I believe that the problem with romanticizing travel is that people tend to believe they will feel special, when in fact it's exactly the opposite: you realize how little you, your problems, your interests, your thoughts, your opinions matter to the rest of the world. And that's precisely what makes it so enrichening. The lack of that awareness is what takes me aback from this movie and most travel movies.
absolutely. i never ran away from anything while travelling, just towards something. the intercultural experience lays bare and proves that social constructs are just that, constructs. not natural law. so it's really not worth stressing about them so much. i wish i could travel more...
You can see your problems better when removed from the location. Just like ots easier to solve others' solutions to their problems than your own.. Travel broadens the mind.
Considering another relationship was the story book ending that basically made everything else kind of useless... gorgeous man in gorgeous place etc. They ditched him for another partner...and another book.
The whole "Americans have such a fast paced life, Europeans really know how to enjoy doing nothing" mindset seems so weird to me, because Europeans also have jobs to get to and errands to run. I feel like a waiter not talking to you every 10 minutes is just a business practice and not a profound philosophical way of life, I don't think it is that deep. Here in European countries people are also really into productivity and hustle. This "they really know how to relax" is a really romanticizes view of a foreign country, it only feels this way if you are on a vacation somewhere, not if you live and work there. Great video essay!
I live next to Chicago where hustle culture is in full swing and people literally work themselves to death and I used to live in Tennessee where relaxing was encouraged. It honestly depends on where in America you’re talking about. But in comparison to Chicago, I’m positive that Europe looks very relaxing and luxurious.
Yeah it's weird. I usually find the "fast paced grind lifestyle" is usually an urban thing. If you visit rural or undeveloped parts of the U.S it's almost like visiting another country with how different the culture and communities are.
Europe is not one single monolith, and it really depends on each country. I feel that southern Europe is far more keen on enjoying life than the rest of europe. Speaking as southern european myself.
I do hear what you're saying and I think the "fast paced" American life is more the case in certain regions - particularly in the big cities along both coasts- European hustle culture is still going to be more relaxing in comparison, especially compared to someplace like New York City. But if you go to the south, like New Orleans, or some of the smaller cities on the coast, like Portland, you will find a more relaxed vibe.
@@imahoare4742 its definitely different but the underlying idea of i need to work hard all the time is still there. the us has a weirdly strong belief of prosperity gospel. if u dont know its the idea that prosperous people are a result of doing good in life and being rewarded by god so to show to others and prove to them and yourself that you are a strong christian being blessed by god, you work hard to ensure this image is preserved. and it becomes this loop of competition and constantly being unsatisfied. its ingrained in the culture and not specifically the religion. there is a constant idea that the ideal perfect image of an american is a hardworking something. it also relies on the lie that hard work always will be rewarded and outwardly shown and effort always leads to improvement.
One of my takeaways from spending my 20s traveling was that no matter where you go, you cannot outrun yourself. Ultimately, this led me to move back home to Chicago, buy a house, and settle into caring for my elderly father. It's the best decision I ever made and, difficult as it can be, I don't regret it in the least. Being in one place means you learn to 'tend to your garden' rather than always assuming the grass is greener somewhere else. Eventually, I even found love and it's been better than the transient relationships I used to have with other people who didn't know themselves very well.
I also took care of my elderly father. He had cancer, and I stayed with him as he progressively worsened. When he died, I was stuck inside working and because of Covid. Now I want to travel. Just get out of the house and see different things. I'm not looking for a spiritual journey, just to have a change of scenery for a bit. I don't see what's so bad about that.
I had the same experience. Always looked forward to the next place to travel to or move to, to avoid my problems. Travel is 100% escapism. I’m now staying put to deal with my decade old issues.
@@ellengill360 There's nothing bad about traveling itself - it's great and I highly recommend it. I still travel for leisure as much as I can--I just don't make it a lifestyle or a personality. What's 'bad', or at least not as good as purported, is traveling to find yourself. Your true self should not be preoccupied with novelty; it should be present in your day-to-day life.
Have you ever thought of writing your own memoir? Either by writing it yourself or working with a ghost writer? It honestly sounds like it could be a beautiful and touching story!
The fact she encountered an underage girl who was forced into an arranged marriage and her first thought was her own failed relationship is so wild to me 💀
Interesting, this reminds me.of that time when I was 15, and went to Arabia-Oman with my parents, and we ran into a girl at the beach that was my age celebrating her upcoming wedding the next day, and my mom told me that it is incredible how this girl is so mature and has to consider stuff like marriage and I am such an immature brat in contrast. It was one of these parenting moments where I was told that someone else would be happy to be im my place. Sometimes we would profit more from keeping thoughts like that to ourselves😂
@@corneliahanimann2173that girl who was sold into an arranged marriage was more mature than you not by choice. She should have been given the possibility to be an immature 15 year old, but alas.
I watched the movie and remember thinking it was just a depressed woman feeling better after a long vacation. After hearing the video essay i imagine the book being basically an overcomplification of a long vacation making you feel better. It also kinda feeling scummy going to poor countries, saying to yourself, see, money doesn't buy happiness! And then making a lot of money from that and never doing anything with that thought.
After living the SAME LIFE with the SAME HUSBAND for over 20 years, I suddenly feel inspired by this film. Yes, we all need a GETAWAY and a REINVENTION. I think there are probably less "spiritual" works out there than this one.
@@MsElke11knew a devoted couple who took a year apart. The wife moved to a different country for a years working holiday. Why not? Meet up in beautiful places, through the time as well. True love will be waiting for you, after a year away ❤
This video was a sign! Currently going through a divorce and I seriously considered a long year of travel a la Liz Gilbert because that’s what my friends encouraged. But late last night I had a feeling I should stay put and work on my problems at home in my new apartment among all the boxes, and now this video showed up I feel like this was a true sign it’s the right choice. Learning to live with myself and take a hard look at my issues in the light of mundanity ❤️
Correct. Travel to see the world or to get away but it won't fix your problems. I traveled once when I was profoundly depressed and going thru some hardships and all that happened was I felt depressed in other countries. It actually caused me to not be fully present and enjoy my travels
When my marriage ended I took myself on a mini ‘eat pray love’ trip to Thailand only I was miserable and crying the entire time. I spent a long time working on my healing and the next time I went on a solo trip I had a blast, I enjoyed every minute. Take your time, allow yourself to grieve, the world will still be there when you feel ready to explore. Sending you much love
Growing up poor and closeted in an immigrant household I desperately wanted to escape my life and the idea of traveling became my obsession - I honestly thought that living like a travel blogger and going new places non stop was the solution to my situation. All of the places I traveled to have been amazing & I don’t regret any of them, but it definitely was a hard pill to swallow when I realized that my issues never went away during & after my travels. It took looking at my life and putting in the dedication, hard work, and luck to slowly start building a better life I loved in all aspects, not just thinking traveling more would solve everything. Also I went to Naples for pizza because of EPL and definitely recommend it - the pizza place she went to is still fantastic and full of locals
Unless you love making content I wouldn't become a travel blogger I think it takes joy out of travel tbh, but with that said I always long to travel more because it's the one time I get away from work and they can't contact me it's such a nice mental vacation.
90% of my traveling has been work related, I have a tight budget and have to accommodate even food. I would never be able to afford traveling like these privileged women.
Idk most pizza places in naples are very good also most italian tell you to go there when you arrive they call it the eat pray love pizzeria and it’s also quite expensive so eh wouldn’t say it’s incredible
honestly .. I've travelled Italy for years and it's pizza isn't all that good. America does far better pizza in my opinion. I had a better pizza in Buxton Derbyshire at the weekend than I ever had in Italy
I feel like the book, unintentionally (which imo is the best way) gives us a perfect window into the head of this affluent white woman falling prey to all the trappings of orientalism and self help spirituality. The book is cringe and uncomfortable but I feel like that's what makes it worth while. Without her complete lack of self awareness, it would have just been a woman coming to pretty obvious conclusions that have been reached before. But as it is, she demonstrates a complete inability to fathom the meaning of her actions, behaviour and environment in a way that is a clear product of the time, her upbringing and the social context of the situation. EPL is a character study written by a main character completely unaware that they are giving away far more than they mean to.
In did a perfect resume, American psychofette eating in Naples dorsia, killing some homeless NY man is evidently worse than forcing a Bali woman to buy a house when you want, and I am glad that she did, but the amount of power that they have over poor ppl lives and that they exercise for their own satisfaction, without any insight is a times amusing at times disgusting.
Tricky thing about personal growth novels is that usually the person’s development doesn’t look very epic: my awesome year long journey was from feeling guilty of playing video games to playing video games without feeling guilty. For me it’s a hard earned self improvement, but can it be interesting as a book? Well, I didn’t lose weight, didn’t start a business, didn’t earn a ton of money, didn’t move to an exciting country. So, I guess not
I'd read that book! You should write about your experience anyway! You could help people who feel ostracized for being gamers, or inspire people who want to play games but won't based on whatever stigma it may have.
My problem with the book was not Liz's privilege so much as the way she was very obviously spinning events to put herself in the best light possible. Her affair didn't surprise me at all. And then during the travels, she would occasionally get really pretentious about her travels and all "you wouldn't understand this cultural thing because you just have to be there...like me." Or, my favorite, "I don't have the time to explain this right now." Like, isn't the whole point of writing transporting your reader into the setting so they can better understand your mindset? I got the feeling that because she was paid for this year-long vacation, she was desperate to find something to write about. There was just something phony about the whole thing.
There's a segment in the show 'Bojack Horseman' that kinda spoofs on this process. It describes a writer who gives herself a directionless assignment that should presumably result in a memoir. After a massive mental break, it becomes clear that finding "herself" was the cause of her depression. She ends up writing a whimsical piece of fiction that attracts a much better reception than the "navel gazing" project she set out to write. I can't help but think this was a catharsis for people who desperately wanted Liz Gilbert to figure it all out
I'm an immigrant living in Japan for the past five years and have been feeling...an extremely complicated and nuanced range of things that I've spent the better part of four years trying to understand. Before I came here I was seduced by the travel blogs and books like this one due to a dissatisfaction with my life, self, etc. I am extremely fortunate that I was able to escape my country, but my shadow is attached to my feet no matter how far I walk. This video has definitely helped frame some things in a way where I don't feel so "lost". It's nice to know I'm not the only one, judging by the comment section, too.
It can be rough. I am not a miserable person for the most part. However, I think for a lot of immigrants are days when you have a problem and the realisation that you are cut off from the people who would support you through it can be crushing at that moment. Do you ever visit your home country?
@@Blanche_255 to me its not but then its personal so you are not wrong too for you. I once met a woman in kyoto and she told me that i was the first person to speak to her in 3 days she was in japan. We two are still in touch after years. She didn't see this as an advantage.
Thanks for the hour long analysis! I like how this film subverts typical clichés prominent in many a rom com, such as "Travelling to find oneself." In actuality, you'll still be the same person you were before you left, and your problems don't just magically disappear.
Yes you will be the same person, but the experience can change you. You most certainly won’t be the same person when you come back. Even the realization that traveling won’t help your problems makes you a different person than when you first left.
God, someone once criticized me for taking time after high-school to just exist, write, be myself, and go to therapy, without the pressures of work or school. They basically told me that I was living my life wrong, and was wasting time, because if I wasn't going to college, I was supposed to be working, or traveling to "find myself," (yes, they literally told me that if I'm not working or in school, I'm supposed to travel to "find myself," they used that exact term) nevermind that I did far more "finding of myself" with my therapist in that time than I would have by traveling, I had absolutely no ability to travel (no driver's license, no money, and no people to travel with, which would have been terribly unsafe for a 100 pound young woman, fresh out of high school) and a crippling and barely managed anxiety disorder that prevented me from functioning in certain situations, such as a work environment (and airports, the idea of going through TSA again still makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry). I resent the idea that I'm more likely to "find myself" in a foreign place, than if I give myself time and space in a familiar, safe environment, with my therapist.
@@IceRiver1020 I hope it's not weird to say but I'm so proud of you! Therapy and facing yourself are not for the faint hearted. Travelling is something anyone (w money and w/o anxiety of course) can handle and doesn't take nearly as much bravery as what you did. But of course self inquiry and such doesn't make money really so we're being sold the idea that travel is the cure. So many people fall for that and it's a shame that they don't see the value of true individual mental health journeys.
@@Shirumoon Thank you, there's no end to the road of self improvement, but I've come a long way since then. I would love to travel and see new places, just not as a way to fix myself or my problems, but to see and experience new things, which is something that my anxiety disorder has held me back from for much of my life. It would be, for me, a measure of growth I've already had, rather than a search for it. Traveling is great, but doing it to "find yourself" is not the best reason for it, and I think one might enjoy it more if they're not weighed down by whatever they're running from, or searching for.
I feel like when you know after she wrote this she ended up leaving the man she met in the book when she realized she was in love with her female best friend who was dying of cancer and ended up being with her and loving her until her death it changes how simple of a human some paint her to be
@@officialmkamzeemwatela Why do you say that? If there's anything that deserves to be critiqued, it's the western belief in individualism, something that hundreds of millions of people are indoctrinated into, which is not something that deserves to be framed as pathological. Nearly every human has some narcissistic tendencies. Very, very few of us are clinically diagnosable.
well how do you politely breakup with someone dying of cancer (when/even if you want to)? Especially if you're in the public eye and have a budding dodgy romantic reputation? Even the most unbridled free-wheeler may sit tight till the end of that show. I used to work with cancer patients and their families.
“If you are sad where you are, and then you get on a plane to Italy, the *you* in Italy will be the *same sad you* from before, just in a new place!” - Adam Sandler, SNL sketch “Romano Tours”
"There's a lot a vacation can do. Help you unwind. See some different looking squirrels. But it cannot fix deeper issues. Like how you behave in group settings or your general baseline mood. That's a job for incremental lifestyle changes sustained over time."
I agree to some extent, but some countries genuinely are better than others for certain people. I think it's possible to find happiness in another country that you weren't born in.
