Elizabeth Gilbert Quotes

page 3

“It seems to me that the less I fight my fear, the less it fights back. If I can relax, fear relaxes, too.”

“You may return here once you have fully come to understand that you are always here.”

“Well, just remember--all your misery will be waiting for you at the door upon your exit, should you care to pick it up again when you leave.”

“You love new boyfriend?"
"I think so. Yes."
"Then you must spoil him. And he must spoil you.”

“Yoga is the effort to experience one's divinity personally and then to hold on to that experience forever.”

“I love my pizza so much, in fact, that I have come to believe in my delirium that my pizza might actually love me, in return. I am having a relationship with this pizza, almost an affair.”

“Someone has to write all those stories: why not me?”

“Teach your heart that this is destiny”

“Done is better than good.”

“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.”

“Sometimes out hearts are broken so new light can get in.”

“Every intimacy carries secreted somewhere below its initial lovely surfaces, the ever-coiled makings of complete catastrophe.”

“Anyhow, the older I get, the less impressed I become with originality. These days, I’m far more moved by authenticity. Attempts at originality can often feel forced and precious, but authenticity has quiet resonance that never fails to stir me.”

“Attraversiamo (meaning "Lets cross over" in Italian)”

“Fear--who cares?”

“Nothing is so essential as dignity…Time will reveal who has it and who has it not.”

“Religion is for those who don't want to go to hell, and spirituality is for those who have already been there.”

“Clearing out all your misery gets you out of the way. You cease being an obstacle, not only to yourself but to anyone else. Only then are you free to serve and enjoy other people.”

“God waited me out.”

“You must find another reason to work, other than the desire for success or recognition. It must come from another place.”

“Devotion is diligence without assurance”

“I was doing something I'd never done before. And what will I be able to do tomorrow that I cannot yet do today?”

“Every word was a singing sparrow, a magic trick, a truffle for me. The words made me laugh in delight.”

“All I could say was, "I don't know what to do." I remember her taking me by the shoulders and looking me in the eye with a calm smile and saying simply, "Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth.”

“What time has ever been a simple time for those who are living it?”

“My heart skipped a beat and then flat-out tripped over itself and fell on its face. Then my heart stood up, brushed itself off, took a deep breath and announced: "I want a spiritual teacher.”

“Who loves you most? Who loves you best? Who thinks of you when others rest?”

“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 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.”

“In a world of disorder and disaster and fraud, sometimes only beauty can be trusted.”

“Oh my God, baby, you are in so much trouble.”

“This is what intimacy does to us over time. That's what a long marriage can do: It causes us to inherit and trade each other's stories. (p.237)”

“Please go to this pizzeria. Order the margherita pizza with double mozzarella. If you do not eat this pizza when you are in Naples, please lie to me and tell me that you did.”

“I thought about the relentless thought-processing, soul-devouring machine that is my brain, and wondered how on earth I was ever going to master it. Then I remembered that line from Jaws and couldn't help smiling: 'We're gonna need a bigger boat.”

“And love is always complicated. But still humans most try to love each other, darling. We must get out hearts broken sometimes. This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something.”

“Beauty is not required. Beauty is accuracy's distraction.”

“Own your disappointment, acknowledge it for what it is, and move on.”

“If you’re alive, you’re a creative person.”

“There is a Dutch word, uitwaaien, “to walk against the wind for pleasure.”

“Argue for your limitations and you get to keep them.”

“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.”

“The Augusteum warns me not to get attached to any obsolete ideas about who I am, what I represent, whom I belong to, or what function I may once have intended to serve.”

“I am not an expert at praying, as you know. But can you please help me? I am in desperate need of help. I don't know what to do. I need an answer. Please tell me what to do…”

“So that's it. You have now reached infatuation's fial destination - the complete and merciless devaluation of self.”

“Ideas are driven by a single impulse: to be made manifest.”

“The Yogic scriptures say that God responds to the sacred prayers and efforts of human beings in any way whatsoever that mortals choose to worship - just so long as those prayers are sincere.”

“creative people always suffer from depression because we're so
super sensitive and special?”

“I was not rescued by a prince; I was the administrator of my own rescue.”

“Basically, your fear is like a mall cop who thinks he’s a Navy SEAL: He hasn’t slept in days, he’s all hopped up on Red Bull, and he’s liable to shoot at his own shadow in an absurd effort to keep everyone “safe.”