Often, the way I lead an intuitively-led life is by following the breadcrumbs that appear on the path in front of me. These aren’t big revelations, arriving in my consciousness like a thunderclap. They’re the smaller signs and signals, the nudges and notes I’m fortunate to pick up on as I wander about.
Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert was one of the whispers.
A writer friend posted that it was on sale for the next day or two at some stupidly easy-to-buy price, $0.99 or $1.99 as an ebook. An internal nudge told me to get it, even though Elizabeth Gilbert wasn’t an author I thought I wanted to read again.
I’d read Eat, Pray, Love in 2006 while in the throes of parenting a toddler. I’m not sure why. It was possibly a book club read, before a tumultuous second pregnancy and subsequent baby pushed a social life aside. I loved being a new mother and, yet, I was jealous of the author’s exploration of food and culture across the globe. I’d held the grudge every since.
At least until I started reading Big Magic.
The beginning seemed so familiar. Had I started reading it at some point prior but gave it up? Read excerpts from it online or in a magazine? I don’t know. But it resonated, so I kept reading.
If you’re already living your life to the fullest, feeling creative and satisfied, you might not need this book. Even then it’s a good reminder and affirmation that you’re carving out the space you need in the world.
For everyone else, read this book. Give yourself the permission you need to free up that inner part of you that longs to be expressed.
Creativity can come in so many ways. You don’t have to be a writer or an artist, make music or sculpt statues. You can find creativity in knitting, cooking dinner, gardening, fermenting foods, pretty much anything. (Yes, these are ways I personally enjoy being creative.) Maybe you’re a creative cookie decorator. Or a dog groomer. I don’t know. But there are ways for you to unleash your personal brand of creativity on the world.
Big Magic is a good book for writers and folks who create tangible things. But it works no matter what you create. And it has just the right amount of woo-woo for me.
So I hereby rescind my grudge, Elizabeth, for the life you were able to lead that I, then or now, was not. I’m glad you found your path and keep shining the light for us to find or stay true to our own.