I didnt read the book. So im basing this on your hard work. The thing is traveling, especially traveling alone can be a very useful resource in battling depression. Travel forces you to be in the moment more, to "problem solve" usually manageable and enjoyable problems (like finding a beautiful place to eat a pizza you were craving). It can help center you in the present moment and current experience more and allow you to seek enjoyment and joy without wracking your brain with all the things you need to do today. It also kind of forces you to focus on others,on your environment and get out of your depression soaked brain. That might sound silly to someone who hasnt experienced a severe depressive episode. But one of the things people with depression struggle with is experiencing and finding moments of joy, they often feel like they are overwhelmed with reponsibility and making wrong decisions, which can make them very crippled and anxious in making decisions, etc. It can absolutely be a useful tool for someone with depression to kind of get a jump start in a lot of these. But ultimately, its just a resource. It goesnt have magical healing abilities. It wont fix you. But it can give you material and information to work with further in improving your life. It can help give you a bit of relief and energy to work on yourself, if your depression was leaving you severely exhausted and depleted. To work on mindfulness in your life. The silliest example I can think of, if you found joy in finding nice places to eat, look into how you can incorporate that into your everyday life when you come back,maybe once a month, maybe once a week, maybe once in 3 months, whatever works for you. Stimulating your body? Maybe finding a workout, dance class, practicing yoga, or maybe massages are what will bring some enjoyment in your life. A romance got you? Was it the romance? Was it the sex? Was it meeting new people? Or maybe youre craving more physical contact with people that you can then maybe find with friends? etc. You get the point. Travel wont solve your problems (unless your problems are sistemical to the place you live, which i mean hey maybe thats what you learn on your trip and you decide to work towards living somewhere else), but it can be a helpful resource, that you can use to then make improvements to your everyday life.
In my experience (and I did not just have one depressive "episode", but actual depression) - what you are describing is horrible advice. Dangerous, even. Moreover, it is totally unmanageable. If you suffer from depression, nearly everything you mention is completely out of reach. "Craving" food? Typically, you lose any sense of hunger, forget meals, everything tastes bland or bitter, every bite of food is a struggle, a fight, a hard work that you detest and have to force yourself to take. Because worthless pieces of sh*t like yourself don't deserve any food, because they don't deserve to live. Eating is crazy hard work, nothing you'd "crave". And there sure as heck isn't any joy in it when you are depressed. Planning a trip, moreover, alone - when even tasks like getting up and brushing your teeth are nearly unmanageable?! How??? "Finding things to enjoy" - I beg your pardon! Depression is when you literally can't enjoy, when your body isn't able to enjoy a n y t h i n g any longer. Everything that seems like other people would enjoy is making you hurt even more, makes it a dozen times harder, makes you even more ashamed about you pathetic existence. Beauty and "nice things" become unbearable, because they exist only for all the other, happy people. Every nice or generally "enjoyable" thing tells you that you are unworthy and should be ashamed that you cannot feel joy any longer. And so much more! Let's not even begin with all the decisions that planning or going on a trip means - that you are unable to do any longer. Depression will make you sit on a desk for hours, struggling extremely hard to try to decide which destination or hotel or xyz would be right - and you just can't make decisions anymore! Everything just makes you feel like of course your decision will be the worst decision - regardless what you pick. You will sit for hours without being able to decide anything and you will cry and be ashamed that you aren't even able to decide anything. I was asked to go on a wonderful trip with some friends when I was depressed and it was absolutely, utterly I m p o s s i b l e to go. Depression makes nearly everything you mentioned - impossible. Depressed brains aren't able to feel *any* joy, they've unlearned how. Same with making decisions. Sorry to say (if that may not be true), but you talk like you have no real idea what actual, climical Depression really is. Going on a trip alone while being actually, clinically depressed, can very much k*ll you. No kidding. I know it would have k*lled me. While an alone-trip might be a wonderful, healing thing that helps you grow for a person that may be a little down or is overworked - the same thing is actually dangerous and cruel for people with actual depression. Because their brains don't work like the brains of healthy people any longer. Please, please, stop with such bullsh*it advice! It is harmful!
I don't want to discredit your experience but for me, travelling is not a resource. A mental health resource as I learned is something you can do at any given time whenever you need it to help yourself, both in everyday life and in unusual situations. Travelling makes me feel better just as any other type of consumption does. Yeah, it's healthier for my body and mind than fast food or social media and it can be a type of exposure therapy. But in the end it's something that gives me a high which doesn't last longer than a few days or weeks after I arrive back home. And then what, book the next trip? Really addicting. I wholeheartedly agree though that you can and should use whatever positive experiences and emotions you take back and put that energy into cultivating a good life within the mundane. But tbh I don't know a single person who has done that so I personally wouldn't recommend travel as more than a fun experience.
I’ve had a similar experience before. While I wasn’t depressed at the time, it did help me out in a number of ways eg. gaining confidence in my ability to figure things out on my own, realizing things I like/want to do more and applying that when I got back home, reflecting on my current situation. I had made some assumptions about what path I wanted to take but I realized there were other options that’d also be interested in. Traveling forces me to make the most of my time and get moving, which by itself also helps my mood. Although I had kind of a specific situation and it happened to work out that way. I wasn’t expecting so much self-reflection just wanted a trip haha
Travel doesn't cure you, but sometimes that's the point of a book. The travel isn't what cures the character, but since that doesn't tell the reader what *does* cure you, the story often has to have the character discover (or sometimes stumble into) something that actually does cure the character, or better: tells the reader what would have worked. Originally, the best stories did this, but copycats often fail to make this distinction.
I get what you're saying, and it's true - wherever you go, there you are. However in my personal experience, taking the time to travel or road trip or just put myself in a different environment helps me reset my energy, get out of routines, and look at things in a new light. Going to other places doesn't fix me, but the act of movement and experiencing different things does help me significantly. Then when I come home, I see home differently.
I wanted to write a similar comment. Travelling doesn't make a totally different person out of me but it does change me one bit at a time and helps me have a broader view of life.
Exactly. Not to judge others who are not constantly, “doing the work…” but you’re traveling wrong if you’re taking nothing away from it. if you only see the same reflection of yourself in a different environment, stop looking inward… look outward and let your new environment overcome your ego. People who say, “wherever you go, there you are,” or whatever the saying is… well duh… you cannot go somewhere new expecting to “find yourself.” You shouldn’t be looking to find answers, but rather questions… like I said, if you’re doing right.
I think we all struggle with getting a grasp on our privilege. I think there is something good in travel because it exposes you to people and it makes you discovee yourself from a new angle. You have the opportunity to make a friend you would not have found in your initial environment, and relate to them even when their habits are so different from yours. For myself, I lived in Asia for 2-3 years, I'm half asian half european, and I look more european than asian. I think I learned a lot in that time about what it is like to be a foreigner, to have people immediately assume who I am based on the colour of my skin rather than the amount of time I have invested in trying to adapt, learning the language, learn what spending time with my family would look like had I always lived there. I'm still white, so there is still some privilege attached to that, but it made me see the lifes of foreigners in europe in a much mpre nuanced way, and it alsp made me look at my previous interactiond with foreigners in europe from a different light. There is something about this privilege, that tells us we have failed to even recognize how lucky we are, while others are not, and I don't know what to do with this information. It feels important to travel because we too often just consume the news and hear about these people from another country having died to something we consider a freakish cause, but never actually notice that these are actual people and not just numbers and headlines in articles. It is somethung to be confronted, that we consider how we are not grateful of what we have, but the people that have even less manage to find happiness. We all know that the opposite exists of that approach, that are the people that consider everything outside the western world to be less than and weaker than, and the cause of their own misery, completly ignorant of how these people have a lot to teach us.
Years ago I was working in a hotel, and a certain person mentioned in this video was staying on a tour. That person was dismissive of the staff and didn't tip *once* despite requesting a lot of extra services from the housekeepers, doormen, and room service. I think about that juxtaposition every time I see a three word phrase like "eat, pray, love" or "live, laugh, love."
India is where I fell off in the book as well. Your take is on point. It was so frustrating and privileged and felt very much like rich white woman "suffers" to be spiritual. She goes on so so so so much about how PAINFUL it is to sit there and pray in the dark in discomfort but something she HAS to do in order to be complete and connect with God. It was so pompous and I kept thinking, "You need really good therapy for the rest of your life. Not this. This is pointless and I am tired of hearing about this self imposed self centered suffering." The shift into the India section really felt like out of touch wealthy white woman finds God by being a tourist. Romanticizes the people and areas in deep poverty as if they reflect some deep meaning in connection to her own experience. Does it by embracing the most basic cherry picking new age whitewash. Thinks it is deeply profound and she literally met God. Ugh. No thank you. My therapist highly suggested it at the time as a way of letting go of some of my own new age magical stuff holding me back from being a better person. It worked. So there's that.
As someone who read the entire book (mostly because it was entertaining to see how out-of-touch Gilbert is), she reaches enlightenment (her literal words) about 2.5 months into her stay in India. Yeah.
I am Indian and that whole arc of hers was incredibly cringey and at points, loathsome. White, affluent people who want to feel different think exposing themselves to the poverty and many "exotic" customs of the "third world" will somehow change something in them. It can never happen because you can't run from yourself and your life no matter where you go and they always come to overexploited countries with a colonizer's gaze.
Does she understand quiet romantic love, the settled, comfortable kind? Honestly, I prefer long-term kind. The emotions from those early days 25ys ago still reemerge regularly, but I can have time to do the things I need to do, to have hobbies that aren't just staring soulfully into his eyes.
People that don’t understand the comfortable kind of love are often still trapped in romantic fantasy. I’ve only had a few relationships in my life and I’m now married. However, all my failed relationships all had one thing in common- me. Yes, they ended for different reasons as well but I was stuck in romantic fantasy. The idea of the spark, how love “should” be or feel. When those relationships didn’t stack up, I ended them. Thankfully I learned what comfortable and settled love was at 22. None of my previous relationships felt like home. Whereas my relationship with my husband is home.
Funny thing is, in many interviews, the writer pointed out that many people superficially misinterpret her book like 'a recipe of spirituality', when she always mentioned that there are many ways to spirituality, that she merely share her own journey.
@@garethwilliams4467 The author left that question open. Enlightenment might be not the word to look for. Rather the feeling of being content and live. Being present in the present.
@@garethwilliams4467 Journey towards something doesn't necessarily mean you arrived somewhere. There may be mini-goals scattered along the way rather than one big "aha" moment. Other people have no sign during the whole journey an one day directly have the "aha" moment. It's not the same for everyone, but the important thing is to be mindful and strive to become better.
Yes, she gets bored with stillness / sameness and needs to keep moving to fuel her creativity. She is a consumer of things, places, and of people. She is also very enterprising at selling and profiting from her "dilemma".
I was shocked listening to the video thinking this woman sounds immature and insecure as fuck. But your comment is the fleshed out explanation I was looking for. 🙏
I actually really deeply enjoyed Eat Pray Love, though I have some beefs with it. Firstly regarding the criticisms, as a woman in my 30s who got divorced because I suddenly realized I wasn't happy - just because there are millions of worse problems doesn't mean "we" (women with such problems) can't try to heal and learn from them at a merciful pace rather than "just get on with it there are people who are starving". I hate whataboutisms. It's weak argumentation. However I think Eat Pray Love's greatest weak points are (1) that Liz ends up with a man - all that just to find another man, really? and (2) it never actually delves into why her marriage 'broke', which is the crisis that launches the journey, which feels weak.
Completely agree with you about not invalidating someone experience just because there are ‘worse things’ or people that ‘suffer more’. In terms of her ending up with a man…well the author actually did end up ending up with a man, married him (wrote a book about it), then ‘fell in love’ or realised that she was ‘in love’ with a terminally ill female friend, divorced her husband and took care of her friend/lover until she passed away… I think it is safe to say that Elizabeth Gilbert has some serious issues when it comes to relationships…
@@sanell6 Yeah exactly - and I kind of wish she would've come to a more 'sage' conclusion at the end of her journey. But the ending, true or not, makes it feel like all she did was go through the motions; eat a lot of pasta and spend a few weeks in silence just to find excuses to throw herself into more relationships as soon as she's "done her time". I have friends like her who have never been on their own fully, and then as soon as they've done their bare minimum 6-9 months single they're like "that's enough now, let's tick the box and move on without any true change or reflection" like they've just been holding their breath for that time, rather than breathe more deeply.
she never delves into why the marriage ended bc it was ultimately her fault, it ended because she is a cheater. but she covered that up to make people like the character or assume it was the ex husband’s fault lmao
I remember loving this book years ago, and the movie was just ok...but I never looked it as a "how to" for finding peace in life. I looked at is as an actual memoir. I noticed a lot of things you mentioned (espeically with privelige and consumerism), but I honestly just enjoyed the read. I'd never heard of a woman setting off to travel for year in this way before, and it was fascinating just in itself to me. I do think that what it turned into on the consumer market was really, really sad, as I felt that's the exact opposite of the message you should be getting. But, it doesn't suprise me. This is America, after all.
Agree, I think the whole “how to find peace” was just a marketing ploy to sell more books. It sells the lie that if you do the same then you will experience the same outcome. But it’s not a self help book, it’s just another memoir.
I was in college and working at a library when I read this book, after all it was the hot thing and I LOVED to read and consume media about travel. I walked away from it with... complicated feelings. The italy portion honestly stuck with me and some of it's lessons were something that helped me as someone who was taught to be ashamed of my love of food and weight. But most of those lessons were in the words of other characters. However outside of a few moments, the India and Bali portions made me wince. Even being a middle class white kid, the internal experiences with prayer felt more christian in origins than truly based on eastern practices (I had some buddhist and hindu friends at the time so I had at least a vague vibe of what their experiences were, and I knew what my christian guilt riddles cycles of prayer were like, and whoo boy did EPL fall into the second), and the portrayal of non-white people was... discomforting to me when ways I couldn't quite put a finger on. Like I spent a week in Brazil a year later (my one time able to go out of the country), and when I think about the people I met inside one week it was a lot more of a diverse set of experiences with a lot more honest conversations than what Eat Pray Love has in India onward, and she spent MONTHS in those places. Years later after having mourned the loss of other writers like Anthony Bourdain who had a impact on me, I think it boils down to who and what you choose to focus on says a lot more about you and where you choose to spend your time, and what you choose to see, than anything else. In India, it was a temple catered to white tourists, with the author uninterested in authenticity of spiritual practices. In Bali, it was mostly tied to people who were beholden to the author (even if she doesn't acknowledge it) with a very present power imbalance. I can appreciate that she is a human who had a very messy internal narrative and sought to be honest about it in the book, but ultimately I'm glad that most people have forgotten about this memoir. So I really insightful analysis and exploration of this book in this vid! It helped me revisit those thoughts and explore them more.
