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Creativity Does Not Belong Exclusively To Professional Artists And Geniuses; It Is The Birthright Of Every Single Human Being. Creativity Is Our Common Heritage. You Don’t Need To Quit Your Job And Move To Paris In Order To Lay Claim To This Heritage - All You Have To Do Is Clear Some Space In Your Life For Whimsy, Invention, Sensory Pleasure, And Play. Most Of All, You Have To Learn How To Follow Your Curiosity More Than Your Fear.

-Elizabeth Gilbert

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Creativity Does Not Belong

Elizabeth Gilbert

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Creativity Does Not Belong Exclusively To Professional Artists And Geniuses; It Is The Birthright Of Every Single Human Being. Creativity Is Our Common Heritage. You Don’t Need To Quit Your Job And Move To Paris In Order To Lay Claim To This Heritage - All You Have To Do Is Clear Some Space In Your Life For Whimsy, Invention, Sensory Pleasure, And Play. Most Of All, You Have To Learn How To Follow Your Curiosity More Than Your Fear.

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I Want To Have A Lasting Experience Of God.

It Seems Obvious That There Comes Period In Your Life When You Have To Learn To Say No To Things You Don't Want To Do. But The Biggest Trickiest Lesson In Holding On The Stalwart Committment To Your Creativity Is Learning How To Say No To The Things You Do Want To Do.

Even In The Worst Tragedies And Crisis, There’s No Reason To Add To Everyone’s Misery By Looking Miserable Yourself.

Yoga Is The Effort To Experience One's Divinity Personally And Then To Hold On To That Experience Forever.

What Profound Reward You Must Glean From Studying The World So Closely....too Many People Turn Away From Small Wonders, I Find. There Is So Much More Potency To Be Found In Detail Than Generalities, But Most Souls Cannot Train Themselves To Sit Still For It.

The Reality, Certainly In My Life, Is That We All Have Love Stories That Go Terribly Wrong; We All Have Horribly Broken Hearts. And Somehow We Endure. We're Not Destroyed By It.

There's A Part Of Me Which Has Always Wanted To Hear A Man Say, "let Me Take Care Of You Forever," And I Have Never Heard It Spoken Before. Over The Last Few Years, I'd Given Up Looking For That Person, Learned How To Say This Heartening Sentence To Myself, Especially In Times Of Fear. But To Hear It From Someone Else Now, From Someone Who Is Speaking Sincerely.

I'm Not Particularly Inventive. If You Left Me In а Room And Told Me To Write A Novel, I Wouldn't Be Able To Do It. But If You Gave Me Two Years In A Public Library Around The Corner, I Could. It All Comes From Sort Of Mixing The True And The Invented. I'm Not A Fabulist. I'm More Of A Reporter.

I Worked At The Original Coyote Ugly Bar When I Was A Young, Unpublished Writer. Then Later When I Became A Writer, I Wrote An Article About It For Gq. Disney Read This Article About This Filthy, Disgusting Pit In The East Village [of New York City], Where We Used To Set The Bar On Fire To Get Customers Away From Us, And Said, "that's A Great Movie For Kids!" They Made The Fantastic Coyote Ugly Movie, Now Legendary.

Felipe And I, As We Discover To Our Delight, Are A Perfectly Matched, Genetically Engineered Belly-to-belly Success Story.

It's What I Call The Haute Couture, High-end Version Of Fear Perfectionism. It's Just Fear In Really Good Shoes. But It's Still Fear.

I Was Not Rescued By A Prince; I Was The Administrator Of My Own Rescue.

A Woman's Place Is In The Kitchen...sitting In A Comfortable Chair, With Her Feet Up, Drinking A Glass Of Wine And Watching Her Husband Cook Dinner.

The Yogic Sages Say That All The Pain Of A Human Life Is Caused By Words, As Is All The Joy. We Create Words To Define Our Experience And Those Words Bring Attendant Emotions That Jerk Us Around Like Dogs On A Leash. We Get Seduced By Our Own Mantras (i'm A Failure I'm Lonely I'm A Failure I'm Lonely) And We Become Monuments To Them. To Stop Talking For A While, Then, Is To Attempt To Strip Away The Power Of Words, To Stop Choking Ourselves With Words, To Liberate Ourselves From Our Suffocating Mantras.

Go Back To Bed', Said The Omniscient Interior Voice, Because You Don't Need To Know The Final Answer Right Now, At Three O'clock In The Morning On The Thursday In November. 'go Back To Bed', Because I Love You. 'go Back To Bed', Beacause The Only Thing You Need To Do For Now Is Get Some Rest And Take Good Care Of Yourself Until You Do Know The Answer.

Embrace The Beautiful Mess That You Are.

And When You Sense A Faint Potentiality For Happiness After Such Dark Times You Must Grab Onto The Ankles Of That Happiness And Not Let Go Until It Drags You Face-first Out Of The Dirt - This Is Not Selfishness, But Obligation. You Were Given Life; It Is Your Duty To Find Something Beautiful Within Life No Matter How Slight.

To Be Fully Seen By Somebody, Then, And Be Loved Anyhow - This Is A Human Offering That Can Border On Miraculous.

Library Is A Beautiful Old Thing

Who Amongst Us Lives Without Sacrifice?

Without Sacrifice

There's Only One Problem With The Hero's Journey, It Never Included Women.

The World Is Like A Dropped Pie Most Of The Time. Don't Kill Yourself Trying To Put It Back Together. Just Grab A Fork And Eat Some Of It Off The Floor. Then Carry On.

Success Isn't About Acquiring Things, It's About Discovering Your Life Purpose And Following The Call

Acquiring Things

I Have No Nostalgia For The Patriarchy, Please Believe Me. But What I Have Come To Realize Is That, When That Patriarchic System Was (rightfully) Dismantled, It Was Not Necessarily Replaced By Another Form Of Protection. What I Mean Is--i Never Thought To Ask A Suitor The Same Challenging Questions My Father Might Have Asked Him, In A Different Age.

