Authors@Google: Janet Carlson

Janet Carlson visits Google's Mountain View, CA headquarters to discuss her book "Quick, Before the Music Stops: How Ballroom Dancing Saved My Life." This event took place on July 25, 2008, as part of the Authors@Google series.

In her twenties, Janet Carlson was a successful competitive ballroom dancer who left dancing to raise a family and pursue a more "suitable" profession. Twenty years later she had it all: a beautiful family, a glamorous job, and an aching feeling that something was missing from her life--until one Valentine's Day when her husband gave her ballroom dancing classes as a gift, and Carlson rediscovered the joy and confidence she had been missing for so long.Based on a popular piece she wrote for" O, The Oprah Magazine," "Quick, Before the Music Stops "is Carlson's exuberant story of how dance helped her find her footing as a woman. Falling backward into a partner's arms, she learned a new sense of trust; surrendering herself to the music taught her to let go of her need for control in her life; and the unspoken yet intimate communication of dance broke through emotional barriers that confined her spirit. Carlson's title echoes what George Balanchine used to command his dancers: "What are you saving it for? Do it now!" Her memoir carries this message of seizing the moment to every woman looking for a way to soar beyond the earth-bound demands of work and family

Janet Carlson is the Beauty & Health Director at Town & Country magazine. She has written articles for O the Oprah Magazine, Elle, Redbook, and Departures, among other publications, and she blogs for the Huffington Post Living Section. She studied ballet and jazz as a child and began ballroom dancing during her college years at Yale University. After graduating, she competed around the country for seven years, and then stopped to pursue her magazine career and start a family. She returned to the dance studio twenty years later and is now certified by the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing, and has co-taught a social dance program called Dance for Joy in the Caribbean. Carlson lives in Westchester County, New York with her two daughters. Visit her website at www.janetcarlson.net.

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