I think is ubfa8r to compare your week în Brazil with her months în Italy for example, how yours was more active and full of New connection with people. I had both experiences. I went 1 week în itally, i meet so many new friends, and i did so many activites în just one week, yet when i went ot Spain for 6 months i barely got to meet anyone and everything was slower and i was a bit more miserable. You can't compare the intenisty of one week with the lrologness of soemonths în a place. Of course your experience was more intense because let's face it, it was shorter time, you were aware of this so you spend it more intesly and more previously because it was more limited. Add to that circumstances and see what you get. Don't compare pears with apples, they are nothing alike
@@marishkaspirit Ah, I would suggest re-reading my post again. For one- I wasn't comparing my 1 week in Brazil with her months in Italy- I was comparing my 1 week in Brazil with her entire time in India and Indonesia. The Italy portion I actually didn't have much of a problem with. Also, my framing was what you choose to focus on. I'm not judging for her not having as many experiences, but rather who and where she spent the most energy with and chose as the people to write about. Like look- my week in Brazil didn't have any life changing friendships. The stories I have from there are actually easily mirrored by experiences I've had just going shopping from my last month at home. I'm not a partier and it was mostly helping out a small business (long story). But for example- the stuff I have written down in little memory snippets is stuff like "I accidentally used the wrong gender when saying thank you in Portuguese, but the grocery cashier was so pleased I was at least trying, and amused at me failing in such a funny way and my flailing corrections, they just smiled and had a full belly laugh and waved me on thanking me back- using the wrong gendered form themselves with a wink" or "one of our guides wanted to buy me a local vodka drink with our pizza, but I declined and though she was put out I explained there was a 1k bet about making it to legal drinking age, and we had a playful debate about the ethics of lying on this bet, Brazil legal drinking age vs. US, and if vacations counted, the 'what stays in vegas' phrase may have gotten re-appropriated". (Turns out they were right and I should've taken the free drink, because when I got home the maker of this bet said "oh yeah no way I would've have counted that.") We also know the author was going out enough to eat and drink and meet others and start a romance, so I don't think your Spain experience would be a fitting analogy either.
Extremely good point about the power imbalance. It was disturbing to see clips from the movie where she is just surrounded by brown people who are waiting on her or otherwise attending to her. Strong colonialism vibes. And the lack of awareness!
Yeah I think one of the reason's the movie missed the mark (other than the book doesn't really follow a traditional narrative) is that Julia Roberts felt very miscast.
@@supervamp78 you are kidding right!? She bullied her sister for her weight and mocked her about it even after she committed suicide. Julia Roberts is a horrible person just a very different type of horrible person.
Romance will distract you but travel can heal you. I broke out of my anxiety and so many mental barriers through travel. I'm not sure if it's as easy to discover yourself with the advent of global gentrification. Part of the journey to self discovery is being uncomfortable but that's more difficult to achieve in an Airbnb world with American culture blanketing the earth. Stepping out of your world and into places that don't adjust to your needs can change you and change you forever.
I appreciate this comment because traveling can get people out of their comfort zone and help them to learn the world doesn’t revolve around them and puts them in the perspective of other cultures and ways of living
The book does come across as self indulgent and glossy at times. It reminds me of sex and the city where the main character is a privileged white woman who uses her wealth to fix her problems
Carrie wasn't wealthy. BUT she definitely did use her pretty white woman privilege to get things for sure. She was also a reckless spender. Remember the shoe episode. She was the poorest out of her friends and basically shamed Charlotte for not helping her with her money problems
Imagine coming away from a MEMOIR about a person's PERSONAL journey with a take like "it was self-indulgent". Yeah. It was. Because it was about HER. Not the world. Not a certain class of people or a general social environment or a specific culture it was about ONE. PERSON. So yes. You're getting a book about one person's perspective on their world.
When the movie first came out I was a 14 year old living in Texas who had never left my home state and who felt profoundly unlike anyone I knew. I watched this movie so many times because the idea that I could just decide to do a year of travel and get to live in all these places and learn Italian. It was incredibly tantalizing. I watched alot of travel shows and any movie about traveling that I could get my hands on because it seemed like the future I really wanted, the answer to all my problems. I don't think you or anyone reading this would be shocked to learn...it wasn't. In the 13 years since this movie was released I have lived abroad twice and lived in a different part of the US. There is usually a 'honeymoon' period to it. I think it might just be the sense of discovery or novelty to the whole thing. Or maybe just the pleasure of sitting in a fancy cafe, eating some dish that is unavailable or hard to come by back home and thinking "wow, I did it! I'm one of those cool people who live abroad!" But once that newness has worn off, you are left with yourself the same as where you came from. I have been depressed in Texas, I have been depressed in France, and I have to say, one is not "better" than the other. In fact, in a way being depressed abroad can be worse BECAUSE of movies like EPL. Sometimes when I was having a bad mental health day I'd beat myself up more about it because of where I was living like "what do I have to be depressed about? I'm in Montreal!" Not to mention being away from friends/loved ones who could potentially comfort you. I now have mixed feelings about this movie; it was incredible comfort to a lonely teen imagining what her future would look like, but it is ultimately a fantasy that adult me had to wake up from
So many people get upset about the aspect of anyone wanting to travel or live abroad whether they are happy or sad. Living abroad for ten years was the best thing I ever did for myself. I evolved, grew, and learned so much about myself and others. I did not run away from all my problems and was still myself but someone who saw beautiful places snd met life long friends. I do not get the offensive comments of “travel will not solve your problems”. Not many people expect travel to be a cure but a gateway of inspiration and slowing down to work in yourself or just simply see amazing things in this short life we have on earth. If you do not need to live in luxury then there are so many places with lower costs of living that digital nomad jobs can cover. She said travel is consumerism? Everyday life anywhere is consumerism but it actually helps the locals when you consume elsewhere. And if travel is correlated with selfishness in some peoples eyes- it is also means to volunteer and help others in less fortunate circumstances. Helping others can help yourself and if trsvel or living abroad does not change anything else in your life then you must have never left your bedroom abroad. Being depressed abroad while seeing beautiful things and eating delicious food was much better than being depressed in the rat race back home. Either way- even if you stayed depressed and did not evolve in some way- so what! You did something awesome and experienced another culture or appreciated your own culture even more. Unless you hate traveling or change then trying to convince others to stay home and not embark on an adventure is not helping them. The rat race at home will always be here. Opportunity to see other places could pass you by. I agree to seek therapy or do what needs to be done to improve your mental health but it is much more fun to do it traveling or living abroad. I know more of my former expats who stayed abroad vs coming back home. I’ve seen more people settle down and get married abroad and love their new life. Life abroad may do a little or lot for you but it will do nothing if you stay home. Discouraging anyone to do anything they want to try is wrong and can make things worse.
As a Black woman of privilege, I do feel sympathy for white women that express their experiences from their point of view and quickly get dismissed as ignorant and silly. I do feel like I have an advantage because I had similar experiences to Liz and I typically get met with praise instead of criticism.
I think traveling opens up doors in the mind and new experiences. I don't understand why people contradict the experience of the traveller. It entirely depends on where they went and what they did!
Travelling with purpose, not just sightseeing and gourmet. I avoid touristic places. Go exploring to off off the beaten track where I can mix with the still authentic locals. It's getting harder to find them these days, thanks to SNS. Don't tell those nice places to anyone.
@@jesseleeward2359 Yeah exactly. It also teaches you how to be self-reliant, trust yourself, and can show you how capable you actually are when you step out and travel to faraway places that most people in your life may have urged you not to go to. On the flip side, you can really experience the kindness of people and learn a lot about community. Not to mention, the perspective you can get from travel, realizing how trivial, and temporary many of your problems can be! It's not just about "eating food". But of course, travel in itself isn't a one-stop/fix all.
Being an Asian American from a white neighborhood, who traveled to China in 2013 gave me perspective on how people really aren't different, only culture is. The trip not only removed alot of my insecurities about my own race, but also more understanding of others different than me. Those lessons have stuck with me to this day. I would change the thumbnail title.
Loved your analysis. Though, as someone who ran away from my problems through travel and eventual immigration, I must say that sometimes a change of scenery can change you, heal you and do all the wonderful things you dream it will do.
My feeling is that escaping one's current context can definitely put things into perspective in a big way. And certainly, getting away from toxic or abusive people is a good thing! I'd question whether just distance can resolve underlying issues, though, and provide emotional healing without any further work...? 🤔
@@anna_in_aotearoa3166 for me personally, everything in my environment was to varying degrees unhealthy there wasn’t mental space to breath. The people in my life were fine but not necessarily the type of people I needed, and my home city was a place I had very strong negative associations with. I did get therapy and medication after I left but the move gave me the space to grow.
Thank you. As a teenager, I just couldn't understand why this movie was so popular or how travelling could help solve our problems. As an adult I realise it was just another superficial flick
Traveling does solve problems by changing your mindset. Meeting new people and cultures changes you and makes you more open minded. You can use your new mindset to tackle your issues better. You are being superficial and shallow towards your views on traveling
sorry, haven't watched the video yet but just needed to get this out of me chest: when i was a kid and watched the movie for the first time, i was quite proud as a wee indonesian gal seeing a part of my country represented in a fairly positive light on an international media, even if it was only the part already internationally known (so better known, in fact, that tourists/foreigners asking if "indonesia is close to bali" is a meme). then as i got older and learnt more about issues of gentrification, the crippling of local economy by being independent on tourism, and global sociopolitics and its implication of power imbalance -- i honestly can't look at it the same way anymore. especially with the scenes of those big houses the tourists stayed in? yeah, entirely unaffordable for the locals but extremely cheap or at the very least affordable to specifically tourists with dollars and euro money. the whole thing with the lady and her kid became less felt like a wholesome friends helping each other and moreso just ... white saviour complex, ig. and i can't really comment much about the india portion (an actual indian would defo have better insight and opinion about it) but it just feel icky that she interacted more with other -- importantly -- _white_ tourists/expats than the locals. it really feels like italy prolly got the best ... coverage? i guess would be the word? and like, it's hard not to see that and not just think ... "oh, she's white WHITE." (and even in italy, iirc she _still_ interacted more with other tourists than locals. it just less visible/noticable bc both the tourists and the locals are racially speaking of the same demographic, but that dynamic was very much still there.) anw, yeah. now to watch the vid lol.
I had the same experience with _I Dreamt of Africa._ As a child, I was so proud but slowly grew up into realizing these MFers glamorized colonization! Wth??
@@availanila i swear these kinds of realisation is its own type of pain esp when/if international representation of your locale is pretty rare if not outright nonexistent to begin with. but like ... at what cost?? 😭😭
Indo here, I literally GAGGED when she said she's disappointed that she's only allowed to stay in Bali for a month 😭 also, interesting how she picked Bali of all literal thousands of other islands in Indonesia, considering Bali is a region that is curated to be a tourist spot, and she didn't go to 'a less aesthetically pleasing' spots showing mundane life of Indonesia like Jakarta, let alone villages. I have the icks with white tourists coming to Indonesia to indulge in superficial level of spiritualism which then they cherry pick and mold it into their Western ideology, and proceeds to think 'poor third world country citizens and look how they're still happy while not being white 😥 they will forever be oppressed' and use it as a comparison to their personal life situation. Like, that's a jump from a political problem comparing to your divorce
I must have read it 10 years ago. It was o-k. Not mind blowing, not life changing. Just a peek into a person who went on a journey. There are better books and there are worse books. I think sometimes books become popular because it’s attractive enough for non-bookworms to pick up the book and they end up celebrating the book if it was surprisingly enjoyable. Which isn’t necessarily about the book itself but about them realizing that reading is enjoyable. I remember my building manager being excited about finishing what sounded like a very mediocre book, and it’s just that she didn’t have any comparison to other books and was just excited that she accomplished reading a book. I’ve always believed that Eat Pray Love attracted these new readers, because I don’t see any justification for it to be popular in any other way.
Plus it was like being apart of something culturally, like watching a popular tv show to participate in the water cooler chat. I remember getting "pulled into" reading and discussing this book with others.
That’s a really insightful observation. I think something similar could be said about books like The Da Vinci Code or even Twilight. The writing style in those is not impressive, but it’s approachable - Da Vinci Code reads like a clunky news-magazine article, for example. Plus everyone is talking about whichever book, so it can’t be that hard to read it. So they give it a try.
I saw this movie, never read this book. For me, it was about trying something new, fumbling around and messing up and keep going anyway. It does seem like a justification for american exceptionalist psychopathy... but in my head it was all about just living anyway, no matter what your misunderstanding of life is because "understanding" life is a delusion we squeeze our myopic self into. I didn't worry about how she got it wrong, I just loved seeing her enjoying her life as she missed the point of the journey. Like watching someone learning a new foreign language. You don't care if they get the words wrong, you just celebrate that they are honestly trying to stretch outside of their comfort zone for something better.
Just like Sex and The City, this book/movie *reeks* of wealthy, self indulgent, urbanite glamorization of the foreign or exotic to drown the sorrows of the consequences of your actions. I just can't stand it. I appreciate the honesty she writes with but the whole thing just kinda comes off as pretentious and self inflating rather than an actual journey of self reflection and self discovery physically, spiritual or otherwise.
I think the difference between the two authors is Candace Bushnell uses humor to point out the flaws and silliness of her characters. Carrie is a type of anti-hero we can love/hate. Whereas "eat pray love" author takes herself 100% seriously, and gives herself a straight protagonist role. She even hides facts that would make her harder to sympathize with (like her adultery)
I didn't go to college. It's just a trend I've noticed amongst out of touch, self inflated urbanites or liberals that think they're holier than thou for a very superficial understanding of a complex ideology or issue.
Hey, I'm just some random dude who listens to your videos at work (I work at a dusty little cabinet shop). Thanks for making these videos, they really help the day go by while giving me things to think about, and I appreciate all of it.
Yes, but I've found my spiritual path to be extremely helpful so if I had the means of staying at the ashram of my guru's for a year, I'd gladly take that opportunity. It's not just the place. Though I don't get the sense she had nearly as deep a connection with her spiritual journey and was trying it on like an accessory more so.
I wonder if her relationship with Rayya was enticing simply because she knew the relationship would be short-lived due to Rayya’s terminal diagnosis. Liz simply never found herself and is continually looking for that spark, that thing that will make her happy.
This is great reflection. It comes across sounding negative, but you did give the appropriate degree of consideration to the author's perspective while simultaneously at the choices she made in her personal life.
The attitude toward medication as a failure if you have to take it is still a common one. My own mom struggles with this; we both got diagnosed with ADHD at the same time
So true. I've been on and off (mostly on) meds for a decade. But I recently caught myself saying 'I've been off meds for a year!' to a group of friends, and they all congratulated me. But then I thought about it for a second like, oh yeah, I've had a really crappy year. I should PROBABLY BE ON MEDS. Idk how this mindset of off-meds = healthy, is so ingrained!!
My brain literally cannot survive without medication. I’ve tried so many times to lower the dose or come off antidepressant’s, but my brain chemistry has just been screwed since I was a kid. And it’s ok to stay on them. There’s literally no downside to me staying on them lol
my mom (a licensed therapist btw🙃) discouraged and fearmongered about any and all psych meds for years, all while belittling me for displaying symptoms of my various mental illnesses so yeah, med shaming is very real and VERY harmful, getting proper treatment literally saved my life
ADHD diagnosis since 1998 here. Later tried different meds over the course of 6 years with side effects ranging from manageable to severe. I never felt like myself on them, although my teachers were pleased since I guess I was more manageable. I just felt like I was seeing everything thru a film (a la Claritin Clear commercials lol). I took myself off them at 16 and never looked back. I would rather feel like me, with my crazy brain instead.