In Every Possible Instance Saint Paul Begged Christians To Restrain Themselves To Contain Their Carnal Yearnings To Live Solitary And Sexless Lives On Earth As It Is In Heaven. "but If They Cannot Contain " Paul Finally Conceded Then "let Them Marry For It Is Better To Marry Than To Burn." Which Is Perhaps The Most Begrudging Endorsement Of Matrimony In Human History.

When It Comes To Women, Get Your Life Together First. Put On Your Own Oxygen Mask First. Figure Out Who You Are. Mature. And Then Go Find Somebody To Share That Life With.

I've Never Seen Any Life Transformation That Didn't Begin With The Person In Question Finally Getting Tired Of Their Own Bullshit.

To Show A Longing For Anything That One Cannot Have, For Instance, Is Not A Clever Position.

Smile With Face, Smile With Mind, And Good Energy Will Come To You And Clean Away Dirty Energy.

Attraversiamo (meaning "lets Cross Over" In Italian)

That's Your Friend. My Husband Is My Best Friend. He's Not The Mirror That Holds Up My Flaws. He's Just The Guy Who's Like, 'i Think You're Terrific'... It's Just Simple, Showing Up For Each Other.

Men Go Into Marriage With Virtually No Expectations Whatsoever. Ten Years Later, The Men Are Delightfully Surprised To Find Out That It's Actually Kind Of Nice, And The Women Have Sort Of Had To Take A Nose Dive From What They Thought It Was Going To Be.

The Hopi Indians Thought That The World’s Religions Each Contained One Spiritual Thread, And That These Threads Are Always Seeking Each Other, Wanting To Join. When All The Threads Are Finally Woven Together They Will Form A Rope That Will Pull Us Out Of This Dark Cycle Of History And Into The Next Realm.

You Have To Work Ceaselessly On Your End To Digest And Imbibe Your Opportunities Or, I Have Come To Believe, They Will Gradually Slip Away And Knock On Someone Else's More Receptive Door.

As Somebody Who, In My Second Marriage, Insisted On A Prenuptial Agreement, I Can Also Testify That Sometimes It Is An Act Of Love To Chart The Exit Strategy Before You Enter The Union, In Order To Make Sure That Not Only You, But Your Partner As Well, Knows That There Will Be No World War Iii Should Hearts And Minds, For Any Sad Reason, Change.

The Thing I Love About Dickens Is The Omniscient, Omnipotent Narrator, And The Great Confidence Of The Narrator, Which Marks 19th-century Novelists In General And Dickens In Particular.

It's Not Enough For Me To Just Hear About Something Or Read About Something, I Wanna Know It In My Bones.

Your Home Is Whatever In This World You Love More Than You Love Yourself. So That Might Be Creativity, Family, Invention, Adventure, Faith, Service, It Might Be Raising Corgies, I Don't Know - Your Home Is That Thing To Which You Can Dedicate Your Energies With Such Singular Devotion That The Ultimate Results Become Inconsequential.

We Live In This Society Where You Must Constantly Be Reinventing Yourself. The Big Question Is What Are You Doing Next. The Only Thing They Want Is Composed Of These Three Elements: They Want You To Do It The Exact Same Way Because They Want More Of It; But They Want It To Be Totally Different; And They Want It To Be Better. That's All You Have To Do. You Just Have To Do Something That's Exactly The Same, Totally Different, And Better.

I Had Always Been Taught That The Pursuit Of Happiness Was My Natural (even National) Birthright. It Is The Emotional Trademark Of My Culture To Seek Happiness. Not Just Any Kind Of Happiness, Either, But Profound Happiness, Even Soaring Happiness. And What Could Possibly Bring A Person More Soaring Happiness Than Romantic Love.

Pursuit Of Happiness

This Is A Good Sign, Having A Broken Heart. It Means We Have Tried For Something.

I Have A History Of Making Decisions Very Quickly About Men. I Have Always Fallen In Love Fast And Without Measuring Risks. I Have A Tendency Not Only To See The Best In Everyone, But To Assume That Everyone Is Emotionally Capable Of Reaching His Highest Potential. I Have Fallen In Love More Times Than I Care To Count With The Highest Potential Of A Man, Rather Than With The Man Himself, And I Have Hung On To The Relationship For A Long Time (sometimes Far Too Long) Waiting For The Man To Ascend To His Own Greatness. Many Times In Romance I Have Been A Victim Of My Own Optimism.

Every Intimacy Carries Secreted Somewhere Below Its Initial Lovely Surfaces, The Ever-coiled Makings Of Complete Catastrophe.

How Could Two People Who Were So In Love Not End Up Happily Ever After? It Had To Work. Didn’t It?

At Some Point, You Gotta Let Go, And Sit Still, And Allow Contentment To Come To You.

Nobody Until Very Recently Would Have Thought That Their Husband Was Supposed To Be Their Best Friend, Confidante, Intellectual Soul Mate, Co-parent, Inspiration.

There's A Wonderful Old Italian Joke About A Poor Man Who Goes To Church Every Day And Prays Before The Statue Of A Great Saint,'dear Saint-please, Please, Please...give Me The Grace To Win The Lottery.' This Lament Goes On For Months. Finally The Exasperated Statue Come To Life, Looks Down At The Begging Man And Says In Weary Disgust,'my Son-please, Please, Please...buy A Ticket.

The Great Lack Of Parity Between Husbands And Wives Has Always Been Spawned By The Disproportionate Degree Of Self-sacrifice That Women Are Willing To Make On Behalf Of Those They Love.

