I was over at a friend’s place when I spotted Eat Pray Love and asked to borrow it because (1) I suffer from a lack of English reading material here in Hong Kong, and (2) it seems the whole world has read it so I decided to be a lemming and do likewise just to see what the fuss is about.
For the unbeknownst, Eat Pray Love in a nutshell is an autobiography by writer Elizabeth Gilbert who was on a year-long journey to three countries – Italy, India and Indonesia – during which she indulges in gastronomic pleasures in Italy, ‘finds’ herself and comes to terms with her own spiritual being in India, and seeks the balance between the pleasurable and spiritual in Indonesia.
It is in the first part of the book that we learn of her depression and the lack of happiness in her life even though she seemed to have the perfect life – doing what she loves and getting paid good money for being a writer, two apartments in New York, a loving husband and a great social life. But Gilbert whines and whines and whines, to the point of being self-absorbed and self-indulgent in my opinion. There were many times, especially in the first 150 pages or so, that I wanted to throw the book against the wall and just give it up altogether. It’s like woman, give it up already! The worst is when she whines about David, the man she hooks up with after leaving her husband. The usual crap about how he’s her soul mate but yet they’re also bad for each other, so what should she do??? There are a few gems in the text, one of which is the piece of advice below given to her by Richard, her good friend at the Ashram in India. He said,
‘People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life.
A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then leave.
A soul mate’s purpose is to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life, then introduce you to your spiritual master…”
In the first few pages, she writes that she wished the hot Italian 26-year-old (a decade younger than her) would kiss her and then take it further. But she had taken a vow of year-long celibacy because she said she needed time to just be alone and get in touch with herself. To add to that, she writes ‘I have finally arrived at that age where a woman starts to question whether the wisest way to get over the loss of one beautiful brown-eyed young man is indeed to promptly invite another one into her bed.’
Obviously not very wise. I had to stifle a laugh when I read about her conscious decision to stay celibate for a year. I, on the other hand, seem to have sub-consciously taken that vow for, let’s just say, too long. Anyway, Gilbert reneges on her vow with some Brazilian dude she meets in Bali. The fairy-tale ending is all a bit too saccharine sweet really. Even she admits so herself.
The only thing that made me press on with the book was the fact that I wanted to read more about the cultural aspects of the countries she visited. There are interesting nuggets of information about the people she meets and the places she visits. When Gilbert is less whiny, her words make for a more pleasant read and there are a few nuggets of wisdom.
Here are some of my favourite quotes from the book:
This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something.
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.
[My guru] says that people universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you are 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 you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it…
There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under the jurisdiction. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I can read and eat and study. I can choose how I’m going to regard unfortunate circumstances in my life – whether I will see them as curses or opportunities. I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts.
Reading Eat, Pray, Love stirred up some wanderlust in me again…not that the dust has ever really settled. It got me thinking to where I’d choose to go if I were to do an Eat Pray Love. I thought, maybe France for all that wonderful food. I already know some very basic French so that bit of knowledge could help. France also seems to be the place for decadence. As for Pray, I thought either in some Buddhist getaway in Japan or China. The vegetarian food will be good, right? Heehee. And Love, where art thou? The place for Love to Gilbert had to be somewhere with a balance between the pleasurable and spiritual. Maybe I would choose Hawaii for that. It has lovely beaches and there’s also something very spiritual about it, what with Hawaiian beliefs in their gods that exist even in outrigger canoes. OK, I just really want to go there to paddle and lie on the beach all day. I’d like to visit some country in South America which could fit any one of these categories. But I don’t know much about South America so I can’t really say which country would be good.
If you were to embark on your own Eat Pray Love, where would you go?