This video popped up in my feed in the nick of time. I have an aunt(Mom's sister) who has a bizarre obsession with travel. My mother's has had significant health issues which required me to move Mom into an assisted living facility. I cannot count on my aunt for anything. If I ask for help, I get a nasty response about how it makes her feel. It makes sense now; she is running away from problems, while everyone else is dealing with them head on. For the record, my aunt is on another trip again, in Jamacia.
i think it’s pretty detestable that she purposefully covered up the fact that her marriage ended because of her cheating on her husband. i always thought it was his fault or that he was abusive or something.
It is her right not to disclose something that is a private matter for someone else, not just her. She's free to speak about her own feelings or doings, but not display in a book the life of someone else.
Eh, I dunno. For me, personally, traveling did a terrific job in helping me to heal. Allowing myself to live in ways completely alien to me, learning to see the world the way other cultures do, and being forced to question every previously held beliefs, even basic notions of right and wrong, allowed me to have a completely different worldview. Learning different languages enabled me to think and perceive the world in new ways. All those experiences basically deconstructed my previous sense of self. No one stays the same after this sort of experience, and the new perspectives we become able to see through, so to speak, totally reframe your issues, better enabling understanding and ways to tackle them. The downside is that you will hardly find anyone who will think like you do anymore. In my case, even my national identity was shattered. (I guess that's where ideas such as "being a citizen of the world" comes from). That might make you feel lonely. Or not. It certainly helped teach me how everything in the world is relative, pretty much like in physics, and how to be more compassionate of others. But, it only works if you let go of yourself.
I think the point of the book was the courage to embrace change or of leaving your comfort zone and trying to discover oneself; the travel is just a part. It resonates with people because people are often in dilemmas or crossroads. Simple 💚
I find it rather ironic how you (rightfully so) criticize the portrayal of India and Indonesia & point out stereotypes, while agreeing that Europeans live a slower life & how the Italians' ultimate goal is to do nothing.. that is just not true lol. Go to any big city in any country and you'll find a fast-paced lifestyle. That is not a US-specific thing and people in Europe have to work to survive too, just like anywhere else in the world.
TBH, this movie kind of made me also want to be a travel blogger for a bit, back in college. But that period of my life also made me realize that I don’t like traveling that much, but maybe because I was young and don’t have much appreciation for it yet. Now that I’m older, I also appreciate this quote more: “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Maybe travel helps a bit, depending on where you are in your life. Now I travel to have distance from where I’m actually situated, so I can view it from a distance with a degree of objectivity. And I have my own places of pilgrimage that don’t necessarily start with the letter I. To each their own, I guess, but it also depends on what you bring with you, not necessarily the place in itself.
I think traveling or at least moving away from your hometown is a really important experience. It gives you a chance to see other people, experience other perspectives. I moved abroad for university and it really widened my horizons. I think being out of your bubble once in a while is a good thing.
I picked up this book, knowing nothing about it, just after I left my first husband and had also returned from an overseas trip in which I had a romance. So there was A LOT that resonated with me and I loved the story. I gave it to my best friend and she hated it. I chalk it up to where we both were in our lives - I was having a very raw adult break up and she was in a stable relationship and hated to leave her house. I see how the book can be problematic, and it's still going to resonate with some people because it captures a certain time and frame of mind very well. It wasn't written for everybody; it wasn't written as a universal manifesto for love or travel. It's her (embellished) experience and shouldn't be taken too seriously. Had I been in a different situation in my life, maybe I wouldn't like it either. Either way I still think she's a good writer and it's a good story. Like all great art, it made me feel deeply and understand more. If it had been a novel it would have done the same. Ultimately, it was a companion to my own lived experience, NOT a set of life directives to emulate. True, travel doesn't cure you. But it's just a metaphor for the act of removing oneself from one's set routine in order to gain insight into themselves. The reason this metaphor and all travel stories resonate is because it works as a "clarifier" for some people. It worked for me. I have never felt more myself than I did in the Taklamakan Desert, and that experience allowed me to return home with clarity and direction. It's just one way out of a thousand ways to know thyself.
Many women resonate with this so much because they have a constant and massive lack of confidence. They need stuff like this because by themselves they are way too insecure to ever try to risk being themselves.
that’s why this genre is often referred to as “divorce porn” the narrative often sold to middle aged women is that their lives will be better if they just get divorced. & in terms of abusive, unhealthy, or unhappy marriages i completely agree. but it’s not always going to make your life better. too often people don’t actually realize that a healthy marriage takes work & communication. that goes for men as well- they statistically uniate divorce far less often bc it’s less advantageous, but a lot of the times they’re unwilling to fix the problems in their marriage to avoid it.
Kinda short sighted to just chalk it up to confidence. Maybe they don’t have the financial support to drop everything and travel for a year? Maybe they actually did have kids before realizing it wasn’t a good fit and now they have a family to take care of? Maybe they have parents or family that need them or are in health crises that might need them around? There’s nearly unlimited reasons why people don’t take a year+ long catharsis trip, try sympathizing.
@@trashketchum9782of course it will not your life better but at least you will have your life. I have seen way too many women give up their lives trying to save marriage and even out their life in the line
Yeah, it's not just insecurity. It's societal conditioning telling women you HAVE to be xyz and making them feel like failures when they can't or self indulgent bitches when they refuse to.
In 2006 I read "Eat Pray Love" when a friend passed it on to me. She proclaimed it a work of depth and genius. I thought it was "interesting" enough, but no masterpiece of a relatable human evolving. And now that I read that Ms Gilbert divorced her husband for another man she was seeing, I now see the book, in retrospect, in most of the words that have been used here: Privilege, Unawareness, Whining (that might be my word), Self-indulgent. I didn't see the film because I thought a Julia Roberts-as-lead treatment would take this in a direction I didn't much care about. It's funny how something can grip so many people when it comes out, then a few years later and a few hours' thought, you wonder what on earth all the acclaim is about.
I read this book when I was very young and fell in love with the idea of travelling to find myself. I’ve been travelling and living abroad for almost 10 years now and although I had lots of fun along the way I’m depressed and I feel I don’t belong anywhere, not even where I come from. I guess what I’m trying to say is - no, travelling won’t heal your problems and make you a better person in life.
My mom made me read this book for her while I was in high school. I was not the right audience for one and I was in my first long term relationship. This book made me second guess my own relationship and so many of the themes did not resonate with me. I was so mad with the idea of escapism, I was so confused and angry that she couldn't find happiness where she was. Thank goodness this book didn't make me leave that relationship because now I'm happily married for 6 years and riding on 15 years together. Maybe the book had merit but it was not for me
I think the success of Eat Pray, Love can be explained by the joseph campbell quote: "People are not looking for the meaning of life. They're looking for the feeling of being alive." Gilbert was just running low on soul coal.
It is interesting that the first book I read from Elithabeth Gilbert was her historical fiction novel "The signature of all things" and I have to say it's a very interesting and nuanced book, something that I've been searching in a modern literature for a while. Couldn't get through the "Eat pray love" though as if it was written by a different person.
i enjoyed how balanced your review of the book and movie is... it helped me view it with more compassion than i would have if I'd reviewed it myself. but the shot of Julia Roberts wearing a bindi and sari still made me jump 😂
I actually never read the book, mostly because of overexposure. My first job was at a bookstore the year this book came out. All I would see would be people looking for the same book, and I realized just how much influence one person's recommendation could have on the masses. After the contract job was over, I ended up realizing how I wanted to make sure to read and watch what I liked and not what others told me I ought to.
This story also started the trend of signs hanging in every kitchen and dining room 😂 After reading through her wiki bio, it’s clear she has some kind of issue she needs to deal with. Her reasons for love seems incredibly superficial and she’s always leaving one person for another. Bleh..
so this is who's to blame for this dumb sign I was gifted that I now use as a laptop lap platform. I wondered how that happened. I hate those signs. Very disingenuous and shallow. Mine says "Happiness is a vegetable garden." And I"m like, I have very complicated thoughts about "happiness" per se, and I don't like this.
@@dotnothing5620 I never really understood the hate towards decorations with words on them. Like "Happiness is a vegetable garden" is the least offensive thing. Yet people still be mad about it. Sometimes taking words at face value is fine.
@@titandarknight2698 at face value, it's wrong, exaggerated, selling life short and missing the whole point. You have to understand the ethos of the signs themselves to think the thing makes any sense. Even the most ardent gardener thinks its takes a lot mroe than a vegetable patch to be happy.... like.... why am I having to argue this, it's obs. that's why people hate the signs. at face value, they're worthless.
This was a wonderful analysis and really pinpointed things i felt was off about the whole era of eat pray love. I found myself self-reflecting on things i never realized i had internalized as well, so this was very refreshing. Thank you!!
The nothing changes by the ending criticism reminds me of My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness - she starts out basing her self-worth on her parents' opinion, but in the end she writes a comic that gets praised and starts basing her self-worth on her readers' opinion. The tangible thing changed but the problem remained the same, which is that she bases her self-worth on others' opinions. It's hard to really change how you operate, but it's frustrating for readers to watch someone's journey following along the same grooves when you know it will cause pain for them.
I travelled to my country of birth (The Canary Islands) age 20 in 1990 all on my own and lived and worked there until age 24 in 1994. I had spent the entire previous year in my first job (aged 19 and a traineeship) saving up for it. It wasn't privelage that gave me that chance but hard work. I got to experience first hand what it was like to romanticise travel, adventure and get a cultural experience. I did read the book but I was disappointed. I found it sorely lacking and realised my own life experience was more fulfilling than reading about someone else's travel adventure. I'm now 53, married with a 15 year old son. I never regretted my early adventure in life as it shaped me into the person I am today. Although I didn't travel to escape anything or try to create space for thoughts. The best advice I can give for anyone contemplating travel to escape something is the saying "Wherever you go, there you are."
I hated this book and did not see the movie. The takeaway for me was the way to heal your self-involvement and ego centricity is to find another man. She did not become more self aware, merely more rich and privileged. Any spiritual enlightenment claimed was only short lasting and superficial. Loved this essay. Glad I found you as I was rummaging around the podcast offerings. I have subscribed. Keep up the excellent work. Stay mighty.
I see you were wondering why an elephant shows up randomly. Let me tell you, though rare, its not that odd here(India). But I gotta say, its been years since I saw one. I rarely go out of my house anymore anyways, so that is probably the reason.
oh man, you just unlocked a core memory of some people coming to my little suburban street with camels and elephants that you could ride for fifty bucks (needless to say, my lower middle class mom never let me or my sister do that)
My therapist told me there have been studies where after natural disasters or life changing events people usually want to speak about there romantic relationships. My therapist shared this with me after I expressed my guilt for speaking about my recent heartbreak at therapy instead of my grandmothers death. 10:13
This is so true.. I grew up in a very violent and abusive household, never had anyone who cared for me either.. But I remember that I was known as the weird girl who "fell in love" and swooned over someone else every couple of months! Just swooning and constantly talking about those boys and putting myself into heartbreaking situations.. Everything was better than thinking about the horrors of my personal life I had no control over as a child and teenager... I just was on survival mode and tried to unsee all of it somehow by stupid nonsense like romance.. And this all went of from age 6 to 30! I'm 33 now and learned to be happy all on my own, in my peaceful quiet home
Irving Yalom in his last book describes how some patients of his had very strong sexual urges right after the death of a close one. It is okay. The soul and body search for a proof that life still goes on.
I read this book years ago (I'm 25F) and I was hooked, I read it again, watched the movie repeatedly. I still talk about it to this day, but today, I wanted to hear someone break it down in a new way. I feel like I hold these high ideas of grandeur for my life due to media such as this. I was annoyed how many gripes a this were literally just about Liz and her personality, it's a memoir and people have opinions and shortcomings. But I do think it creates a horribly idealized fantasy that is ultimately unattainable for the majority of people. I have always wanted to run away and just knew everything would work out because of shit like this, but I just never devoted to the idea out of fear, plus I'm still kind of a child lol
Well, the both the book and the movie were made as products to appeal and to be consumed.. how else could they be if not fantasies that thrust people into consumption? Much how like companies use "influencers" to market their products in a way that normal pleb would want them in a futile attempt to be as "cool" and "successful". Also, it sure seems that story is a high-point of what might as well be a small highlight of an entire life up until that point (how much sh*t did she have to get there.. not to mention her story did not end like the book and keeps going). Close the curtains and "neck yourself" when you think you'll be at your best.. is a terrible way to see life. Of course we would also get there! But we would need to go on. Your life will be whatever it needs to be, and you just have to "do something" to "pass the time" and try to enjoy it.
This is a well thought-through criticism of what I suppose is called 'neoliberal feminism'. As I travel around the world I tend to bump into these ladies and I believe they did start with some idea they can attain certain experiences and then some revelation and enlightenment will be attained by them for them.
This book has always fascinated me as a phenomenon-even though I’m not a big fan of it, its popularity is an insightful view into sociology. The author is also fascinating to me as a person, and I appreciate that you included that clip from her house sale, as I have watched that several times, trying to understand her better.
i really appreciate how more and more people are reflecting on what the point of travel should be for them, the reality that wherever you go, there you are (you bring all your problems with you, you don't escape your life simply by going to a different location). and the class implications... i always felt conflicted about the idea of me, a white american, traveling to someone else's country to pay that community to host me and show me a good time... when i was a teen starting to form those opinions everyone in my life told me i was overthinking and being a stick in the mud, and even now 20 years later there are still lots of people in my social circle who tell me i'm bringing unnecessary politics to a non-political topic... i really appreciate videos like this giving more and more people the opportunity to reflect on these ideas.
I was 17 when I first read this book. It came at a moment of reflection of becoming a young woman, not knowing what to do with my life moving forward. What was the typical plan for a young woman to have from high school onwards? It helped me reflect on what I might want to for myself having been surrounded by women who had babies at 18 and marriage soon after. The most important lesson I took from Liz’s memoir is to not be afraid of asking yourself what you want out of life. Whether she is a privileged white woman in her early thirties, or anything else, she was given one life, with no choice in what color her skin was, the sum of the bank accounts of the family she was born into, and the talents she acquired through birth or being raised by her family. But she was born with the right to ask herself the same important questions that everyone has asked themselves and should be allowed to ask themselves; What is the meaning of their life and what do they want to do with it? Whatever audience she reached, whether they look like her or not, the message I believe is still important and should be commended since there are many people who are too afraid to ask themselves those questions. Her book, it seems, certainly made others feel not as alone in their life's journey, and was enough of a cultural phenomena to leak into other facets of woman's culture in America, such as the choice to have children or not/ to go after a fulfilling career/the choice to be single, etc. Her memoir might have into been done perfectly, but it was one stepping stone for women to consider thinking about what they want in their lives, instead of being blindly lead down a chosen path. Great introspective video, it made me reflect on what I picked up from the book when I initially read it and would be a great reread with these new insights.