Happiness Is The Consequence Of Personal Effort. You Fight For It, Strive For It, Insist Upon It, And Sometimes Even Travel Around The World Looking For It. You Have To Participate Relentlessly In The Manifestations Of Your Own Blessings. And Once You Have Achieved A State Of Happiness, You Must Never Become Lax About Maintaining It. You Must Make A Mighty Effort To Keep Swimming Upward Into That Happiness Forever, To Stay Afloat On Top Of It.

You Need To Learn How To Select Your Thoughts Just The Same Way You Select Your Clothes Every Day. This Is A Power You Can Cultivate. If You Want To Control Things In Your Life So Bad, Work On The Mind. That's The Only Thing You Should Be Trying To Control.

You May Return Here Once You Have Fully Come To Understand That You Are Always Here.

I Am Stronger Than Depression And I Am Braver Than Loneliness And Nothing Will Ever Exhaust Me.

I Equal Parts Loved Him And Could Not Stand Him. I Couldn't Wake Him To Share In My Distress.

There's No Reason To Keep A Piece Of Furniture In Your House That Is So Sacred And Rare That You Can't Put Your Feet Up On It And A Dog Can't Jump Up On It. Likewise, A Book That Sits On A Shelf Like A Piece Of Porcelain, Only To Be Admired, Never To Be Read Again, Is A Dead Book.

I See Women Who Have This Struggle Between What They Know Is Right, What They Know Is Necessary, What They Know Is Healthy, What They Know Is Good For Them, What They Know Is Good For The Work That They Need To Do, What They Know Is Good For Their Bodies, What They Know Is Good For Their Families - All Too Often Ending That Statement With The Upturned Question Mark: "if It's Okay With Everyone?" Still Asking, Still Requesting, Still Filing Petitions For Somebody To Say That It's All Right.

David Was Catnip And Kryptonite To Me.

Faith Is Belief In What You Cannot See Or Prove Or Touch. Faith Is Walking Face-first And Full-speed Into The Dark.

The Yogic Path Is About Disentangling The Built-in Glitches Of The Human Condition, Which I'm Going To Over-simply Define Here As The Heartbreaking Inability To Sustain Contentment.

Devotion Is Diligence Without Assurance. Faith Is A Way Of Saying "yes, I Pre-accept The Terms Of The Universe And I Embrace In Advance What I Am Presently Incapable Of Understanding.

This Is What Rituals Are For. We Do Spiritual Ceremonies As Human Beings In Order To Create A Safe Resting Place For Our Most Complicated Feelings Of Joy Or Trauma, So That We Don't Have To Haul Those Feelings Around With Us Forever, Weighing Us Down. We All Need Such Places Of Ritual Safekeeping. And I Do Believe That If Your Culture Or Tradition Doesn't Have The Specific Ritual You Are Craving, Then You Are Absolutely Permitted To Make Up A Ceremony Of Your Own Devising, Fixing Your Own Broken-down Emotional Systems With All The Do-it-yourself Resourcefulness Of A Generous Plumber/poet.

I Am Alone, I Am All Alone, I Am Completely Alone. Grasping This Reality, I Let Go Of My Bag, Drop To My Knees And Press My Forehead Against The Floor. There, I Offer Up To The Universe A Fervent Prayer Of Thanks. First In English. Then In Italian. And Then - Just To Get The Point Across - In Sanskrit.

Who Loves You Most? Who Loves You Best? Who Thinks Of You When Others Rest?

Devotion Is Diligence Without Assurance

You Make Some Big Grandoise Decision About What You Need To Do, Or Who You Need To Be, And Then Circumstances Arise That Immediately Reveal To You How Little You Understood About Yourself.

There Is A Reason They Call God A Presence - Because God Is Right Here, Right Now. In The Present Is The Only Place To Find Him, And Now Is The Only Time.

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What I Object To Is The Hyper-fetishized Wedding Day, The Prioritizing Of Wedding Over Marriage. I Have A Real Problem With Couples Spending Far More Time Discussing The Seating Arrangement Or The Color Of The Bridesmaid's Gowns Than Hashing Out, For Instance, Their Feelings About How They Intend To Handle Questions Of Housework, Child-rearing, Finances And Fidelity For The Next Four Or Five Decades.

Mostly You Meet Friends When Traveling By Accident, Like By Sitting Next To Them On The Train, Or In A Restaurant, Or In A Holding Cell.

Most Of Us, Even If Only For Two Minutes In Our Lives, Have Experienced At Some Time Or Another An Inexplicable And Random Sense Of Complete Bliss, Unrelated To Anything That Was Happening In The Outside World.

I Think That If You Can Roast A Chicken, You Can Get Whatever You Want Out Of A Woman. Maybe It's Just Me But I Would Suspect That A Man Trying To Impress A Woman Would Be More Likely To Bring Out The Steak - "i Killed This For You, Now I'm Grilling It For You."... A Man That Can Cook You A Proper Meal That Is Like A Weekday Meal - Which I Think Cannot Be Better Than In The Form Of A Roast Chicken - That's The Greatest.

But I Don't Know How Much More Socializing I Can Do, Felipe. I Only Have The One Dress. People Will Start To Notice That I'm Wearing The Same Thing All The Time." "you're Young And Beautiful, Darling. You Only Need The One Dress

There Are Always Two Figures In A Marriage, Two Votes, Two Conflicting Sets Of Decisions, Desires And Limitations.

When You Write A Novel, There’s A Level At Which You Are Much More Revealing About Who You Are Because You’re Less Self-conscious About How You’re Presenting Yourself. You Are Accidentally Leaving Your Dna All Over Everything In A Novel Because It’s All Coming From You.

It Is Not We As Individuals, Then, Who Must Bend Uncomfortably Around The Institution Of Marriage; Rather, It Is The Institution Of Marriage That Has To Bend Uncomfortably Around Us.

