Marianne Williamson

American Author

Date of Birth	:	08 Jul, 1952
Place of Birth	:	Houston, Texas, United States
Profession	:	Author
Nationality	:	American
Social Profiles	:	Facebook Twitter Instagram

Marianne Deborah Williamson is an American author, speaker, and politician. She began her professional career as spiritual leader of the Church of Today, a Unity Church in Warren, Michigan.

Early life and education

Williamson was born in Houston, Texas in 1952. She is the youngest of three children of Samuel "Sam" Williamson, a World War II veteran and immigration lawyer, and Sophie Ann Kaplan, a homemaker and community volunteer.

Williamson was raised in an upper-middle class family that practiced Conservative Judaism. Her family attended Congregation Beth Yeshurun. She learned about world religions and social justice at home and became interested in public advocacy when she saw her rabbi speak against the Vietnam War.

In 1965, after Williamson came home from school in the seventh grade, she recounted to her parents that her teacher supported the Vietnam War. Her father reacted by taking the family to Vietnam to help explain to Marianne why he thought that the war was wrong. She has said that through travel she "had an experience, at a young age, that people are the same everywhere."

Williamson attended Houston ISD's Bellaire High School. After graduating, she spent two years studying theater and philosophy at Pomona College in Claremont, California, where she was a roommate of future film producer Lynda Obst. In 1973, Williamson dropped out of college and lived "a nomadic existence" during what she calls "her wasted decade".

Career

In 1979, Williamson returned to Houston, where she ran a metaphysical bookstore coffee shop, sang Gershwin standards in a nightclub, got married and divorced "almost immediately", and underwent a "spiritual surrender".

In 1983, Williamson had what she has called a "flash" to close the coffee shop and move to Los Angeles. She got an apartment in Hollywood, where her roommate was 17-year-old Laura Dern. Dern has stated that Williamson "held prayer groups in our living room."

Williamson's teachings stemmed from an inspirational message: "Divine love is the core and essence of every human mind." She saw this message as a remedy to misinterpretations of the Bible that, through an emphasis on sin and guilt, could lead to harm (e.g. slavery, depression, self-loathing).

Personal life and family

Williamson's older brother, Peter, became an immigration attorney like his father. Her late sister, Elizabeth "Jane," was a teacher. Her father and her maternal grandparents were Russian Jewish immigrants. Her grandfather changed his surname from Vishnevetsky to Williamson after seeing "Alan Williamson Ltd" on a train. Williamson described herself as a "Jewish woman" in a 2022 interview.

She was briefly married in 1979 to a Houston businessman. She said the marriage lasted "for a minute and a half". In 1990, she gave birth to a daughter. She has one grandchild. In 2006, a Newsweek poll named her one of the 50 most influential baby boomers.

In 2013, Williamson reported having assets estimated to be valued between $1 million and $5 million (not including personal residences).