Honestly, even the first section about how much the living is slower in Europe, in contrast to America, feels very disingenuous to me. It might be for a tourist, but to us normie natives it's just as hectic, or at least it has become that way in the last 20 years. I was just sitting in a tiny local hair salon in my home town in Bosnia this morning and my mum and I were chatting to the hairdresser as she was drying my mums massive locks. She was commenting on how everything has to be done so hastily now, everyone can barely wait their turn and then they run along. It used to be that you'd spend half the day at the hair dressers, because all the shops are owned and operated by one woman, who maybe sometimes has one student who's studying the trade from her to help out. You'd sit there with the other ladies and sip on coffee, gossiping all morning while letting your hair dye or perm set. And all of that goes on like that till noon when all the hair is styled, the ladies go home to make lunch, the hair dresser has a wad of cash for her work and some tips, and the cafe next door also turned a tidy profit with the waiter bustling the coffee to and from the salon earning some tips as well. But that doesn't really exist anymore and it never did for the tourists. So her writing about living authentically with the folks in her travels sounds so clearly fake and/or unaware, it's funny. Also, the whole orientalism and white saviour stuff in the next two parts really waft of early 2000s to me. Still, it's interesting to see/hear someone's thoughts so unreflected and unfiltered. Almost like a reality TV show.
If I could sum up this woman, I would use the word capricious. People put her and her book up on a pedestal, characterizing her as courageous for upending her life. but as she admits, she's upending her life and relationships every few years. This isn't courage it's childishness. at least she was responsible enough to decide not to have a family.
@@williampan29 responsible adult = a person who is aware of their actions/ decisions and their consequences; if you cannot maintain a relationship and feel like quitting it every few years then don't Bother others and don't waste their time/feelings, you'd better stay single and figure out what your problem is, people are not toys you can play with
@martun321 so supposed my partner has a sickness that render her unemployed or even crippled, I told her: "for the sake of my children's financial and family security, I need to get rid of you to reduce the cost of living and mental stress", thus divorce and kick her out, am I being a responsible adult? After all, I place my children and family before me as my motif. I'm not selfish.
This movie is great for anyone recovering from a broken heart. It is not for happily ever after people. If you are going through a bad relationship, you will get the message. It is very powerful for either men or women. I love the movie. I recommend it to all divorcees. It help me to forgive me instead of others. Traveling is a nice distraction, then come friends, then culture, and therefore healing at last. ❤
I have to admit, this book is my guilty pleasure. I find Elizabeth’s writing to be an indulgence, and the passages about food in Italy are some of my favourite. However I went travelling, probably inspired in part by this book, and all my problems were just magnified. I realized how self absorbed I was (and still am sometimes). My perspective on Elizabeth changed quite a bit as I got older.
I didn't love the overall 'white person finding enlightenment in brown places' vibe either, but I actually thought her processing of the young Indian woman's arranged marriage was.... overall one of the least awful parts? It's been a while since I saw the film, but I got the impression that EG had a sort of automatic White Feminist Savior Complex initial reaction - like 'oh this poor child, I must help her escape her cultural oppression' - but ultimately realized she didn't understand the context, didn’t have the solution, and would do more harm than good by trying to 'liberate' the young woman according to White Feminist ideology. It's possible I remember it incorrectly, though. What should EG have done (regarding her young Indian friend and the wedding), do you think?
I enjoyed this! Excellent writing and production. I will just say, you must love yourself. Before you can love anybody else, you've got to love yourself!
When I first saw that this video essay was a little over 52 minutes, in my head, I went "not one more of these" - but you've done such an excellent job analyzing Liz, her personality, and you've intertwined the information from the book and visuals from the movie in such an amazing way that the 52 minutes literally flew by! This was amazing! I loved the comparison you made between visiting India to discover yourself to visiting Disneyland. Also, I think I should try out anti-depressants (18:11). :)
Pheww, I needed this. I have been feeling the urge to flee my own life, go and get a airbnb and put it on the credit card. But I have been feeling that I can put money and resources into things and practices that actually RELIEVE the stress I am feeling. Putting that money back into my hobbies and the community that comes with it to keep me grounded. Even putting resources into my garden so I can eat healthier and avoid some of this dread from the imbalance of nutrition in my life. I was so skeptical at first in this video because I LOVED the Eat Pray Love movie, but now I realize that it was also romantic escapism, and that is how I have been forming my life as well. It was definitely a grounding and humbling experience to watch this video. Unique perspective, incredible structure of your essay, and you told the truths that we didn't want to hear... but we needed it!
My personal experience is that a good therapist and a professional psychotherapy taken seriously can be more helpful than anything. It's not cheap either, I know, still. Combine it with some yoga or whatever sport makes you happy...reduced my anxiety disorder to practically zero. Good luck for everybody.
The only scene that I remember and that stuck with me was the cheering to button her pants in Italy. There was a cheerfulness and relaxedness that helped me a lot.
I believe that the problem with romanticizing travel is that people tend to believe they will feel special, when in fact it's exactly the opposite: you realize how little you, your problems, your interests, your thoughts, your opinions matter to the rest of the world. And that's precisely what makes it so enrichening. The lack of that awareness is what takes me aback from this movie and most travel movies.
Never ever has anyone thought travelling would "make them special" lol
Lots of 'OK Boomer' moments in books like these.
absolutely. i never ran away from anything while travelling, just towards something. the intercultural experience lays bare and proves that social constructs are just that, constructs. not natural law. so it's really not worth stressing about them so much. i wish i could travel more...
@@agnessofiacastrocarvalho774 It does when everyone can see your photos in social media
You can see your problems better when removed from the location.
Just like ots easier to solve others' solutions to their problems than your own..
Travel broadens the mind.
There is an SNL skit with Adam Sandler that essentially says - if you are sad at home, you're still going to be sad in Italy.
Considering another relationship was the story book ending that basically made everything else kind of useless... gorgeous man in gorgeous place etc. They ditched him for another partner...and another book.
Rather be sad in Italy than this midwestern hellscape
@@Littlespottedfawn midwestern hellscape to be sad in i found.
Yesss! Romano tours!! 🤣🤣🤣
@@lealmelisa I LOVE that sketch!
The whole "Americans have such a fast paced life, Europeans really know how to enjoy doing nothing" mindset seems so weird to me, because Europeans also have jobs to get to and errands to run. I feel like a waiter not talking to you every 10 minutes is just a business practice and not a profound philosophical way of life, I don't think it is that deep. Here in European countries people are also really into productivity and hustle. This "they really know how to relax" is a really romanticizes view of a foreign country, it only feels this way if you are on a vacation somewhere, not if you live and work there. Great video essay!
I live next to Chicago where hustle culture is in full swing and people literally work themselves to death and I used to live in Tennessee where relaxing was encouraged. It honestly depends on where in America you’re talking about. But in comparison to Chicago, I’m positive that Europe looks very relaxing and luxurious.
Yeah it's weird. I usually find the "fast paced grind lifestyle" is usually an urban thing. If you visit rural or undeveloped parts of the U.S it's almost like visiting another country with how different the culture and communities are.
Europe is not one single monolith, and it really depends on each country. I feel that southern Europe is far more keen on enjoying life than the rest of europe. Speaking as southern european myself.
I do hear what you're saying and I think the "fast paced" American life is more the case in certain regions - particularly in the big cities along both coasts- European hustle culture is still going to be more relaxing in comparison, especially compared to someplace like New York City. But if you go to the south, like New Orleans, or some of the smaller cities on the coast, like Portland, you will find a more relaxed vibe.
@@imahoare4742 its definitely different but the underlying idea of i need to work hard all the time is still there. the us has a weirdly strong belief of prosperity gospel. if u dont know its the idea that prosperous people are a result of doing good in life and being rewarded by god so to show to others and prove to them and yourself that you are a strong christian being blessed by god, you work hard to ensure this image is preserved. and it becomes this loop of competition and constantly being unsatisfied. its ingrained in the culture and not specifically the religion. there is a constant idea that the ideal perfect image of an american is a hardworking something. it also relies on the lie that hard work always will be rewarded and outwardly shown and effort always leads to improvement.
One of my takeaways from spending my 20s traveling was that no matter where you go, you cannot outrun yourself. Ultimately, this led me to move back home to Chicago, buy a house, and settle into caring for my elderly father. It's the best decision I ever made and, difficult as it can be, I don't regret it in the least. Being in one place means you learn to 'tend to your garden' rather than always assuming the grass is greener somewhere else. Eventually, I even found love and it's been better than the transient relationships I used to have with other people who didn't know themselves very well.
I also took care of my elderly father. He had cancer, and I stayed with him as he progressively worsened. When he died, I was stuck inside working and because of Covid. Now I want to travel. Just get out of the house and see different things. I'm not looking for a spiritual journey, just to have a change of scenery for a bit. I don't see what's so bad about that.
I had the same experience. Always looked forward to the next place to travel to or move to, to avoid my problems. Travel is 100% escapism. I’m now staying put to deal with my decade old issues.
@@ellengill360 There's nothing bad about traveling itself - it's great and I highly recommend it. I still travel for leisure as much as I can--I just don't make it a lifestyle or a personality. What's 'bad', or at least not as good as purported, is traveling to find yourself. Your true self should not be preoccupied with novelty; it should be present in your day-to-day life.
Have you ever thought of writing your own memoir? Either by writing it yourself or working with a ghost writer? It honestly sounds like it could be a beautiful and touching story!
Beautiful. Thanks for sharing.
The fact she encountered an underage girl who was forced into an arranged marriage and her first thought was her own failed relationship is so wild to me 💀
Everything is about her.
I thought the same about mama mia 2… like donna was main charactered so hard she became unlikeable
Interesting, this reminds me.of that time when I was 15, and went to Arabia-Oman with my parents, and we ran into a girl at the beach that was my age celebrating her upcoming wedding the next day, and my mom told me that it is incredible how this girl is so mature and has to consider stuff like marriage and I am such an immature brat in contrast. It was one of these parenting moments where I was told that someone else would be happy to be im my place.
Sometimes we would profit more from keeping thoughts like that to ourselves😂
Yeah it’s strange she knows how privileged she is but can’t dissect the world away from that privilege
@@corneliahanimann2173that girl who was sold into an arranged marriage was more mature than you not by choice. She should have been given the possibility to be an immature 15 year old, but alas.
Imagine being Italian and being told that your ultimate goal is to do nothing.
Underrated comment 😂
Imagine being american and not getting the pleasure of simple relaxation around the table with family and friends xd
Imagine being Indian being told you are into God and all.....but all you wanna do immigrantnt to the US and eat a big mac at MacDonalds.
imagine living in poverty and being told in a way that you chose to live like that because you know the secret to a happy life.
Imagine trying to make a point without starting with "imagine"
I watched the movie and remember thinking it was just a depressed woman feeling better after a long vacation.
After hearing the video essay i imagine the book being basically an overcomplification of a long vacation making you feel better.
It also kinda feeling scummy going to poor countries, saying to yourself, see, money doesn't buy happiness! And then making a lot of money from that and never doing anything with that thought.
An accidentally beautiful madeup word, ‘overcomplification.’ Self-reflexive
After living the SAME LIFE with the SAME HUSBAND for over 20 years, I suddenly feel inspired by this film. Yes, we all need a GETAWAY and a REINVENTION. I think there are probably less "spiritual" works out there than this one.
@@MsElke11If you have to get away from your husband of 20 years that’s more revealing then anything I can possibly say.
@@Waspinmymind really? How many years have you been married....to the same guy?
@@MsElke11knew a devoted couple who took a year apart.
The wife moved to a different country for a years working holiday.
Why not?
Meet up in beautiful places, through the time as well.
True love will be waiting for you, after a year away ❤
This video was a sign! Currently going through a divorce and I seriously considered a long year of travel a la Liz Gilbert because that’s what my friends encouraged. But late last night I had a feeling I should stay put and work on my problems at home in my new apartment among all the boxes, and now this video showed up I feel like this was a true sign it’s the right choice. Learning to live with myself and take a hard look at my issues in the light of mundanity ❤️
I love this! Yes! You can do the work all on your own, wherever you are in the world!
Rooting for you! You’re doing amazing. Choose yourself ❤
Do the travel. It doesn't have to be a full year. Travel actually does change you. And gives you renewed perspective.
Correct. Travel to see the world or to get away but it won't fix your problems. I traveled once when I was profoundly depressed and going thru some hardships and all that happened was I felt depressed in other countries. It actually caused me to not be fully present and enjoy my travels
When my marriage ended I took myself on a mini ‘eat pray love’ trip to Thailand only I was miserable and crying the entire time. I spent a long time working on my healing and the next time I went on a solo trip I had a blast, I enjoyed every minute. Take your time, allow yourself to grieve, the world will still be there when you feel ready to explore. Sending you much love
Growing up poor and closeted in an immigrant household I desperately wanted to escape my life and the idea of traveling became my obsession - I honestly thought that living like a travel blogger and going new places non stop was the solution to my situation. All of the places I traveled to have been amazing & I don’t regret any of them, but it definitely was a hard pill to swallow when I realized that my issues never went away during & after my travels. It took looking at my life and putting in the dedication, hard work, and luck to slowly start building a better life I loved in all aspects, not just thinking traveling more would solve everything.
Also I went to Naples for pizza because of EPL and definitely recommend it - the pizza place she went to is still fantastic and full of locals
There is a lot of therapy in writing your feelings maybe thats what really helped her.
Unless you love making content I wouldn't become a travel blogger I think it takes joy out of travel tbh, but with that said I always long to travel more because it's the one time I get away from work and they can't contact me it's such a nice mental vacation.
90% of my traveling has been work related, I have a tight budget and have to accommodate even food. I would never be able to afford traveling like these privileged women.
Idk most pizza places in naples are very good also most italian tell you to go there when you arrive they call it the eat pray love pizzeria and it’s also quite expensive so eh wouldn’t say it’s incredible
honestly .. I've travelled Italy for years and it's pizza isn't all that good. America does far better pizza in my opinion. I had a better pizza in Buxton Derbyshire at the weekend than I ever had in Italy
I feel like the book, unintentionally (which imo is the best way) gives us a perfect window into the head of this affluent white woman falling prey to all the trappings of orientalism and self help spirituality.