People Will Always Want Intimacy With One Chosen Person And You Cannot Have Intimacy Without Privacy, Which Is Why Couples Draw Circles Of Privacy Around Themselves. They Demand That Family, Neighbors And The Law Respect Their Union, And That Is Why We Have Marriage.

I Feel Like All This Stuff That We Make: Books And Art And Music, All Of It. There's This Energy That Circles The World That Wants To Be Made Manifest, And It Is Just Looking For Someone To Come Through. And It's Dying For You To Make It. And If You Don't Do It, It Will Go Find Somebody Else.

If You're Brave Enough To Leave Behind Everything Familiar And Comforting, Which Can Be Anything From Your House To Bitter, Old Resentments, And Set Out On A Truth-seeking Journey, Either Externally Or Internally, And If You Are Truly Willing To Regard Everything That Happens To You On That Journey As A Clue And If You Accept Everyone You Meet Along The Way As A Teacher And If You Are Prepared, Most Of All, To Face And Forgive Some Very Difficult Realities About Yourself, Then The Truth Will Not Be Withheld From You.

The Bhagavad Gita—that Ancient Indian Yogic Text—says That It Is Better To Live Your Own Destiny Imperfectly Than To Live An Imitation Of Somebody Else’s Life With Perfection. So Now I Have Started Living My Own Life. Imperfect And Clumsy As It May Look, It Is Resembling Me Now, Thoroughly.

You Were Given Life; It Is Your Duty (and Also Your Entitlement As A Human Being) To Find Something Beautiful Within Life, No Matter How Slight.

Marriage Is Not Simply A Romantic Union Between Two People; It's Also A Political And Economic Contract Of The Highest Order.

Of Course, We All Inevitably Work Too Hard, Then We Get Burned Out And Have To Spend The Whole Weekend In Our Pajamas, Eating Cereal Straight Out Of The Box And Staring At The Tv In A Mild Coma (which Is The Opposite Of Working, Yes, But Not Exactly The Same Thing As Pleasure).

I Wonder If I Am Capable Of Being Somebody’s Sun, Somebody’s Everything. Am I Centered Enough Now To Be The Center Of Somebody Else’s Life?

I Am Determined To Make The Most Of This Life That I Have, Damn It - It's That Kind Of Stubbornness I Think We All Need More Of.

He Endeared Himself To Me Forever The First Night We Met, When I Was Getting Frustrated With My Inability To Find The Words I Wanted In Italian, And He Put His Hand On My Arm And Said, "liz, You Must Be Very Polite With Yourself When You Are Learning Something New.

What Richard Is Talking About Is Instead Admitting To The Existence Of Negative Thoughts, Understanding Where They Came From And Why They Arrived, And Then - With Great Forgiveness And Fortitude - Dismissing Them.

The Six Elements Of Her Fail Proof Broken-heart Curing Treatment: "vitamin E, Get Much Sleep, Drink Much Water, Travel To A Place Far Away From The Person You Loved, Meditate And Teach Your Heart That This Is Destiny.

It Has Never Been Easy For Me To Understand Why People Work So Hard To Create Something Beautiful, But Then Refuse To Share It With Anyone, For Fear Of Criticism.

We're Miserable Because We Think That We Are Mere Individuals, Alone With Our Fears And Flaws And Resentment And Mortality.

Todd's Mother Had Several Children By Different Fathers, And Todd [willingham] Had Been Abandoned In California. ... He's A Good-looking Man. He Was A Witty Man, You Know? Funny, Caring. He Wasn't Arrogant, But He Was Kind Of Set In His Ways. If He Thought Something, It Was One Way. You Could Show Him An Alternative, But He Was Still Going To Stick By His Particular View. But I Could See How To Women He Could Be A Very Charming, Good-looking Guy, Especially When He Was Younger.

But If You Can Plant Yourself In Stillness Long Enough, You Will, In Time, Experience The Truth That Everything (both Uncomfortable And Lovely) Does Eventually Pass.

As A Writer, You Always Read In Two Minds: You Read As A Reader And You Enjoy It, And You Look At It As A Writer, And You Just Admire The Architecture And The Construction.

You Are Still Young, So You Think Only Of Your Own Self. You Do Not Notice The Tribulations That Occur All Around You, To Other People. Do Not Protest; It Is True. I Am Not Condemning You. I Was As Selfish As You, When I Was Your Age. It Is The Custom Of The Young To Be Selfish... But Someday You Will Understand That Nobody Passes Through This World Without Suffering-no Matter What You Think Of Them And Their Supposed Good Fortune.

Too Many Maniacs Not Enough Michelangelos

Someone Has To Write All Those Stories: Why Not Me?

I Am Burdened With What The Buddhists Call The 'monkey Mind' -- The Thoughts That Swing From Limb To Limb, Stopping Only To Scratch Themselves, Spit And Howl.

Unfenced By Law, The Unmarried Lover Can Quit A Bad Relationship At Any Time. But You - The Legally Married Person Who Wants To Escape Doomed Love - May Soon Discover That A Significant Portion Of Your Marriage Contract Belongs To The State, And That It Sometimes Takes A Very Long While For The State To Grant You Your Leave.

Bad Relationship

What A Large Number Of Factors Constitute A Single Human Being! How Very Many Layers We Operate On, And How Very Many Influences We Receive From Our Minds, Our Bodies, Our Histories, Our Families, Our Cities, Our Souls And Our Lunches!

The Number 108 Is Held To Be The Most Auspicious, A Perfect Three-digit Multiple Of Three, Its Components Adding Up To 9, Which Is Three Threes. And 3, Of Course, Is The Number Representing Supreme Balance.

Maturity Brings - Among Other Things - The Ability To Sustain And Survive Enormous Contradictions And Disappointments.

