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People universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you're fortunate enough. But that's not how happiness works. 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 yo..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under my jurisdiction. There are certain lottery tickets I can buy, thereby increasing my odds of finding contentment. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom share my body and life and money and energy with.
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free-will
identity
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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04d7563
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I remember saying once to my friend Susan, when my marriage was becoming intolerable, "I don't want my children growing up in a household like this." Susan said, "Why don't you leave those so-called children out of the discussion? They don't even exist yet. Why can't you just admit that you don't want to live in unhappiness anymore?"
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not-settling-for-second-best
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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5263228
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Devo farmi le ossa is how they say it in Italian. "I need to make my bones."
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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Yoga is to find union - between mind and body, between the individual and her God, between our thoughts and the source of our thoughts, between teacher and student..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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I'm considered a difficult girl. I have a reputation for needing to be told a good reason to do something before I will do it.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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5571011
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Honey -- even Ray Charles can see that you have control issues.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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c7789be
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I have always responded with breathless excitement to anyone who has ever said that God does not live in a dogmatic scripture or in a distant throne in the sky, but instead abides very close to us indeed - much closer than we imagine, breathing right through our own hearts. I respond with gratitude to anyone who has ever voyaged to the center of that heart, and who has then returned to the world with a report for the rest of us that God is ..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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Raising a child is the very definition of ambivalence. I am overwhelmed at times by how something can simultaneously be so awful and so rewarding.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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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.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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56a3417
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All the pain of a human life is caused by words, as is all the joy.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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6863a5e
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What you produce is not necessarily always sacred, I realized, just because you think it's sacred. What sacred is the time that you spend working on the project, and what that time does to expand your imagination, and what that expanded imagination does to transform your life.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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Do you think you are the only one to suffer? Read your bible, child; this world is not a paradise but a vale of tears. Do you think God made an exception for you? Look around you, what do you see? All is anguish. Everywhere you turn there is sorrow. If you do not see sorrow at first glance, look more carefully. You will soon enough see it.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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The sooner and more passionately you get married to this idea- that it is ultimately entirely up to you- the better off you'll be.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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44ea9b1
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Because often what keeps you from creative living is your self-absorption (your self-doubt, your self-disgust, your self-judgment, your crushing sense of self-protection).
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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b2c3757
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At no moment in history has a bright young girl with plenty of food and a good constitution perished from too much learning.
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women
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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df14c1f
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She felt listless, tragic, and slightly murderous. She was irritable and prickly with exactly those people who were the kindest to her.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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6e6e308
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Go back to bed so that, when the tempest comes, you'll be strong enough to deal with it. And the tempest is coming, dear one. Very soon. But not tonight.
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elizabeth-gilbert
sleepless-nights
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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8d12126
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author Martha Beck says of the ego, "Don't leave home without it." But do not let your ego totally run the show, or it will shut down the show. Your ego is a wonderful servant, but it's a terrible master--because the only thing your ego ever wants is reward, reward, and more reward. And since there's never enough reward to satisfy, your ego will always be disappointed. Left unmanaged, that kind of disappointment will rot you from the inside..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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fb9c87b
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Plant an expectation; reap a disappointment.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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Never explain yourself, Alma. It makes you appear weak.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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Frustration is not an interruption of your process; frustration is the process.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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92aa203
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All I know for certain is that this is how I want to spend my life--collaborating to the best of my ability with forces of inspiration that I can neither see, nor prove, nor command, nor understand. It's a strange line of work, admittedly. I cannot think of a better way to pass my days.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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They loved each other, she realized. They loved each other, because they knew each other.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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The universe buries strange jewels deep within us all, and then stands back to see if we can find them. The hunt to uncover those jewels--that's creative living. The courage to go on that hunt in the first place--that's what separates a mundane existence from a more enchanted one.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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We had more fun waiting in line together at the Department of Motor Vehicles than most couples have on their honeymoons. We gave each other same nickname, so there would be no separation between us. We made goals, vows, promises and dinner together. He read books to me...