The book is cringe and uncomfortable but I feel like that's what makes it worth while. Without her complete lack of self awareness, it would have just been a woman coming to pretty obvious conclusions that have been reached before. But as it is, she demonstrates a complete inability to fathom the meaning of her actions, behaviour and environment in a way that is a clear product of the time, her upbringing and the social context of the situation.
EPL is a character study written by a main character completely unaware that they are giving away far more than they mean to.
In did a perfect resume, American psychofette eating in Naples dorsia, killing some homeless NY man is evidently worse than forcing a Bali woman to buy a house when you want, and I am glad that she did, but the amount of power that they have over poor ppl lives and that they exercise for their own satisfaction, without any insight is a times amusing at times disgusting.
💯
i wonder if you would say this about a man.
Eat, prey. Love?
@@LynnHermione lmao
Tricky thing about personal growth novels is that usually the person’s development doesn’t look very epic: my awesome year long journey was from feeling guilty of playing video games to playing video games without feeling guilty. For me it’s a hard earned self improvement, but can it be interesting as a book? Well, I didn’t lose weight, didn’t start a business, didn’t earn a ton of money, didn’t move to an exciting country. So, I guess not
Changing our perspective is difficult, just wanted to say congratulations on that achievement.
I'd read that book! You should write about your experience anyway! You could help people who feel ostracized for being gamers, or inspire people who want to play games but won't based on whatever stigma it may have.
I sometimes wish people wrote books like that
My problem with the book was not Liz's privilege so much as the way she was very obviously spinning events to put herself in the best light possible. Her affair didn't surprise me at all. And then during the travels, she would occasionally get really pretentious about her travels and all "you wouldn't understand this cultural thing because you just have to be there...like me." Or, my favorite, "I don't have the time to explain this right now." Like, isn't the whole point of writing transporting your reader into the setting so they can better understand your mindset? I got the feeling that because she was paid for this year-long vacation, she was desperate to find something to write about. There was just something phony about the whole thing.
There's a segment in the show 'Bojack Horseman' that kinda spoofs on this process. It describes a writer who gives herself a directionless assignment that should presumably result in a memoir. After a massive mental break, it becomes clear that finding "herself" was the cause of her depression. She ends up writing a whimsical piece of fiction that attracts a much better reception than the "navel gazing" project she set out to write. I can't help but think this was a catharsis for people who desperately wanted Liz Gilbert to figure it all out
She is really full of herself..
I'm an immigrant living in Japan for the past five years and have been feeling...an extremely complicated and nuanced range of things that I've spent the better part of four years trying to understand. Before I came here I was seduced by the travel blogs and books like this one due to a dissatisfaction with my life, self, etc. I am extremely fortunate that I was able to escape my country, but my shadow is attached to my feet no matter how far I walk. This video has definitely helped frame some things in a way where I don't feel so "lost". It's nice to know I'm not the only one, judging by the comment section, too.
womp womp.
It can be rough. I am not a miserable person for the most part. However, I think for a lot of immigrants are days when you have a problem and the realisation that you are cut off from the people who would support you through it can be crushing at that moment.
Do you ever visit your home country?
Japan is best place for tourists because people don't bother talking and disturbing you.
@@parthsavyasachi9348 that sounds more like a disadvantage than an advantage
@@Blanche_255 to me its not but then its personal so you are not wrong too for you.
I once met a woman in kyoto and she told me that i was the first person to speak to her in 3 days she was in japan. We two are still in touch after years.
She didn't see this as an advantage.
Thanks for the hour long analysis! I like how this film subverts typical clichés prominent in many a rom com, such as "Travelling to find oneself." In actuality, you'll still be the same person you were before you left, and your problems don't just magically disappear.
Yes you will be the same person, but the experience can change you. You most certainly won’t be the same person when you come back. Even the realization that traveling won’t help your problems makes you a different person than when you first left.
Wherever you go, there you are.
God, someone once criticized me for taking time after high-school to just exist, write, be myself, and go to therapy, without the pressures of work or school. They basically told me that I was living my life wrong, and was wasting time, because if I wasn't going to college, I was supposed to be working, or traveling to "find myself," (yes, they literally told me that if I'm not working or in school, I'm supposed to travel to "find myself," they used that exact term) nevermind that I did far more "finding of myself" with my therapist in that time than I would have by traveling, I had absolutely no ability to travel (no driver's license, no money, and no people to travel with, which would have been terribly unsafe for a 100 pound young woman, fresh out of high school) and a crippling and barely managed anxiety disorder that prevented me from functioning in certain situations, such as a work environment (and airports, the idea of going through TSA again still makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry). I resent the idea that I'm more likely to "find myself" in a foreign place, than if I give myself time and space in a familiar, safe environment, with my therapist.
@@IceRiver1020 I hope it's not weird to say but I'm so proud of you! Therapy and facing yourself are not for the faint hearted. Travelling is something anyone (w money and w/o anxiety of course) can handle and doesn't take nearly as much bravery as what you did. But of course self inquiry and such doesn't make money really so we're being sold the idea that travel is the cure. So many people fall for that and it's a shame that they don't see the value of true individual mental health journeys.
@@Shirumoon Thank you, there's no end to the road of self improvement, but I've come a long way since then. I would love to travel and see new places, just not as a way to fix myself or my problems, but to see and experience new things, which is something that my anxiety disorder has held me back from for much of my life. It would be, for me, a measure of growth I've already had, rather than a search for it. Traveling is great, but doing it to "find yourself" is not the best reason for it, and I think one might enjoy it more if they're not weighed down by whatever they're running from, or searching for.
I feel like when you know after she wrote this she ended up leaving the man she met in the book when she realized she was in love with her female best friend who was dying of cancer and ended up being with her and loving her until her death it changes how simple of a human some paint her to be
I was about to write this update too lol I used to follow her on Facebook and I was there in real time when this all went down.
She’s extremely narcissistic and her first husband was right
@@officialmkamzeemwatela Why do you say that? If there's anything that deserves to be critiqued, it's the western belief in individualism, something that hundreds of millions of people are indoctrinated into, which is not something that deserves to be framed as pathological. Nearly every human has some narcissistic tendencies. Very, very few of us are clinically diagnosable.
well how do you politely breakup with someone dying of cancer (when/even if you want to)? Especially if you're in the public eye and have a budding dodgy romantic reputation? Even the most unbridled free-wheeler may sit tight till the end of that show. I used to work with cancer patients and their families.
she better write a book bout that
“If you are sad where you are, and then you get on a plane to Italy, the *you* in Italy will be the *same sad you* from before, just in a new place!” - Adam Sandler, SNL sketch “Romano Tours”
"There's a lot a vacation can do. Help you unwind. See some different looking squirrels. But it cannot fix deeper issues. Like how you behave in group settings or your general baseline mood. That's a job for incremental lifestyle changes sustained over time."
I agree to some extent, but some countries genuinely are better than others for certain people. I think it's possible to find happiness in another country that you weren't born in.
@@shaunmckenzie5509 Oh, I agree! But if someone goes in with the wrong mindset, then it could become an issue.
I didnt read the book. So im basing this on your hard work. The thing is traveling, especially traveling alone can be a very useful resource in battling depression. Travel forces you to be in the moment more, to "problem solve" usually manageable and enjoyable problems (like finding a beautiful place to eat a pizza you were craving). It can help center you in the present moment and current experience more and allow you to seek enjoyment and joy without wracking your brain with all the things you need to do today. It also kind of forces you to focus on others,on your environment and get out of your depression soaked brain.
That might sound silly to someone who hasnt experienced a severe depressive episode. But one of the things people with depression struggle with is experiencing and finding moments of joy, they often feel like they are overwhelmed with reponsibility and making wrong decisions, which can make them very crippled and anxious in making decisions, etc. It can absolutely be a useful tool for someone with depression to kind of get a jump start in a lot of these.
But ultimately, its just a resource. It goesnt have magical healing abilities. It wont fix you. But it can give you material and information to work with further in improving your life. It can help give you a bit of relief and energy to work on yourself, if your depression was leaving you severely exhausted and depleted. To work on mindfulness in your life. The silliest example I can think of, if you found joy in finding nice places to eat, look into how you can incorporate that into your everyday life when you come back,maybe once a month, maybe once a week, maybe once in 3 months, whatever works for you. Stimulating your body? Maybe finding a workout, dance class, practicing yoga, or maybe massages are what will bring some enjoyment in your life. A romance got you? Was it the romance? Was it the sex? Was it meeting new people? Or maybe youre craving more physical contact with people that you can then maybe find with friends? etc. You get the point.
Travel wont solve your problems (unless your problems are sistemical to the place you live, which i mean hey maybe thats what you learn on your trip and you decide to work towards living somewhere else), but it can be a helpful resource, that you can use to then make improvements to your everyday life.
Good point. Thanks for sharing. I also believe that It can be a good resource
In my experience (and I did not just have one depressive "episode", but actual depression) - what you are describing is horrible advice. Dangerous, even. Moreover, it is totally unmanageable. If you suffer from depression, nearly everything you mention is completely out of reach.
"Craving" food? Typically, you lose any sense of hunger, forget meals, everything tastes bland or bitter, every bite of food is a struggle, a fight, a hard work that you detest and have to force yourself to take. Because worthless pieces of sh*t like yourself don't deserve any food, because they don't deserve to live. Eating is crazy hard work, nothing you'd "crave". And there sure as heck isn't any joy in it when you are depressed.
Planning a trip, moreover, alone - when even tasks like getting up and brushing your teeth are nearly unmanageable?! How???
"Finding things to enjoy" - I beg your pardon! Depression is when you literally can't enjoy, when your body isn't able to enjoy a n y t h i n g any longer. Everything that seems like other people would enjoy is making you hurt even more, makes it a dozen times harder, makes you even more ashamed about you pathetic existence. Beauty and "nice things" become unbearable, because they exist only for all the other, happy people. Every nice or generally "enjoyable" thing tells you that you are unworthy and should be ashamed that you cannot feel joy any longer.
And so much more! Let's not even begin with all the decisions that planning or going on a trip means - that you are unable to do any longer. Depression will make you sit on a desk for hours, struggling extremely hard to try to decide which destination or hotel or xyz would be right - and you just can't make decisions anymore! Everything just makes you feel like of course your decision will be the worst decision - regardless what you pick. You will sit for hours without being able to decide anything and you will cry and be ashamed that you aren't even able to decide anything.
I was asked to go on a wonderful trip with some friends when I was depressed and it was absolutely, utterly I m p o s s i b l e to go. Depression makes nearly everything you mentioned - impossible. Depressed brains aren't able to feel *any* joy, they've unlearned how. Same with making decisions.
Sorry to say (if that may not be true), but you talk like you have no real idea what actual, climical Depression really is.
Going on a trip alone while being actually, clinically depressed, can very much k*ll you. No kidding. I know it would have k*lled me.
While an alone-trip might be a wonderful, healing thing that helps you grow for a person that may be a little down or is overworked - the same thing is actually dangerous and cruel for people with actual depression. Because their brains don't work like the brains of healthy people any longer.
Please, please, stop with such bullsh*it advice! It is harmful!
In her case, it felt like she’s running from her problems and only to realize that she can’t run away from herself
I don't want to discredit your experience but for me, travelling is not a resource. A mental health resource as I learned is something you can do at any given time whenever you need it to help yourself, both in everyday life and in unusual situations.
Travelling makes me feel better just as any other type of consumption does. Yeah, it's healthier for my body and mind than fast food or social media and it can be a type of exposure therapy. But in the end it's something that gives me a high which doesn't last longer than a few days or weeks after I arrive back home. And then what, book the next trip? Really addicting. I wholeheartedly agree though that you can and should use whatever positive experiences and emotions you take back and put that energy into cultivating a good life within the mundane. But tbh I don't know a single person who has done that so I personally wouldn't recommend travel as more than a fun experience.
I’ve had a similar experience before. While I wasn’t depressed at the time, it did help me out in a number of ways eg. gaining confidence in my ability to figure things out on my own, realizing things I like/want to do more and applying that when I got back home, reflecting on my current situation. I had made some assumptions about what path I wanted to take but I realized there were other options that’d also be interested in.
Traveling forces me to make the most of my time and get moving, which by itself also helps my mood.
Although I had kind of a specific situation and it happened to work out that way. I wasn’t expecting so much self-reflection just wanted a trip haha
Travel doesn't cure you, but sometimes that's the point of a book. The travel isn't what cures the character, but since that doesn't tell the reader what *does* cure you, the story often has to have the character discover (or sometimes stumble into) something that actually does cure the character, or better: tells the reader what would have worked. Originally, the best stories did this, but copycats often fail to make this distinction.
I get what you're saying, and it's true - wherever you go, there you are. However in my personal experience, taking the time to travel or road trip or just put myself in a different environment helps me reset my energy, get out of routines, and look at things in a new light. Going to other places doesn't fix me, but the act of movement and experiencing different things does help me significantly. Then when I come home, I see home differently.
Totally agree, though I have to admit I only see home in a different light for some time (maybe 1-2 months). But that's better than nothing
I wanted to write a similar comment. Travelling doesn't make a totally different person out of me but it does change me one bit at a time and helps me have a broader view of life.
Exactly. Not to judge others who are not constantly, “doing the work…” but you’re traveling wrong if you’re taking nothing away from it. if you only see the same reflection of yourself in a different environment, stop looking inward… look outward and let your new environment overcome your ego. People who say, “wherever you go, there you are,” or whatever the saying is… well duh… you cannot go somewhere new expecting to “find yourself.” You shouldn’t be looking to find answers, but rather questions… like I said, if you’re doing right.
I think we all struggle with getting a grasp on our privilege. I think there is something good in travel because it exposes you to people and it makes you discovee yourself from a new angle. You have the opportunity to make a friend you would not have found in your initial environment, and relate to them even when their habits are so different from yours.
For myself, I lived in Asia for 2-3 years, I'm half asian half european, and I look more european than asian. I think I learned a lot in that time about what it is like to be a foreigner, to have people immediately assume who I am based on the colour of my skin rather than the amount of time I have invested in trying to adapt, learning the language, learn what spending time with my family would look like had I always lived there. I'm still white, so there is still some privilege attached to that, but it made me see the lifes of foreigners in europe in a much mpre nuanced way, and it alsp made me look at my previous interactiond with foreigners in europe from a different light.
There is something about this privilege, that tells us we have failed to even recognize how lucky we are, while others are not, and I don't know what to do with this information. It feels important to travel because we too often just consume the news and hear about these people from another country having died to something we consider a freakish cause, but never actually notice that these are actual people and not just numbers and headlines in articles.
It is somethung to be confronted, that we consider how we are not grateful of what we have, but the people that have even less manage to find happiness. We all know that the opposite exists of that approach, that are the people that consider everything outside the western world to be less than and weaker than, and the cause of their own misery, completly ignorant of how these people have a lot to teach us.
