Eat, Pray, Love

That afternoon when I first open the book page, all I could remember is that it came up to be a stunning, unforgettable experience. I took my desk as Italy, pursuing pleasure in the sentences. Imagine the novel as India, allow the book bring me devotion and fulfill my emptiness of mind. Ultimately, my study spontaneously became Indonesia, balanced the comfort and disorder of the outside world.

Elizabeth Gilbert was a successful American woman. She had a career as a writer and lived a wealthy life. It all seemed perfect before a devastating divorce. She was deeply hurt and decided to embark on a healing trip to search for consolations. She spent four months in Italy, enjoying gourmet and pleasure of life. After that, she headed for India and stayed for three months. In India, she figured out several answers to her confusing life through meditation. She than spent her rest of the year in Bali, Indonesia. There she found balance and love in the form of a Brazilian businessman.

One issue the book tries to explore is loneliness. “When I get lonely these days, I think: So BE lonely. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person’s body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings.” Sometimes I suffer a lot from loneliness, always wishing somebody could stay by my side. To draw attention from family and friends, I used to make great effort which consumed all of my time and energy to please others. But after reading this novel, I realized that loneliness is sometimes a hint to transform our life style. To live lonely, means more time to search for who we really want to be and more opportunities to make decisions with our intuition, without being interfered by others. Loneliness doesn’t stand for the desperation of being alone, but for the blessing to live our own life.

Another point the author talks about is imperfection. “There’s a crack (or cracks) in everyone, that’s how the light of God gets in.” Nobody can live a life without falling. Everyone faces different obstacles in every sort of circumstances, though it may sometimes leave scars after it passes or causes irreparable wounds, but as what I believe after reading through this book, the sorrow we’ve been through would all turn into aisles for hope to come in. The crack, the failure, whatever it is called shouldn’t be blamed. The truth is we should feel blessed to have all those in ourselves. They’re marks of a hard-working life, they’re gifts we gain from awful experiences, and they’re our motivation for us to reach perfection. Without the cracks, one will be arrogant and unwilling to improve, and the light of faith and religion wouldn’t be able to enter to strengthen our hearts.

It’s like taking a long walk in the forest sharing life experiences with the author when I was reading this book. It makes me feel like that the author is talking directly to my heart. Comforting and encouraging me with her life story. Reading this book doesn’t make me feel tense, but relaxing. Her tender words, seems to be a stream of warmth running in my soul, gave me power and energy to stand up from whatever beats me down. She didn’t exaggerate anything, but the way she describes her struggle and recovery was so humbling and unforgettable. I couldn’t stop pondering, if I could stand up again after encounting serious frustration such as a divorce? And do I have the courage to free myself from the grief of losing my love or not? Maybe I’m not sure of my answers right now, but I believe the book Eat, Pray, Love will always be there as my lighthouse, not only offering me a beautiful story to temporarily escape from the sorrow, but also leads me to stand firm.