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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But what if, either by choice or by reluctant necessity, you end up not participating in this comforting cycle of family and continuity? What if you step out? Where do you sit at the reunion? How do you mark time's passage without the fear that you've just frittered away your time on earth without being relevant? You'll need to find another purpose, another measure by which to judge whether or not you have been a successful human being. I l..
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feminism
life
tradition
virginia-woolf
woman
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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8d6f791
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The essential ingredients for creativity remain exactly the same for everybody: courage, enchantment, permission, persistence, trust--and those elements are universally accessible.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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You don't have to live like this because people tell you it's the only way. You're not handcuffed to your culture!
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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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 it grants us these remarkable minds, in order that we try to reach for it. It wants us to find it. It want..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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The work wants to be made, and it wants to be made through you.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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a4a6e28
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The world just happens to you sometimes, is what I think. And people just gotta keep moving through it, best they can.
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life
what-happens-to-you
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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32c3500
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wD `n mHwl@ rd ljmyl lmn d`mn fy Hytn , qd ykwn mn lHkm@ lstslm 'mm `Zm@ krm lnsny@ w lktf btwjyh lshkr lSdq l~ lbd
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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There's plenty of room in this vehicle for all of us, so make yourself at home, but understand this: Creativity and I are the only ones who will be making any decisions along the way. I recognize and respect that you are part of this family, and so I will never exclude you from our activities, but still--your suggestions will never be followed. You're allowed to have a seat, and you're allowed to have a voice, but you are not allowed to hav..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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9bc039d
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'nt lst sw~ m tfkr fyh , w 'Hsysk hy `bd l'fkrk , w 'nt `bd l`wTfk
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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a075325
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It has taken me years to learn this, but it does seem to be the case if that I am not actively creating something, then I am probably actively destroying something
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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cb12543
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ynbG~ `lyk 'l t`T~ nfsk lfrS@ llnhyr lnk Hyn tf`lyn dhlk ytHwl l'mr l~ `d@ ldyk ttkrr mrr `lyk n t`wWd nfsk `l~ 'n tbqy qwy `wD `n dhlk
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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de17c07
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Inevitably even the most original new ideas will eventually harden into dogma or stop working for everybody.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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7d7ad64
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lyki n tt`lmy kyf tkhtryn fkrk tmm km tkhtryn mlbsk kl ywm . nh qw~ ymknk tTwyrh n knt trGbyn kthyr blsyTrh `l~ mwr Hytk , bd'y b`qlk . nh lshy lwHyd ldhy ynbGy lsyTrh `lyh . tkhl~ `n kl mtbq~, fy m `dh . lnk n `jzt `n n tkwny syd@ fkrk, fnt fy wrTh kbyrh ln tkhrjy mnh bd
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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00cf2d3
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't`rfyna kyfa ybdw lns mthl klbhm , '`tqd b'nk tbdyn mthla rjlk !!
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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6847306
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Those girls are on the road to trouble," I heard an older woman say about us one night, as we were staggering down the street drunk--and that woman was absolutely right. What she didn't understand, though, is that trouble is what we wanted. Oh, our youthful needs! Oh, the deliciously blinding yearnings of the young--which inevitably take us right to the edges of cliffs, or trap us in cul-de-sacs of our design."
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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88ebe07
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qltu lhu :"rbm 'mknk lmjy lzyrty fy 'mryk ywman m , kytwt " hz r'shu nfyan wmstslman bmrH lqdrh :" l ymknny lyz , l 'mlk m ykfy mn l'snn llsfr blTy'r@ "
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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3ef52b4
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Aperson only gets to move to New York City for the first time in her life once, Angela, and it's a pretty big deal. Perhaps this idea doesn't hold any romance for you, since you are a born New Yorker. Maybe you take this splendid city of ours for granted. Or maybe you love it more than I do, in your own unimaginably intimate way. Without a doubt, you were lucky to be raised here. But you never got to move here--and for that, I am sorry for ..
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Elizabeth Gilbert |
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I always hated hearing old people yammering on like this when I was young. And I do what to assure you: I'm aware that many thing were not better in the 1940s. Underarm deodorants and air-conditioning were woefully inadequate, for instance, so everybody stank like crazy, especially in the summer, and also we had Hitler.
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Elizabeth Gilbert |