Years ago I was working in a hotel, and a certain person mentioned in this video was staying on a tour. That person was dismissive of the staff and didn't tip *once* despite requesting a lot of extra services from the housekeepers, doormen, and room service. I think about that juxtaposition every time I see a three word phrase like "eat, pray, love" or "live, laugh, love."
Can't believe that Oprah is rude to service employees!
Who??
@@anglophoned I can't name names, but it's a person who is famous for traveling.
So that's where those stupid signs came from.
sounds about right.
India is where I fell off in the book as well. Your take is on point.
It was so frustrating and privileged and felt very much like rich white woman "suffers" to be spiritual. She goes on so so so so much about how PAINFUL it is to sit there and pray in the dark in discomfort but something she HAS to do in order to be complete and connect with God. It was so pompous and I kept thinking,
"You need really good therapy for the rest of your life. Not this. This is pointless and I am tired of hearing about this self imposed self centered suffering."
The shift into the India section really felt like out of touch wealthy white woman finds God by being a tourist. Romanticizes the people and areas in deep poverty as if they reflect some deep meaning in connection to her own experience. Does it by embracing the most basic cherry picking new age whitewash. Thinks it is deeply profound and she literally met God.
Ugh. No thank you. My therapist highly suggested it at the time as a way of letting go of some of my own new age magical stuff holding me back from being a better person. It worked. So there's that.
As someone who read the entire book (mostly because it was entertaining to see how out-of-touch Gilbert is), she reaches enlightenment (her literal words) about 2.5 months into her stay in India. Yeah.
I am Indian and that whole arc of hers was incredibly cringey and at points, loathsome. White, affluent people who want to feel different think exposing themselves to the poverty and many "exotic" customs of the "third world" will somehow change something in them. It can never happen because you can't run from yourself and your life no matter where you go and they always come to overexploited countries with a colonizer's gaze.
Does she understand quiet romantic love, the settled, comfortable kind? Honestly, I prefer long-term kind. The emotions from those early days 25ys ago still reemerge regularly, but I can have time to do the things I need to do, to have hobbies that aren't just staring soulfully into his eyes.
People that don’t understand the comfortable kind of love are often still trapped in romantic fantasy. I’ve only had a few relationships in my life and I’m now married. However, all my failed relationships all had one thing in common- me. Yes, they ended for different reasons as well but I was stuck in romantic fantasy. The idea of the spark, how love “should” be or feel. When those relationships didn’t stack up, I ended them. Thankfully I learned what comfortable and settled love was at 22. None of my previous relationships felt like home. Whereas my relationship with my husband is home.
🥰♥️ This comment made me feel cozy
Funny thing is, in many interviews, the writer pointed out that many people superficially misinterpret her book like 'a recipe of spirituality', when she always mentioned that there are many ways to spirituality, that she merely share her own journey.
bullshit, this video literally destroys EPL and shits over it showing the writer hypocrisy
what does the authour mean by her journey to spirituality ? Does she now believe she is enlightened ?
@@garethwilliams4467 The author left that question open. Enlightenment might be not the word to look for. Rather the feeling of being content and live. Being present in the present.
@@garethwilliams4467 Journey towards something doesn't necessarily mean you arrived somewhere. There may be mini-goals scattered along the way rather than one big "aha" moment. Other people have no sign during the whole journey an one day directly have the "aha" moment. It's not the same for everyone, but the important thing is to be mindful and strive to become better.
Thank you! The only voice of reason in this comment section. Omg.
Yes, she gets bored with stillness / sameness and needs to keep moving to fuel her creativity. She is a consumer of things, places, and of people. She is also very enterprising at selling and profiting from her "dilemma".
I was shocked listening to the video thinking this woman sounds immature and insecure as fuck. But your comment is the fleshed out explanation I was looking for. 🙏
I actually really deeply enjoyed Eat Pray Love, though I have some beefs with it. Firstly regarding the criticisms, as a woman in my 30s who got divorced because I suddenly realized I wasn't happy - just because there are millions of worse problems doesn't mean "we" (women with such problems) can't try to heal and learn from them at a merciful pace rather than "just get on with it there are people who are starving". I hate whataboutisms. It's weak argumentation. However I think Eat Pray Love's greatest weak points are (1) that Liz ends up with a man - all that just to find another man, really? and (2) it never actually delves into why her marriage 'broke', which is the crisis that launches the journey, which feels weak.
Completely agree with you about not invalidating someone experience just because there are ‘worse things’ or people that ‘suffer more’.
In terms of her ending up with a man…well the author actually did end up ending up with a man, married him (wrote a book about it), then ‘fell in love’ or realised that she was ‘in love’ with a terminally ill female friend, divorced her husband and took care of her friend/lover until she passed away…
I think it is safe to say that Elizabeth Gilbert has some serious issues when it comes to relationships…
@@sanell6 Yeah exactly - and I kind of wish she would've come to a more 'sage' conclusion at the end of her journey. But the ending, true or not, makes it feel like all she did was go through the motions; eat a lot of pasta and spend a few weeks in silence just to find excuses to throw herself into more relationships as soon as she's "done her time". I have friends like her who have never been on their own fully, and then as soon as they've done their bare minimum 6-9 months single they're like "that's enough now, let's tick the box and move on without any true change or reflection" like they've just been holding their breath for that time, rather than breathe more deeply.
@@GoblinsAreAGirlsBestFriend exactly! She’s just a selfish person who refuses to grow up. I felt bad for her family
she never delves into why the marriage ended bc it was ultimately her fault, it ended because she is a cheater. but she covered that up to make people like the character or assume it was the ex husband’s fault lmao
@@trashketchum9782 how do you know that she is the cheater ?
I remember loving this book years ago, and the movie was just ok...but I never looked it as a "how to" for finding peace in life. I looked at is as an actual memoir. I noticed a lot of things you mentioned (espeically with privelige and consumerism), but I honestly just enjoyed the read. I'd never heard of a woman setting off to travel for year in this way before, and it was fascinating just in itself to me.
I do think that what it turned into on the consumer market was really, really sad, as I felt that's the exact opposite of the message you should be getting. But, it doesn't suprise me. This is America, after all.
Agree, I think the whole “how to find peace” was just a marketing ploy to sell more books. It sells the lie that if you do the same then you will experience the same outcome. But it’s not a self help book, it’s just another memoir.
I was in college and working at a library when I read this book, after all it was the hot thing and I LOVED to read and consume media about travel. I walked away from it with... complicated feelings.
The italy portion honestly stuck with me and some of it's lessons were something that helped me as someone who was taught to be ashamed of my love of food and weight. But most of those lessons were in the words of other characters.
However outside of a few moments, the India and Bali portions made me wince. Even being a middle class white kid, the internal experiences with prayer felt more christian in origins than truly based on eastern practices (I had some buddhist and hindu friends at the time so I had at least a vague vibe of what their experiences were, and I knew what my christian guilt riddles cycles of prayer were like, and whoo boy did EPL fall into the second), and the portrayal of non-white people was... discomforting to me when ways I couldn't quite put a finger on.
Like I spent a week in Brazil a year later (my one time able to go out of the country), and when I think about the people I met inside one week it was a lot more of a diverse set of experiences with a lot more honest conversations than what Eat Pray Love has in India onward, and she spent MONTHS in those places.
Years later after having mourned the loss of other writers like Anthony Bourdain who had a impact on me, I think it boils down to who and what you choose to focus on says a lot more about you and where you choose to spend your time, and what you choose to see, than anything else. In India, it was a temple catered to white tourists, with the author uninterested in authenticity of spiritual practices. In Bali, it was mostly tied to people who were beholden to the author (even if she doesn't acknowledge it) with a very present power imbalance.
I can appreciate that she is a human who had a very messy internal narrative and sought to be honest about it in the book, but ultimately I'm glad that most people have forgotten about this memoir.
So I really insightful analysis and exploration of this book in this vid! It helped me revisit those thoughts and explore them more.
I think is ubfa8r to compare your week în Brazil with her months în Italy for example, how yours was more active and full of New connection with people. I had both experiences. I went 1 week în itally, i meet so many new friends, and i did so many activites în just one week, yet when i went ot Spain for 6 months i barely got to meet anyone and everything was slower and i was a bit more miserable. You can't compare the intenisty of one week with the lrologness of soemonths în a place. Of course your experience was more intense because let's face it, it was shorter time, you were aware of this so you spend it more intesly and more previously because it was more limited. Add to that circumstances and see what you get. Don't compare pears with apples, they are nothing alike
@@marishkaspirit Ah, I would suggest re-reading my post again. For one- I wasn't comparing my 1 week in Brazil with her months in Italy- I was comparing my 1 week in Brazil with her entire time in India and Indonesia. The Italy portion I actually didn't have much of a problem with.
Also, my framing was what you choose to focus on. I'm not judging for her not having as many experiences, but rather who and where she spent the most energy with and chose as the people to write about.
Like look- my week in Brazil didn't have any life changing friendships. The stories I have from there are actually easily mirrored by experiences I've had just going shopping from my last month at home. I'm not a partier and it was mostly helping out a small business (long story).
But for example- the stuff I have written down in little memory snippets is stuff like "I accidentally used the wrong gender when saying thank you in Portuguese, but the grocery cashier was so pleased I was at least trying, and amused at me failing in such a funny way and my flailing corrections, they just smiled and had a full belly laugh and waved me on thanking me back- using the wrong gendered form themselves with a wink" or "one of our guides wanted to buy me a local vodka drink with our pizza, but I declined and though she was put out I explained there was a 1k bet about making it to legal drinking age, and we had a playful debate about the ethics of lying on this bet, Brazil legal drinking age vs. US, and if vacations counted, the 'what stays in vegas' phrase may have gotten re-appropriated". (Turns out they were right and I should've taken the free drink, because when I got home the maker of this bet said "oh yeah no way I would've have counted that.")
We also know the author was going out enough to eat and drink and meet others and start a romance, so I don't think your Spain experience would be a fitting analogy either.
Thank you for writing my thoughts down!
Thanks for taking time to share this comment! Insightful.
Extremely good point about the power imbalance. It was disturbing to see clips from the movie where she is just surrounded by brown people who are waiting on her or otherwise attending to her. Strong colonialism vibes. And the lack of awareness!
She's way more of a Gwyneth Paltrow than a Juliette Roberts but whatever
Yeah I think one of the reason's the movie missed the mark (other than the book doesn't really follow a traditional narrative) is that Julia Roberts felt very miscast.
What's a Juliette Roberts?
@@Wandering.Homebody a good person
@@supervamp78 you are kidding right!? She bullied her sister for her weight and mocked her about it even after she committed suicide. Julia Roberts is a horrible person just a very different type of horrible person.
@@josephmanning3179ooooooooooooooooooooooooo III oI ist der der oooooooo
Romance will distract you but travel can heal you.
I broke out of my anxiety and so many mental barriers through travel. I'm not sure if it's as easy to discover yourself with the advent of global gentrification. Part of the journey to self discovery is being uncomfortable but that's more difficult to achieve in an Airbnb world with American culture blanketing the earth. Stepping out of your world and into places that don't adjust to your needs can change you and change you forever.
I appreciate this comment because traveling can get people out of their comfort zone and help them to learn the world doesn’t revolve around them and puts them in the perspective of other cultures and ways of living
Yeah, moving to China really helped me work through some stuff. But I have known some who travel and never change, so maybe it depends on the person?
Everything you said about the benefits of travel also applies to romance and travel is absolutely a crutch and a distraction as well.
In the book, it seems pretty clear that she does do a lot of travelling, even seems to do the travelling you describe.
The book does come across as self indulgent and glossy at times. It reminds me of sex and the city where the main character is a privileged white woman who uses her wealth to fix her problems
Carrie wasn't wealthy. BUT she definitely did use her pretty white woman privilege to get things for sure. She was also a reckless spender. Remember the shoe episode. She was the poorest out of her friends and basically shamed Charlotte for not helping her with her money problems
The difference is that Sex and the city doesn’t try to hide its superficiality, the superficiality is the point of the show.
LOL racist
What is the issue in using money to fix a problem? Traveling is good way to learn about other culture and have open mindset
Imagine coming away from a MEMOIR about a person's PERSONAL journey with a take like "it was self-indulgent". Yeah. It was. Because it was about HER. Not the world. Not a certain class of people or a general social environment or a specific culture it was about ONE. PERSON. So yes. You're getting a book about one person's perspective on their world.
When the movie first came out I was a 14 year old living in Texas who had never left my home state and who felt profoundly unlike anyone I knew. I watched this movie so many times because the idea that I could just decide to do a year of travel and get to live in all these places and learn Italian. It was incredibly tantalizing. I watched alot of travel shows and any movie about traveling that I could get my hands on because it seemed like the future I really wanted, the answer to all my problems. I don't think you or anyone reading this would be shocked to learn...it wasn't. In the 13 years since this movie was released I have lived abroad twice and lived in a different part of the US. There is usually a 'honeymoon' period to it. I think it might just be the sense of discovery or novelty to the whole thing. Or maybe just the pleasure of sitting in a fancy cafe, eating some dish that is unavailable or hard to come by back home and thinking "wow, I did it! I'm one of those cool people who live abroad!" But once that newness has worn off, you are left with yourself the same as where you came from. I have been depressed in Texas, I have been depressed in France, and I have to say, one is not "better" than the other. In fact, in a way being depressed abroad can be worse BECAUSE of movies like EPL. Sometimes when I was having a bad mental health day I'd beat myself up more about it because of where I was living like "what do I have to be depressed about? I'm in Montreal!" Not to mention being away from friends/loved ones who could potentially comfort you. I now have mixed feelings about this movie; it was incredible comfort to a lonely teen imagining what her future would look like, but it is ultimately a fantasy that adult me had to wake up from
So many people get upset about the aspect of anyone wanting to travel or live abroad whether they are happy or sad. Living abroad for ten years was the best thing I ever did for myself. I evolved, grew, and learned so much about myself and others. I did not run away from all my problems and was still myself but someone who saw beautiful places snd met life long friends. I do not get the offensive comments of “travel will not solve your problems”. Not many people expect travel to be a cure but a gateway of inspiration and slowing down to work in yourself or just simply see amazing things in this short life we have on earth.