Travel Is Similar To Therapy. You Can Go To The Best Psychologist In The World For Ten Years. If You Don't Feel Like Actively Shifting Anything In Your Life, There Is Nothing That Person Can Do To Change You.

What I Think Is Amazing Is Not That 85% Of People Who Get Married Under The Age Of 25 Get Divorced, It's That 15% Of Them Stay Together. How Did They Manage To Pull That Off? You Almost Can't Wait Too Long. It's The Single Simplest Measure To Predict Divorce.

There Was Really Only One Person Who - And I Remember To This Day - He Was A Fireman, And He Said, "you'll Never Know What You'll Do When You're In A Fire." Everyone Else Was Like: "i Don't Care; I Would Have Saved My Children; I Could Have Done It. Even If I Was Asleep I Would Have Woken Up And Saved My Children." But The Fireman Said, "you Never Know What's Going To Happen Unless You're In There."

For If There Is One Thing I Have Learned Over The Years About Men, It Is That Feelings Of Powerlessness Do Not Usually Bring Forth Their Finest Qualities.

If Faith Were Rational , It Wouldn't Be -by Definition- Faith.

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Tis' Better To Live Your Own Life Imperfectly Than To Imitate Someone Else's Perfectly.

The Only Thing More Unthinkable Than Leaving Was Staying; The Only Thing More Impossible Than Staying Was Leaving.

Here's The Thing: The Unit Of Reverence In Europe Is The Family, Which Is Why A Child Born Today Of Unmarried Parents In Sweden Has A Better Chance Of Growing Up In A House With Both Of His Parents Than A Child Born To A Married Couple In America. Here We Revere The Couple, There They Revere The Family.

The Trick At Every Turn Was To Endure The Test Of Living For As Long As Possible. The Odds Of Survival Were Punishingly Slim, For The World Was Naught By A School Of Calamity And An Endless Burning Furnace Of Tribulation. But Those Who Survived The World Shaped It--even As The World, Simultaneously, Shaped Them.

I Was Just Really Appalled, And I Really Kept Quiet Until I Saw The Governor [rick Perry] Get On And Repeat The Same Words That The Prosecution Had Used In The Penalty Phase: That He [todd Willingham] Was A Monster. And That Got Me To Get On To The Computer And Connect With Some Of The Media And Say: "i Have His Letters. He Wasn't A Monster. He Was A Caring Individual." Let Them See Another Side.

For The Entire Decade Of My 30s And The Early Part Of My 40s, I Didn't Write A Word Of Fiction. I Just Left Behind A Dream Of My Life.

I Was A Veritable Johnny Appleseed Of Grand Expectations, And All I Reaped For My Trouble Was A Harvest Of Bitter Fruit.

We’re Miserable Because We Think That We Are Mere Individuals, Alone With Our Fears And Flaws And Resentments And Mortality. We Wrongly Believe That Our Limited Little Egos Constitute Our Whole Entire Nature. We Have Failed To Recognize Our Deeper Divine Character.

He Looks At You Like You're Someone He's Never Met Before, Much Less Someone He Once Loved With High Passion. The Irony Is, You Can Hardly Blame Him. I Mean, Check Yourself Out. You're A Pathetic Mess, Unrecognizable Even To Your Own Eyes.

Also, I Could Finally Sleep. And This Was The Real Gift, Because When You Cannot Sleep, You Cannot Get Yourself Out Of The Ditch--there's Not A Chance.

Someone Asked Me If I Would Like To Write A Man On Death Row, Be A Pen Pal, And I Was Like, Sure. I Volunteered. I Had Been In A Place In My Life - A Relationship Had Ended; My Parents Were Getting Elderly - I Was Kind Of Adrift. The Name That Was Given To Me, Just Randomly, Was Todd Willingham. And He Wrote Me A Letter, And In This Letter, He Thanked Me For Writing Him And [said That] If I Would Like To Visit, He Would Put Me On His Visitor List... I Was Just Really Struck By The Letter From Todd. It Was Very Polite; It Was Very Kind.

A Man That Can Cook You A Proper Meal That Is Like A Weekday Meal - Which I Think Cannot Be Better Than In The Form Of A Roast Chicken - That's The Greatest.

We Invented Marriage. Couples Invented Marriage. We Also Invented Divorce,mind You. And We Invented Infidelity,too, As Well As Romantic Misery. In Fact We Invented The Whole Sloppy Mess Of Love And Intimacy And Aversion And Euphoria And Failure. But Most Importantly Of All, Most Subversively Of All, Most Stubbornly Of All, We Invented Privacy.

Astonishingly, At Some Point, A Sputtering Torch Was Thrust Into Her Hands. Alma Did Not See Who Gave It To Her. She Had Never Before Been Entrusted With Fire. The Torch Spit Sparks And Sent Chunks Of Flaming Tar Spinning Into The Air Behind Her As She Bolted Across The Cosmos-the Only Body In The Heavens Who Was Not Held To A Strict Elliptical Path. Nobody Stopped Her. She Was A Comet. She Did Not Know That She Was Not Flying.

Infatuation Is Not Quite The Same Thing As Love; It's More Like Love's Shady Second Cousin Who's Always Borrowing Money And Can't Hold Down A Job.

Childlessness Doesn't Make People Selfish; Selfishness Makes People Selfish.

Your Emotions Are The Slaves To Your Thoughts, And You Are The Slave To Your Emotions.

I Like It When Science And Devotion Find Places Of Intersection.

My Husband Is Not American. He Was Born In Brazil, Where He Grew Up Under A Filthy, Corrupt Dictatorship. In His Twenties, He Moved To Europe, Where He Lived For A While Under Various Socialist Democracies. He Spent A Few Years On A Kibbutz In Israel, Living Out A Utopian Experiment In Communal Existence.

