Elizabeth Gilbert Quotes

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“Loneliness watches and sights, then climbs into my bed and pulls the covers over… himself, fully dressed, shoes and all. He’s going to make me sleep with him again tonight, i just know it.”

“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.”

“creative entitlement simply means believing that you are allowed to be here, and that—merely by being here—you are allowed to have a voice and a vision of your own.”

“Kalos Kai Agathos, the singular balance of the good and the beautiful.”

“Man is a demon, man is a god. Both true.”

“Traveling-to-a-place energy and living-in-a-place energy are two fundamentally different energies”

“perfectionism is just fear in fancy shoes and a mink coat”

“I was a veritable Johnny Appleseed of grand expectations, and all I reaped for my trouble was a harvest of bitter fruit.”

“It is merely this world that is chaotic, bringing changes to us all that nobody could have anticipated.”

“We have hands; we can stand on them if we want to. That's our privilege. That's the joy of a mortal body. And that's why God needs us. Because God loves to feel things through our hands.”

“If something is rubbing so hard against you, you can be sure it's working on you.”

“True wisdom gives the only possible answer at any given moment, and that night, going back to bed was the only possible answer.”

“if I am not actively creating something, then I am probably actively destroying something”

“It's so much easier and cheaper to keep the river uncontaminated in the first place than it is to clean it up again once it's been polluted.”

“David was catnip and kryptonite to me.”

“Most of humanity, he said, have eyes that are so caked shut with the dust of deception they will never see the truth, no matter who tries to help them.”

“living a life that is driven more strongly by curiosity than by fear.”

“Who will ever kiss this encyclopedia of a head?”

“The appreciation of pleasure can be the anchor of humanity.”

“As far as we know, we are the only species on the planet who have been given the gift-or curse, perhaps-of awareness about our own mortality. Everything here eventually dies; we're just the lucky ones who get to think about this fact every day.”

“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”

“What do you love doing so much that the words failure and success essentially become irrelevant?”

“What kind of dog is that?" I would always give the same answer: "She's a brown dog." Similarly, when the question is raised, "What kind of God do you believe in?" my answer is easy: "I believe in a magnificent God.”

“All transformation appears to be motivated by desperation and emergency.”

“Equally disquieting are the times when we do make a choice, only to later feel as though we have murdered some other aspect of our being by settling on one single concrete decision.”

“A true soul mate is probably the most important person you'll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake.”

“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.”

“A lovely evening of new idioms and fresh mozzarella.”

“Before you realize this truth, say the Yogis, you will always be in despair, a notion nicely expressed in this exasperated line from the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus: 'You bear God within you, poor wretch, and know it not.”

“you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead.”

“Venice is beautiful, but like a Bergman movie is beautiful; you can admire it, but you don't really want to live in it.”

“Listen to the whispers or soon you will be listening to the screams.”

“To be prosperous and happy in life, Henry, it is simple. Pick one woman, pick it well, and surrender.”

“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.”

“It may be that same-sex couples will save the institution of marriage.”

“It might have been done before, but it hasn’t been done by you!”

“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.”

“Even in the worst tragedies and crisis, there’s no reason to add to everyone’s misery by looking miserable yourself.”

“the beauty of doing nothing”

“A parent is inexcusable who does not personally teach her child to think.”

“The culture of Rome just doesn't match the culture of Yoga, not as far as I can see. In fact, I've decided that Rome and Yoga don't have anything in common at all. Except for the way they both kind of remind you of the word toga.”

“Create whatever causes a revolution in your heart. The rest of it will take care of itself.”

“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.”

“But the very fact that this world is so challenging is exactly why you sometimes must reach out of its jurisdiction for help, appealing to a higher authority in order to find your comfort.”

“To show a longing for anything that one cannot have, for instance, is not a clever position.”

“You don’t need to conduct autopsies on your disasters.”

“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.”

“My face is a transparent transmitter of my every thought.”

“The mysterious magnet is either there, buried somewhere deep behind the sternum, or it is not.”