Quotes from Elizabeth Gilbert

clean up my mess in the middle of the night. Then my mercy swelled, and for just a moment I felt mercy for everyone who has ever gotten involved in an impossibly messy story. All those predicaments that we humans find ourselves in—predicaments that we never see coming, do not know how to handle, and then cannot fix.

Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it's what you want before you commit.

But what does any of that have to do with vocation? What does any of that have to do with the pursuit of love? What does any of that have to do with the strange communion between the human and the magical? What does any of that have to do with faith? What does any of that have to do with the quiet glory of merely making things, and then sharing those things with an open heart and no expectations?

I think perfectionism is just a high-end, haute couture version of fear. I think perfectionism is just fear in fancy shoes and a mink coat.

Because this is the other side of the contract with creativity: If inspiration is allowed to unexpectedly enter you, it is also allowed to unexpectedly exit you.

Then my mercy swelled, and for just a moment I felt mercy for everyone who has ever gotten involved in an impossibly messy story.

from Beatrix in this case, who quoted the esteemed Swedish botanical taxonomist Carl Linnaeus on how to distinguish minerals from plants, and plants from animals: "Stones grow. Plants grow and live. Animals grow, live, and feel

To find the balance you want," Ketut spoke through his translator, "this is what you must become. You must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it's like you have four legs, instead of two. That way, you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead. That way, you will know God.

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.

It was an adventure. You must learn in life to take things more lightly, my dear. The world is always changing. Learn how to allow for it.

Nothing will uproot your life more violently than true love.

Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings. It's

Well, if you can't make a plan for your own life, Vivian, then somebody needs to be your mother!

Later in life he reported that he had found his fame boring—not because it was immoral or corrupting, but simply because it was exactly the same thing every day.

Your job, then, should you choose to accept it, is to keep searching for the metaphors, rituals and teachers that will help you move ever closer to divinity.

I kept waiting to want to have a baby, but it didn't happen. And I know what it feels like to want something, believe me. I well know what desire feels like. But it wasn't there. Moreover, I couldn't stop thinking about what my sister had said to me once, as she was breast-feeding her firstborn: "Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it's what you want before you commit.

Lo que no quiere decir que vivir creativamente sea siempre fácil; solo que siempre es posible.

The day is ending. It's time for something that was beautiful to turn into something else that is beautiful. Now, let go.

When I was younger, I had wanted to be at the very center of all the action in New York, but I slowly came to realize that there is no one center. The center is everywhere—wherever people are living out their lives. It's a city with a million centers.

Look how little I need, Prudence seemed to be saying. Behold my goodness.

as a friend's grandfather once put it, "Sometimes life is too hard to be alone, and sometimes life is too good to be alone.

Accompanying this nineteen-year-old virgin to New York City were two large suitcases- one filled with my clothes, all folded neatly in tissue, and the other packed with fabrics, trimmings, and sewing supplies, so that I could make more clothes.

Creativity is sacred, and it is not sacred. What we make matters enormously, and it doesn't matter at all. We toil alone, and we are accompanied by spirits. We are terrified, and we are brave. Art is a crushing chore and a wonderful privilege.

Moreover, I can't say I ever fantasized about marrying him. In general, of course, the thought of marriage gave me a hemmed-in feeling, and I didn't long for it with anyone. But certainly not with Frank. I couldn't imagine us sitting at a breakfast table, talking over a newspaper. Planning vacations. That picture didn't look like either of us.