Creativity Living Beyond Fear — Elizabeth Gilbert

When I started reading the first few pages of this book, I didn’t expect myself to be a big fan of Big Magic. How wrong I was. This book succeeds to touch my heart in many ways. The Author of this book is Elizabeth Gilbert. One of the international Bestseller Authors. No doubt she is a brilliant writer.

There are both negative and positive observations about this book. Even I found some points which I cannot totally sympathise with her perspectives. So I have a mix feeling toward this book. Somehow when I continued my reading, I fount it more interesting.

This is not an article of review for the Big Magic. The sole purpose of writing this article is to share few of the remarkable words I found in this book.

Decorate the temporary life

“Confused, I asked, “You mean, all your tattoos are temporary?” She smiled and said, “No, Liz. My tattoos are permanent; it’s just my body that’s temporary. So is yours. We’re only here on earth for a short while, so I decided a long time ago that I wanted to decorate myself as playfully as I can, while I still have time.”

“I love this so much, I can’t even tell you. Because — like Eileen — I also want to live the most vividly decorated temporary life that I can. I don’t just mean physically; I mean emotionally, spiritually, intellectually. I don’t want to be afraid of bright colours, or new sounds, or big love, or risky decisions, or strange experiences, or weird endeavours, or sudden changes, or even failure.”

Yeah… this hit me a bit hard. Most of us used to live our life with fear of changes and fear for new challenges. It’s all because of our predictions for failures. But as Elizabeth states, what’s the point of not even trying. We live in a temporary life anyway. so why not decorate it with more colours.

The Shit Sandwich

“Everything sucks, some of the time.” You just have to decide what sort of suckage you’re willing to deal with. So the question is not so much “What are you passionate about?” The question is “What are you passionate enough about that you can endure the most disagreeable aspects of the work?”

“If you want to be a professional artist, but you aren’t willing to see your work rejected hundreds, if not thousands, of times, then you’re done before you start. If you want to be a hotshot court lawyer, but can’t stand the eighty-hour workweeks, then I’ve got bad news for you.”

“What’s your favourite flavour of shit sandwich?”

No success is easily achievable. There is a hard way to climb for every success we talk about. So we need to have the courage to face the real Sh**y struggles along the way.

Have an Affair

“Stop treating your creativity like it’s a tired, old, unhappy marriage (a grind, a drag) and start regarding it with the fresh eyes of a passionate lover. Even if you have only fifteen minutes a day in a stairwell alone with your creativity, take it. Go hide in that stairwell and make out with your art! (You can get a lot of making out done in fifteen minutes, as any furtive teenager can tell you.) Sneak off and have an affair with your most creative self. Lie to everyone about where you’re actually going on your lunch break. Pretend you’re traveling on a business trip when secretly you’re retreating in order to paint, or to write poetry, or to draw up the plans for your future organic mushroom farm.”

Giving at least a few minutes of our day for our most important life goals, will make a huge difference in our lives. The way she explain that, comparing it to a love affair is simply stunning.

“Ah, my ego! There you are, old friend!”

“I have learned to watch my heated emotions carefully, but I try not to take them too seriously, because I know that it’s merely my ego that has been wounded — never my soul. It is merely my ego that wants revenge, or to win the biggest prize. It is merely my ego that wants to start a Twitter war against a hater, or to sulk at an insult, or to quit in righteous indignation because I didn’t get the outcome I wanted.”

How wonderful these words are. A great clause of life advice, which we all need to consider about. When we hurt by someone or something, most of the time we react by the reason of our ego. And our mind is tricking us to believe so. Think clear before all the actions you take. Our brain is very tricky. So do not believe everything it says. Don’t let your ego overcome you.

Let it go

“First of all, forgive yourself. If you made something and it didn’t work out, let it go. Remember that you’re nothing but a beginner — even if you’ve been working on your craft for fifty years. We are all just beginners here, and we shall all die beginners. So let it go. Forget about the last project, and go searching with an open heart for the next one”

We cannot expect everything to be perfect and flawless. Also we can’t be success in every step we take and it’s not our fault. We all are human and it’s normal to make mistakes and failures. So we need to learn how to forgive ourselves.

This is one of the interesting books i read so far. Elizabeth has shared stories from her life and giving advises to the readers in a very fascinating way. Also there are a lot of things which I needed to mention here. But I want my readers to find this article less boring. So here are my last few words from Big Magic…

“Curiosity is the truth and the way of creative living.” — Elizabeth Gilbert