Elizabeth M. Gilbert is an American author, essayist, short story writer, biographer, novelist, and memoirist. She is best known for her 2006 memoir, "Eat, Pray, Love" which had spent over 200 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller's List, and which was also made into a film by the same name in 2010 starring Julia Roberts.
Gilbert discussed the odds in keeping up with the creative pursuits and shared how she learned to cope with these pressures. Unlike other professions, creative professionals (either in writing, painting, artists and others)had this reputation of a battle with depression and mental instability. She cited the pressures she experienced after her success with Eat, Pray, Love and how she learned from the creative process of notable writers and recognizing that there is a higher being apart from herself that is responsible for her creative genius.
Gilbert's best advice for people in the creative field:
"And what I have to sort of keep telling myself when I get really psyched out about that is don't be afraid. Don't be daunted. Just do your job. Continue to show up for your piece of it, whatever that might be. If your job is to dance, do your dance. If the divine, cockeyed genius assigned to your case decides to let some sort of wonderment be glimpsed, for just one moment through your efforts, then "Olé!" And if not, do your dance anyhow. And "Olé!" to you, nonetheless. I believe this and I feel that we must teach it. "Olé!" to you, nonetheless, just for having the sheer human love and stubbornness to keep showing up." - Elizabeth Gilbert
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Here's the complete transcript from TEDTAlks:
I am a writer. Writing books is my profession but it's more than that, of course. It is also my great lifelong love and fascination. And I don't expect that that's ever going to change. But, that said, something kind of peculiar has happened recently in my life and in my career, which has caused me to have to recalibrate my whole relationship with this work. And the peculiar thing is that I recently wrote this book, this memoir called "Eat, Pray, Love" which, decidedly unlike any of my previous books, went out in the world for some reason, and became this big, mega-sensation, international bestseller thing. The result of which is that everywhere I go now, people treat me like I'm doomed. Seriously -- doomed, doomed! Like, they come up to me now, all worried, and they say, "Aren't you afraid you're never going to be able to top that? Aren't you afraid you're going to keep writing for your whole life and you're never again going to create a book that anybody in the world cares about at all, ever again?"
