Monday, January 11, 2010

The Divine Genuis

I'm always hesitant when a book becomes a bestseller, and I'll admit I have yet to read a line of anything written by Elizabeth Gilbert other than articles and interviews, but as her new book Committed is making its debut, this talk of hers from Ted.com (which came out in February of last year) has come up in multiple conversations over the past few days. It has encouraged me enough to share. Hope you enjoy:

4 comments:

Rebecca D. Martin said...

Wow. Fantastic, and yes - encouraging.

I had to transcribe this because it rang so true in a way and reassured me:

"This [fear that your best work is already done and behind you] is one of the most painful reconciliations to make in a creative life. But maybe it doesn’t have to be quite so full of anguish. If you never happened to believe in the first place that the most extraordinary aspects of your being came from you, but maybe if you just believed that they were on loan to you from some unimaginable source for some exquisite portion of your life, to be passed along when you’re finished to somebody else . . . ”

That last part - a beautiful picture.

Elizabeth Dark Wiley said...

Yes, I noted the same part. The "vessel" stuff is quite wonderful. Always is.

elizabeth said...

i'm sitting in a car dealership
waiting for some brake pads
looking to pass the time
by frequenting my favorite blogs.

thats how i landed on this post!

and the weird thing is, i think it just changed the way i view the entire creative process(?)

naturally this sort of revelation happens when one gets new brake pads

Unknown said...

Thank you. How easy it is to treat creativity as a burden, forgetting it is also a gift. I needed the reminder.