Thich Nhat Hanh Has The Ability To Bring Forth The State Of Peace That We Each Inherently Posses Merely By His Presence In A Room-this Is Divine Power.

Marriage Is An Ongoing, Centuries-long Social Experiment That Is Mostly Controlled By The Individuals In The Relationships Who Insist On Determining What The Relationship Terms Are Going To Be. And That's Why The Terms Of Marriage Change With Every Century And Decade. We're Shaping It From The Inside. Marriage Endures Because It Evolves. Obviously It Does. None Of Us Would Accept Marriage On Its 13th Century Terms, Not Even The Most Conservative People...

I've Read That Under Trauma, That You Have This Ability To Kind Of Disconnect From The Experience.

I Think There's More Real In The Unreal Than There Is In The Real.

The Fantasy Of The Wedding Day Is That It Represents Undeniable Public And Private Truth That You Have Been Chosen. For That One Day, You Are The Most Valuable Creature In The World - A Treasure, A Princess, A Prize.

Women Come Into Marriage With Great Inflated Expectations For What They Want This Relationship To Be, And Men Don't Give It That Much Thought. Men Come Into It With Reluctance About Being Capsized Or Trapped Or Whatever Their Fear Is. When You Check In Later, Women Are Disappointed Because Their Expectations Have Not Come To Pass, And Men Are Pleasantly Surprised.

My Career Started Young And I Was Really Ambitious, And Then I Had Success And I Hung Out With People Who Were Much Older. I Think I Might Have Been Temporally Misplaced, So I Thought I Was 40. It Was A Premature Midlife Crisis.

I See A Lot Of Women Who Can't Travel When They're Young, And Then Their Kids Grow Up And They Become Amazing Adventurers. Travel Is Not Only For The Young. Sometimes It's Wasted On The Young.

I Don't Think You Can Say That Feminism Has Made Women Critical Of Marriage Because Women Have Been Critical Of Marriage For Centuries.

[my Friend And I] Decided, We'll Go To Corsicana, And We'll See What The People In Corsicana Say. ... We Just Started Meeting People And Talking To Them, And The More I Heard The Stories, The More Red Flags Kept Popping Up. There Was This Disconnect Between This Person [todd Willingham] That I'm Reading In The Court Records, The Prosecutor's Statements, And This Person That I'm Learning About.

But When It Comes To Writing The Thing That I've Sort Of Been Thinking About Lately, Is Why? You Know, Is It Rational? Is It Logical That Anybody Should Be Expected To Be Afraid Of The Work That They Feel They Were Put On This Earth To Do.

Both The Five-year-olds Looked At Me With Bewilderment And A Bit Of Fearful Uncertainty. I Had A Sudden Horrifying Image Of The Woman I Might Become If I'm Not Careful: Crazy Aunt Liz. The Divorcee In The Muumuu With The Dyed Orange Hair Who Doesn't Eat Dairy But Smokes Menthols, Who's Always Just Coming Back From Her Astrology Cruise Or Breaking Up With Her Aroma-therapist Boyfriend, Who Reads The Tarot Cards Of Kindergarteners And Says Things Like, "bring Aunty Liz Another Wine Cooler, Baby, And I'll Let You Wear My Mood Ring.

I Have Searched Frantically For Contentment For So Many Years In So Many Ways, And All The Acquisitions And Accomplishments- They Run You Down In The End.

When You Have Only Two Minutes To Say Good-bye To The Person You Love Most In The World, And You Don’t Know When You’ll See Each Other Again, You Can Become Logjammed With The Effort To Say And Do And Settle Everything At Once.

Real, Sane, Mature Love—the Kind That Pays The Mortgage Year After Year And Picks Up The Kids After School—is Not Based On Infatuation But On Affection And Respect.

Maybe [artistry] Doesn't Have To Be Quite So Full Of Anguish If You Never Happened To Believe, In The First Place, That The Most Extraordinary Aspects Of Your Being Came From You. But Maybe If You Just Believed That They Were On Loan To You From Some Unimaginable Source For Some Exquisite Portion Of Your Life To Be Passed Along When You're Finished ... It Starts To Change Everything.

I Am Far More Of A Loner Than People Would Imagine. But I Am The Most Gregarious And Socially Interactive Loner You Ever Met. The Thing Is, I Am Fascinated By People's Stories And I'm Very Talkative And Can't Ever Say No To Anything Or Anyone, So I Tend To Over-socialize, To Give Away Too Much Of My Time To The Many People I Adore.

I Was The Baby Of The Family, But I Was Never Babied, And That Allowed Me To Take Whatever Artistic Temperament I Had And Apply Learned Discipline. I Was Taught How To Work. I Think That's Everything. Creativity And Imagination Alone Are Not Going To Get You There.

Ketut, Why Is Life All Crazy Like This?" I Asked My Medicine Man The Next Day...so What Can We Do About The Craziness Of The World?" Nothing." Ketut Laughed, But With A Dose Of Kindness. "this Is Nature Of World. This Is Destiny. Worry About Your Craziness Only-make You In Peace.

You Must Find Another Reason To Work, Other Than The Desire For Success Or Recognition. It Must Come From Another Place.

Desire For Success

This Is Intimacy: The Trading Of Stories In The Dark.

But Is It Such A Bad Thing To Live Like This For Just A Little While? Just For A Few Months Of One's Life, Is It So Awful To Travel Through Time With No Greater Ambition Than To Find The Next Lovely Meal? Or To Learn How To Speak A Language For No Higher Purpose Than That It Pleases Your Ear To Hear It? Or To Nap In A Garden, In A Patch Of Sunlight, In The Middle Of The Day, Right Next To Your Favourite Fountain? And Then To Do It Again The Next Day?

