“Eat, pray, love” Elizabeth Gilbert
(Riverhead books, 2007)
“Eat, pray, love” by Elizabeth Gilbert tells the autobiographical journey of a woman who offers herself a sabbatical year to recover from a stormy divorce followed by an unconvincing love affair. During this year, she will stay in three countries, Italy, India and Indonesia.
In Italy, she goes in search of the pleasure of living and finds the art of savouring beautiful things and tasting good food.
“In a world of disorder and disaster and fraud, sometimes only beauty can be trusted. Only artistic excellence is incorruptible. Pleasure cannot be bargained down. And sometimes the meal is the only currency that is real.”
In India she stays in an ashram where she sets out to seek devotion; she tries to free her thoughts from all the evils that paralyze her life in order to reach spiritual serenity. “We spend our time excavating the past, or scrutinizing the future, but we rarely rest in the present moment …… The present is the only place and the only time to find God. ”
Finally in Indonesia, she finds through love a kind of balance between earthly life and spiritual life. “The best thing to do in response to our incomprehensible and dangerous world is to train ourselves to maintain the balance” internally “whatever the madness that transpires here below. ” and
“To lose balance sometimes for love is part of living a balanced life“
Superbly written, this novel puts words on emotions which might be difficult to say and opens the doors of hope to the person who believes that everything is finished after a love disappointment. I strongly recommend it to all women in the process of divorce or separation, but also to all the persons who are looking for inner peace.
Read to Heal 