contemplation).  But it's equally important for a writer to look outside herself.  Lately I have noticed myself trapped in my interior life when, in fact, what was going on all around me was interesting, possibly even useful and important.  When I am thinking, rather than using all five senses--seeing, smelling, hearing, tasting, touching--I am not really using my whole instrument.  We are observers, aren't we?  We carefully watch and listen to what is swirling all around us, and that in combination with our interior lives is what ends up making something rich happen on the page.  If a writer is entirely trapped inside herself, the result can be stultifying.  If a writer is entirely outward-looking, the result can be superficial and thin.  The goal, I think, is to balance oneself in the fulcrum between thinking about life and actually living it.



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  • lemead

    This makes complete, crystalline sense to me. And I relate powerfully. It's a balancing point, a tippy point that I often misjudge in either direction. I guess the challenge is recognizing the imbalances and adjusting as necessary - not always easy for me.

  • http://www.beaulipp.com/wordpress Beaulipp

    Not sure if you're familiar with the following poem, but I think you may find it resonates with what you've said in your blog. It's one of my favorites.

    Of Mere Being

    The palm at the end of the mind,
    Beyond the last thought, rises
    In the bronze distance.

    A gold-feathered bird
    Sings in the palm, without human meaning,
    Without human feeling, a foreign song.

    You know then that it is not the reason
    That makes us happy or unhappy.
    The bird sings. Its feathers shine.

    The palm stands on the edge of space.
    The wind moves slowly in the branches.
    The bird’s fire-fangled feathers dangle down.
    – Wallace Stevens, 1954

  • Annhite

    First, I'm so glad there are others that need solitude in the way I do. Second, balance seems to be the key. I thought the word 'balance' as soon as I began reading your post. It is a simple word but ah so hard to obtain sometimes. I too spend way too much time in my cave. But I need this time to create. When I emerge and spend time outside of myself, I tend to drag my feet about cave dwelling again.

    I started to read devotion for the second time. Why? The first time I read it was in May and I devoured the pages quickly. This week I began to feel the stress of signing my first book contract. Yes, I came off of cloud nine. Now, the insecurities are popping up several times a day. I remembered devotion was nurturing and peaceful to read. I was correct. It's just what I need right now.

    Thanks for your blog posts. They always give me the message I need to hear. ;)

  • http://twitter.com/musingsdemommy Musings de Mommy

    I struggle with this on a daily basis. I sit on that teeter totter, precariously balancing between my guttural need for peace, solitude and inward thought and the raw need to be connected to my husband, children, family and kindred spirits. I think they are the fuel which moves my solitude forward.

    I haven't yet mixed the right elixir for me and I still experiment with the right proportions...but your lovely post reminds me that I'm not alone in my struggle. Thank you.

  • Sarah

    I long for solitude. Vast amounts of time and space to follow my thoughts and see where they go. Or, to sit and work through a thought or idea that I am struggling with but don't ordinarily have the time to ponder or solve. OR, to calm the inner dialogue and quiet my mind, enjoy the silence of isolation and the silence of my stammering self-conscious.

    Alas, there is very little solitude. I know, however, that as my children grow there will be more opportunity for this. And, while I don't want to rush their aging, I DO look forward to a wee bit more time away as they become more independent.

    That said--and I have no idea why I'm running on so much--I think the light you shed on the importance of both inwardness AND outwardness is true to all of us, writers or not. Without looking inward from time to time we are less of who we ought to be, or something like that...and everybody has a different balance to keep, I think, but it's so easy to get off track--for all of us.

  • Teresa

    Beautifully said, Dani. Thank you. You speak right to the question that's at the center of all my wrestling this year, it always comes down to balance. A lovely word, sounds simple, like something we might order from a catalog or be given in a beautifully wrapped gift from a friend. For me, it's the cornerstone of my life work, the understanding I return to when things get shaky in my personal earthquake zone.

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  • http://www.ivyleagueinsecurities.com/ Aidan Donnelley Rowley

    To balance oneself on that fulcrum... Yes. But how? On any given day, I am trapped inside myself, awash in creative contemplation or I am trapped out there, in the noise and the needs. Rarely, so rarely, do I feel that sense of both-ness, or balance. Maybe it is the seeking of this balance, the striving toward it, the wrestling with our inner and outer aspects, that makes us good writers after all? I don't pretend to know...

  • http://lisamckaywriting.wordpress.com/ Lisa McKay

    Thank you for this post. I've just quit my job and moved from LA to Laos with my husband so that he could take up a position with an NGO here - so I'm adjusting from "full time work in trauma training for aid workers" to "full time learning to live in Laos and working on my second book." So far I've been enjoying more silence in my life, but that, like you, there are also times when that quiet does not serve me well. All the best, lisa (PS I read some of your essays this morning, and it's sparked interesting conversation for my Michael and me here in Luang Prabang. Thanks for those, too.)

  • http://twitter.com/katiengibson Katie Noah Gibson

    Beautiful, and so true. I struggle with this balance, too - I think so many of us do - but it's important to have both the outer/sensory and the inner. Thanks for the reminder, Dani.

  • http://twitter.com/katiengibson Katie Noah Gibson

    Beautiful, and so true. I struggle with this balance, too - I think so many of us do - but it's important to have both the outer/sensory and the inner. Thanks for the reminder, Dani.