Here In America, Marriage Still Has A Mystical, Intangible Power: It Is A Passport To Adulthood And Respectability And To A Certain Extent Citizenship. Any Relationship Less Than "married" Is Considered Temporary And Not Worthy Of Honor.

You Have Now Reached Infatuation’s Final Destination—the Complete And Merciless Devaluation Of Self.

I Don't Think You Can Come Into Your Wisdom Until You Have Made Mistakes On Your Own Skin And Felt Them In Reality Of Your Own Life.

I Used To Say, 'man, I Think I'd Be A Really Good Dad. I'll Be A Great Provider. I'm Funny; I'll Go On Trips With Them - I'll Do All Sorts Of Stuff.' But The Momming? I'm Not Made For That. I Have A Really Good Mom; I Know What She Put Into It.

Only The Young And Stupid Are Confident About Sex And Romance.

Traveling-to-a-place Energy And Living-in-a-place Energy Are Two Fundamentally Different Energies

Why Must Everything Be Repeat And Repeat, Never Finish, Never Resting? You Work So Hard One Day, But The Next Day You Must Only Work Again. You Eat, But The Next Day, You Are Already Hungry. You Find Love, Then Love Goes Away. You Are Born With Nothing, You Work Hard, Then You Die With Nothing. You Are Young, Then You Are Old. No Matter How Hard You Work, You Cannot Stop Getting Old. - Wayan

True Wisdom Gives The Only Possible Answer At Any Given Moment, And That Night, Going Back To Bed Was The Only Possible Answer.

My Restlessness Makes Me A Far Better Day-to-day Traveler Than He Will Ever Be. I Am Infinitely Curious And Almost Infinitely Patient With Mishaps, Discomforts, And Minor Disasters. So I Can Go Anywhere On The Planet—that’s Not A Problem. The Problem Is That I Just Can’t Live Anywhere On The Planet.

I Want To Learn How To Speak Italian. For Years, I'd Wished I Could Speak Italian--a Language I Find More Beautiful Than Roses :)

I Think Another Way That You Can Really Harm Yourself As An Artist Is By Buying Into The Mythology That It's Really Important.

Parla Come Mangi' --it Is A Common Way To Say 'be Simple', 'don't Try To Be Rhetorical' Literaly: 'speak The Way You Eat

I Will Tell You Why We Have These Extraordinary Minds And Souls, Miss Whittaker," He Continued, As Though He Had Not Heard Her. "we Have Them Because There Is A Supreme Intelligence In The Universe, Which Wishes For Communion With Us. This Supreme Intelligence Longs To Be Known. It Calls Out To Us. It Draws Us Close To Its Mystery, And Grants Us These Remarkable Minds, In Order That We Try To Reach For It. It Wants Us To Find It. It Wants Union With Us, More Than Anything.

A Glorious Failure Can Sometimes Be More Life Affirming Than A Cautious Win.

I Think My Weakness As A Writer Is A Limited Imagination, And I Think My Strength Is A Talent For Reflecting The World, Or Sort Of Curating Things Out Of The World And Putting Them Into Books.

That Competition And The Struggle For Existence Is The Mechanism Behind This State Of Perpetual Change.

Every Woman Deserves A Man That Can Make Her Heart Forget That It Was Ever Broken. Even If These Have Been Broken To Pieces To Me,this Represents A Person Who Gave Me A Complete,flawless Heart. I Don't Need Someone Who Makes My Heart Whole. Instead, I Need Someone Who Will Never Let Me Feel Broken. This Is A Good Sign, Having A Broken Heart. It Means We Have Tried For Something.

So Sadness Is A Place?' Giovanni Asked. 'sometimes People Live There For Years,'i Said.

Your Home Is That Thing To Which You Can Dedicate Your Energies With Such Singular Devotion That The Ultimate Results Become Inconsequential.

You Take Whatever Works From Wherever You Can Find It, And You Keep Moving Toward The Light.

I Felt Like I Was Some Kind Of Primitive Spring-loaded Machine, Placed Under Far More Tension Than It Had Ever Been Built To Sustain, About To Blast Apart At Great Danger To Anyone Standing Nearby. I Imagined My Body Parts Flying Off My Torso In Order To Escape The Volcanic Core Of Unhappiness That Had Become: Me.

I Thought About One Of My Favorite Sufi Poems, Which Says That God Long Ago Drew A Circle In The Sand Exactly Around The Spot Where You Are Standing Right Now. I Was Never Not Coming Here. This Was Never Not Going To Happen.

My Mom Is A Master Gardener And I Grew Up On A Farm. I Came Back To It Really Late In Life And Discovered That Despite How Lazy And Inattentive I Was As A Child, I Had Managed To Accidentally Learn Quite A Bit About Gardening.

When I Diagnose My Depression Now, I Think It Was Partially About Saying Goodbye To These Kids That I Always Expected To Have But Already Knew That I Wouldn't.

Creativity Asks You To Enter Realms With Uncertain Outcomes. People Want To Create A Safe Life For Themselves So They Try To Live Without Fear And They End Up Killing Their Creativity In The Process.

Prayer Is A Relationship; Half The Job Is Mine. If I Want Transformation, But Can't Even Be Bothered To Articulate What, Exactly, I'm Aiming For, How Will It Ever Occur? Half The Benefit Of Prayer Is In The Asking Itself, In The Offering Of A Clearly Posed And Well-considered Intention. If You Don't Have This, All Your Pleas And Desires Are Boneless, Floppy, Inert; They Swirl At Your Feet In A Cold Fog And Never Lift.

Longing To Travel While You Are Already Traveling Is, I Admit, A Kind Of Greedy Madness

That's Just Your Ego, Trying To Make Sure It Stays In Charge. This Is What Ego Does. It Keeps You Feeling Separate, Keeps You With A Sense Of Duality, Tries To Convince You That You're Flawed And Broken And Alone Instead Of Whole.

