Eat Pray Love.

Two years ago, I traveled to Calcutta, India. While I was there, I picked up Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Eat, Pray, Love. It’s a biography of a 40-something woman who fell into a pit of monotony and despair in her life in NYC and decided to take a year off and travel the world. 

She spent 4 months in Italy just learning the language and eating pasta, 4 months in an ashram in India learning mediation, and 4 months in Indonesia learning from a medicine man. 

I devoured the book the first time I read it. A movie came out last year sometime, but I hadn’t watched it until this week. I am watching it for the second time today as I write this. 

This true story holds some of the most profoundly simple life truths I have ever heard. I absolutely love when an author is capable of penning the thoughts and feelings we all have but are unable to put into words. Elizabeth Gilbert did just that.

I have copied down a few of my favorite quotes from this book. It was extremely difficult to narrow it down, but these are the best lines.

“To lose balance sometimes for love is part of living a balanced life.”

“But why must everything have a practical application? I'd been such a diligent soldier for years - working, producing, never missing a deadline, taking care of my loved ones, my gums and my credit record, voting, etc. Is this lifetime supposed to be only about duty? In this dark period of loss, did I need any justification for learning Italian other than that it was the only thing I could imagine bringing me any pleasure right now?”

“The more exquisitely and delightfully you can do nothing, the higher your life's achievement.”

“There's no trouble in this world so serious that it can't be cured with a hot bath, a glass of whiskey, and the Book of Common Prayer.”

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

“Of course, we all inevitably work too hard, then we get burned out and have to spend the whole weekend in our pajamas, eating cereal straight out of the box and staring at the TV in a mild coma (which is the opposite of working, yes, but not exactly the same thing as pleasure).”

I look at the Augusteum, and I think that perhaps my life has not actually been so chaotic, after all. It is merely this world that is chaotic, bringing changes to us that nobody could have anticipated. 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. Yesterday I might have been a glorious monument to somebody, true enough – but tomorrow I could be a fireworks depository. Even in the Eternal City, says the silent Augusteum, one must always be prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation.”

I also created a list of my own top 10 ways to enrich life.

1. Stop eating only Chef Boyardee and nachos. Start eating salmon, berries, walnuts, and green tea. (check out these amazing facts about these foods – major health boosters: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-patricia-fitzgerald/let-food-be-thy-medicine_b_406582.html)

3. Go to bed before midnight.

4. Do not procrastinate.

5. Let things be. Stop trying to plan out every second of every day – it won’t work out how you plan anyway.

6. Take time to actually enjoy what you’re doing: actually taste that strawberry, actually smell the rain, linger in that embrace, etc. Don’t be thinking about that paper that needs written while sipping tea with a friend, don’t be mentally working through co-worker drama while soaking in the tub. This robs the joy of the moment. And moments are priceless.

7. L'arte di non fare niente. “The sweetness of doing nothing.” Just be. You don’t have to be moving on to the next thing all the time.  The most enjoyable activity is any activity in which there is nothing that has to be done next.

8. Challenge long-standing motifs. Of your own and of the culture’s. The truth is worth seeking out. Et la verite vous rendra libres. [And the truth will set you free.]

9. Travel. Whether that means to Indonesia or the nearest state park or your backyard. Just get out. See the world, see nature, let your senses be alivened.  And most importantly, let your preconceived notions about this world we live in be shaken.

10. Paint your walls a new color. Pick a color you love and spice up your home. It’s amazing how much a new color can change your outlook. Home is where you are edified and nurtured and safe, make sure you treat it as such.