Soon You Start Craving That Intense Attention With The Hungry Obsession Of Any Junkie. When The Drug Is Withheld You Probably Turn Sick, Crazy And Depleted Not To Mention Resentful Of The Dealer Who Encourage This Addiction In The First Place But Who Now Refuses To Pony Up The Good Stuff Anymore Despite That You Know That He Has It Hidden Somewhere God Dammit Because You Know That He Used To Give It To You For Free.

I Think That If You Can Roast A Chicken, You Can Get Whatever You Want Out Of A Woman.

The Best We Can Do Then, In Response To Our Incomprehensible And Dangerous World, Is To Practice Holding Equilibrium Internally - No Matter What Insanity Is Transpiring Out There.

Dangerous World

When I Read The Article [in The New Yorker] By David Grann, I Was Very Struck By People Responding To The Article, Of People Thinking I Was Such A Hero And What A Wonderful Person I Was, And I Didn't Feel That At All. I Felt Like I Had Very Much, Like Todd [willingham], Taken A Path Of Self-preservation.

You Know, It’s The Same Thing As The Question Of Free Will And Destiny, The Question Of Creativity - You, The Artist, You’re Not The Puppet Of The Piano, You’re Not The Puppet Of The Muse, But You’re Not Its Master, Either. It’s A Relationship, It’s A Conversation, And All It Wants Is To Be Treated With Respect And Dignity - And It Will Return Ten Thousand Times Over.

The Act Of Quiet Nighttime Talking, Illustrates For Me More Than Anything Else The Curious Alchemy Of Companionship.

Until I Can Feel As Ecstatic About Having A Baby As I Felt About Going To New Zealand To Search For Giant Squid, I Cannot Have A Baby.

Our Relationship Now Thoroughly Ruined, With Even Civility Destroyed Between Us, All I Wanted Anymore Was The Door.

Our Relationship

I Still Can’t Say Whether I Ever Want Children….i Can Only Say How I Feel Now--grateful To Be On My Own. I Also Know That I Won’t Go Forth And Have Children Just In Case I Might Regret Missing It Later In Life; I Don’t Think This Is A Strong Enough Motivation To Bring More Babies Onto The Earth.

All Of Women's Stories In The 19th Century Had Either One Of Two Endings: You Either Had The Good Jane Austen Marriage At The End And You Were Happy; Or You Had The Terrible Henry James Savage Downfall Because Of Your Own Hubris As A Woman, Or You've Made Some Great Error Leading You Down A Path To Ruin. One Is The Story Of Love That's Successful And The Other Is The Story Usually Of Reckless Love That Goes Terribly Wrong That Destroys The Woman.

A Fish And A Bird May Indeed Fall In Love, But Where Shall They Live?

Falling In Love

In Venice In The Middle Ages There Was Once A Profession For A Man Called A Codega--a Fellow You Hired To Walk In Front Of You At Night With A Lit Lantern, Showing You The Way, Scaring Off Thieves And Demons, Bringing You Confidence And Protection Through The Dark Streets.

Dear Me, How I Love A Library.

I'm Trying To Dismantle A Stereotype That In Order To Live Any Kind Of Creative Life, You Have To Be In Torment And Suffering. We're Addicted To This Idea Because It Makes For Good Bio Pics... But I Actually Think It's Better To Live A Life Where You're Constantly Exploring Your Curiosity And Creativity.

Reality Has Taught Us That No Woman Can Build An Honest Life Without Sacrificing Something Along The Way. Deciding What Will Be Sacrificed Is Not Easy.

But Vegetarians Can Eat This...because Intestines Aren't Even Meat, Liz. They're Just Sh$*.

When We Are Mindful Of Every Nuance Of Our Natural World, We Finally Get The Picture: That We Are Only Given One Dazzling Moment Of Life Here On Earth, And We Must Stand Before That Reality Both Humbled And Elevated, Subject To Every Law Of Our Universe And Grateful For Our Brief But Intrinsic Participation With It.

You Write Fiction, You're Writing Memoir, And When You're Writing Memoir, You're Writing Fiction.

Writing Fiction

A Lot Of [erotica] Was Really Interestingly Disguised In The 19th-century As Medical Journals. So It Would Be In The Voice Of A Learned Doctor Talking About Somebody's Pathologies. And Then It Would Get Really Detailed. And Then It Would Get Really Sweaty. And Then You're Like, "this Isn't A Doctor! I Would Like To See A Degree, Mister!"

Maybe The Difference Between First Marriage And Second Marriage Is That The Second Time At Least You Know You Are Gambling.

You Might Get Nothing Out Of It At All Except A Beautiful, Long Life Where All You Did Was Follow Your Gorgeous Curiosity. And That Should Be Enough Too.

I Consider A Good Dinner Party At Our House To Be Where People Drink And Eat More Than They're Meant To.

My Life's Accomplishments? Sanity, And You.

Once Henry Had Heard A Crying Noise At Sea, And Had Seen A Mermaid Floating On The Ocean's Surface. The Mermaid Had Been Injured By A Shark. Henry Had Pulled The Mermaid Out Of The Water With A Rope, And She Had Died In His Arms..."what Language Did The Mermaid Speak?" Alma Wanted To Know, Imagining That It Like Almost Have To Be Greek. "english!" Henry Said. "by God, Plum, Why Would I Rescue A Deuced Foreign Mermaid?

Eventually, Everything Goes Away.

As Smoking Is To The Lungs, So Is Resentment To The Soul; Even One Puff Is Bad For You.

We All Seem To Get This Idea That, In Order To Be Sacred, We Have To Make Some Massive, Drastic Change Of Character, That We Have To Renounce Our Individuality. To Know God, You Only Need To Renounce One Thing - Your Sense Of Division From God

I Crossed The Street To Walk In The Sunshine.

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