If you do not need to live in luxury then there are so many places with lower costs of living that digital nomad jobs can cover. She said travel is consumerism? Everyday life anywhere is consumerism but it actually helps the locals when you consume elsewhere. And if travel is correlated with selfishness in some peoples eyes- it is also means to volunteer and help others in less fortunate circumstances. Helping others can help yourself and if trsvel or living abroad does not change anything else in your life then you must have never left your bedroom abroad. Being depressed abroad while seeing beautiful things and eating delicious food was much better than being depressed in the rat race back home. Either way- even if you stayed depressed and did not evolve in some way- so what! You did something awesome and experienced another culture or appreciated your own culture even more. Unless you hate traveling or change then trying to convince others to stay home and not embark on an adventure is not helping them. The rat race at home will always be here. Opportunity to see other places could pass you by. I agree to seek therapy or do what needs to be done to improve your mental health but it is much more fun to do it traveling or living abroad. I know more of my former expats who stayed abroad vs coming back home. I’ve seen more people settle down and get married abroad and love their new life. Life abroad may do a little or lot for you but it will do nothing if you stay home. Discouraging anyone to do anything they want to try is wrong and can make things worse.
As a Black woman of privilege, I do feel sympathy for white women that express their experiences from their point of view and quickly get dismissed as ignorant and silly. I do feel like I have an advantage because I had similar experiences to Liz and I typically get met with praise instead of criticism.
I think traveling opens up doors in the mind and new experiences. I don't understand why people contradict the experience of the traveller. It entirely depends on where they went and what they did!
Travelling with purpose, not just sightseeing and gourmet. I avoid touristic places. Go exploring to off off the beaten track where I can mix with the still authentic locals. It's getting harder to find them these days, thanks to SNS. Don't tell those nice places to anyone.
So if you had no privilege, would it mean that these women do not deseve any sympathy any more? What if you were a black man? A white woman?
Thats why class matters!
@@jesseleeward2359 Yeah exactly. It also teaches you how to be self-reliant, trust yourself, and can show you how capable you actually are when you step out and travel to faraway places that most people in your life may have urged you not to go to. On the flip side, you can really experience the kindness of people and learn a lot about community. Not to mention, the perspective you can get from travel, realizing how trivial, and temporary many of your problems can be! It's not just about "eating food". But of course, travel in itself isn't a one-stop/fix all.
Being an Asian American from a white neighborhood, who traveled to China in 2013 gave me perspective on how people really aren't different, only culture is. The trip not only removed alot of my insecurities about my own race, but also more understanding of others different than me. Those lessons have stuck with me to this day. I would change the thumbnail title.
Loved your analysis. Though, as someone who ran away from my problems through travel and eventual immigration, I must say that sometimes a change of scenery can change you, heal you and do all the wonderful things you dream it will do.
My feeling is that escaping one's current context can definitely put things into perspective in a big way. And certainly, getting away from toxic or abusive people is a good thing! I'd question whether just distance can resolve underlying issues, though, and provide emotional healing without any further work...? 🤔
@@anna_in_aotearoa3166 for me personally, everything in my environment was to varying degrees unhealthy there wasn’t mental space to breath. The people in my life were fine but not necessarily the type of people I needed, and my home city was a place I had very strong negative associations with. I did get therapy and medication after I left but the move gave me the space to grow.
The fact that eat pray love was mentioned in Across the SpiderVerse
OMG I laughed so hard when I heard that in the film 😂
Lol exactly my thought
Thank you. As a teenager, I just couldn't understand why this movie was so popular or how travelling could help solve our problems. As an adult I realise it was just another superficial flick
The author had no problems. She dumped her man and traveled because she wanted to.
It was also part of the Oprah Knows Best culture that I'm so glad we're done with.
@@pysq8 same here
Traveling does solve problems by changing your mindset. Meeting new people and cultures changes you and makes you more open minded. You can use your new mindset to tackle your issues better.
You are being superficial and shallow towards your views on traveling
@@msunje9862 She didn't travel to solve a problem. She had no problems. She traveled to pamper herself.
sorry, haven't watched the video yet but just needed to get this out of me chest: when i was a kid and watched the movie for the first time, i was quite proud as a wee indonesian gal seeing a part of my country represented in a fairly positive light on an international media, even if it was only the part already internationally known (so better known, in fact, that tourists/foreigners asking if "indonesia is close to bali" is a meme). then as i got older and learnt more about issues of gentrification, the crippling of local economy by being independent on tourism, and global sociopolitics and its implication of power imbalance -- i honestly can't look at it the same way anymore. especially with the scenes of those big houses the tourists stayed in? yeah, entirely unaffordable for the locals but extremely cheap or at the very least affordable to specifically tourists with dollars and euro money. the whole thing with the lady and her kid became less felt like a wholesome friends helping each other and moreso just ... white saviour complex, ig.
and i can't really comment much about the india portion (an actual indian would defo have better insight and opinion about it) but it just feel icky that she interacted more with other -- importantly -- _white_ tourists/expats than the locals. it really feels like italy prolly got the best ... coverage? i guess would be the word? and like, it's hard not to see that and not just think ... "oh, she's white WHITE." (and even in italy, iirc she _still_ interacted more with other tourists than locals. it just less visible/noticable bc both the tourists and the locals are racially speaking of the same demographic, but that dynamic was very much still there.)
anw, yeah. now to watch the vid lol.
I had the same experience with _I Dreamt of Africa._ As a child, I was so proud but slowly grew up into realizing these MFers glamorized colonization! Wth??
@@availanila i swear these kinds of realisation is its own type of pain esp when/if international representation of your locale is pretty rare if not outright nonexistent to begin with. but like ... at what cost?? 😭😭
Indo here, I literally GAGGED when she said she's disappointed that she's only allowed to stay in Bali for a month 😭 also, interesting how she picked Bali of all literal thousands of other islands in Indonesia, considering Bali is a region that is curated to be a tourist spot, and she didn't go to 'a less aesthetically pleasing' spots showing mundane life of Indonesia like Jakarta, let alone villages.
I have the icks with white tourists coming to Indonesia to indulge in superficial level of spiritualism which then they cherry pick and mold it into their Western ideology, and proceeds to think 'poor third world country citizens and look how they're still happy while not being white 😥 they will forever be oppressed' and use it as a comparison to their personal life situation. Like, that's a jump from a political problem comparing to your divorce
This comment was so interesting!!! Thank you for taking time to write
I must have read it 10 years ago. It was o-k. Not mind blowing, not life changing. Just a peek into a person who went on a journey. There are better books and there are worse books. I think sometimes books become popular because it’s attractive enough for non-bookworms to pick up the book and they end up celebrating the book if it was surprisingly enjoyable. Which isn’t necessarily about the book itself but about them realizing that reading is enjoyable. I remember my building manager being excited about finishing what sounded like a very mediocre book, and it’s just that she didn’t have any comparison to other books and was just excited that she accomplished reading a book. I’ve always believed that Eat Pray Love attracted these new readers, because I don’t see any justification for it to be popular in any other way.
Plus it was like being apart of something culturally, like watching a popular tv show to participate in the water cooler chat. I remember getting "pulled into" reading and discussing this book with others.
That’s a really insightful observation. I think something similar could be said about books like The Da Vinci Code or even Twilight. The writing style in those is not impressive, but it’s approachable - Da Vinci Code reads like a clunky news-magazine article, for example. Plus everyone is talking about whichever book, so it can’t be that hard to read it. So they give it a try.
I saw this movie, never read this book. For me, it was about trying something new, fumbling around and messing up and keep going anyway. It does seem like a justification for american exceptionalist psychopathy... but in my head it was all about just living anyway, no matter what your misunderstanding of life is because "understanding" life is a delusion we squeeze our myopic self into. I didn't worry about how she got it wrong, I just loved seeing her enjoying her life as she missed the point of the journey. Like watching someone learning a new foreign language. You don't care if they get the words wrong, you just celebrate that they are honestly trying to stretch outside of their comfort zone for something better.
Just like Sex and The City, this book/movie *reeks* of wealthy, self indulgent, urbanite glamorization of the foreign or exotic to drown the sorrows of the consequences of your actions. I just can't stand it. I appreciate the honesty she writes with but the whole thing just kinda comes off as pretentious and self inflating rather than an actual journey of self reflection and self discovery physically, spiritual or otherwise.
It’s just like sex and the city. There’s nothing liberating about a privileged white woman traveling.
Yup
I think the difference between the two authors is Candace Bushnell uses humor to point out the flaws and silliness of her characters. Carrie is a type of anti-hero we can love/hate. Whereas "eat pray love" author takes herself 100% seriously, and gives herself a straight protagonist role. She even hides facts that would make her harder to sympathize with (like her adultery)
Did your college professor program that into your brain ?
I didn't go to college. It's just a trend I've noticed amongst out of touch, self inflated urbanites or liberals that think they're holier than thou for a very superficial understanding of a complex ideology or issue.
Hey, I'm just some random dude who listens to your videos at work (I work at a dusty little cabinet shop). Thanks for making these videos, they really help the day go by while giving me things to think about, and I appreciate all of it.
this is excellent! yes consumerism isn't liberation.
If you want EPL without consumerism then watch the extreme exact opposite in "Keep Breathing" (which is fictional so...).
…
I remember a quote from a TV show: “A darkness carried in the heart cannot be cured by moving the body from place to place.” -Lennier, B5
Yes, but I've found my spiritual path to be extremely helpful so if I had the means of staying at the ashram of my guru's for a year, I'd gladly take that opportunity. It's not just the place. Though I don't get the sense she had nearly as deep a connection with her spiritual journey and was trying it on like an accessory more so.
I wonder if her relationship with Rayya was enticing simply because she knew the relationship would be short-lived due to Rayya’s terminal diagnosis. Liz simply never found herself and is continually looking for that spark, that thing that will make her happy.
This is great reflection. It comes across sounding negative, but you did give the appropriate degree of consideration to the author's perspective while simultaneously at the choices she made in her personal life.
The attitude toward medication as a failure if you have to take it is still a common one. My own mom struggles with this; we both got diagnosed with ADHD at the same time
So true. I've been on and off (mostly on) meds for a decade. But I recently caught myself saying 'I've been off meds for a year!' to a group of friends, and they all congratulated me. But then I thought about it for a second like, oh yeah, I've had a really crappy year. I should PROBABLY BE ON MEDS. Idk how this mindset of off-meds = healthy, is so ingrained!!
I have adhd too and my fam too. It makes me sad how ppl view it too my own mom thinks it’ll be cured.
My brain literally cannot survive without medication. I’ve tried so many times to lower the dose or come off antidepressant’s, but my brain chemistry has just been screwed since I was a kid. And it’s ok to stay on them. There’s literally no downside to me staying on them lol
my mom (a licensed therapist btw🙃) discouraged and fearmongered about any and all psych meds for years, all while belittling me for displaying symptoms of my various mental illnesses
so yeah, med shaming is very real and VERY harmful, getting proper treatment literally saved my life
ADHD diagnosis since 1998 here. Later tried different meds over the course of 6 years with side effects ranging from manageable to severe. I never felt like myself on them, although my teachers were pleased since I guess I was more manageable. I just felt like I was seeing everything thru a film (a la Claritin Clear commercials lol). I took myself off them at 16 and never looked back. I would rather feel like me, with my crazy brain instead.
This video popped up in my feed in the nick of time. I have an aunt(Mom's sister) who has a bizarre obsession with travel. My mother's has had significant health issues which required me to move Mom into an assisted living facility. I cannot count on my aunt for anything. If I ask for help, I get a nasty response about how it makes her feel. It makes sense now; she is running away from problems, while everyone else is dealing with them head on. For the record, my aunt is on another trip again, in Jamacia.
i think it’s pretty detestable that she purposefully covered up the fact that her marriage ended because of her cheating on her husband. i always thought it was his fault or that he was abusive or something.
You made that assumptions about the husband. Why blame her for your wrong assumptions? Take accountability for your wrong ways.
@@msunje9862well, it is mostly men that cheat so you can’t blame her for coming to the obvious conclusion like most people 🤷
So you just assumed the man was at fault? Yikes 😅
I thought the marriage break up was left completely without explanation. I felt the husband was blind sided an hadn't actually done anything wrong.
It is her right not to disclose something that is a private matter for someone else, not just her. She's free to speak about her own feelings or doings, but not display in a book the life of someone else.
Eh, I dunno. For me, personally, traveling did a terrific job in helping me to heal. Allowing myself to live in ways completely alien to me, learning to see the world the way other cultures do, and being forced to question every previously held beliefs, even basic notions of right and wrong, allowed me to have a completely different worldview. Learning different languages enabled me to think and perceive the world in new ways. All those experiences basically deconstructed my previous sense of self. No one stays the same after this sort of experience, and the new perspectives we become able to see through, so to speak, totally reframe your issues, better enabling understanding and ways to tackle them. The downside is that you will hardly find anyone who will think like you do anymore. In my case, even my national identity was shattered. (I guess that's where ideas such as "being a citizen of the world" comes from). That might make you feel lonely. Or not. It certainly helped teach me how everything in the world is relative, pretty much like in physics, and how to be more compassionate of others. But, it only works if you let go of yourself.
I think the point of the book was the courage to embrace change or of leaving your comfort zone and trying to discover oneself; the travel is just a part. It resonates with people because people are often in dilemmas or crossroads. Simple 💚
why do people need a book to give them permission to change?
they dont
So ultimately it’s just a book detailing a western woman’s vapid and banal attempt at spirituality
I find it rather ironic how you (rightfully so) criticize the portrayal of India and Indonesia & point out stereotypes, while agreeing that Europeans live a slower life & how the Italians' ultimate goal is to do nothing.. that is just not true lol.
Go to any big city in any country and you'll find a fast-paced lifestyle. That is not a US-specific thing and people in Europe have to work to survive too, just like anywhere else in the world.
TBH, this movie kind of made me also want to be a travel blogger for a bit, back in college. But that period of my life also made me realize that I don’t like traveling that much, but maybe because I was young and don’t have much appreciation for it yet. Now that I’m older, I also appreciate this quote more: “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
Maybe travel helps a bit, depending on where you are in your life. Now I travel to have distance from where I’m actually situated, so I can view it from a distance with a degree of objectivity. And I have my own places of pilgrimage that don’t necessarily start with the letter I. To each their own, I guess, but it also depends on what you bring with you, not necessarily the place in itself.
I think traveling or at least moving away from your hometown is a really important experience. It gives you a chance to see other people, experience other perspectives. I moved abroad for university and it really widened my horizons. I think being out of your bubble once in a while is a good thing.
This is such an intelligent insight into the film and also the modern approach to 'spiritualism'
I picked up this book, knowing nothing about it, just after I left my first husband and had also returned from an overseas trip in which I had a romance. So there was A LOT that resonated with me and I loved the story. I gave it to my best friend and she hated it.
I chalk it up to where we both were in our lives - I was having a very raw adult break up and she was in a stable relationship and hated to leave her house. I see how the book can be problematic, and it's still going to resonate with some people because it captures a certain time and frame of mind very well. It wasn't written for everybody; it wasn't written as a universal manifesto for love or travel. It's her (embellished) experience and shouldn't be taken too seriously.
Had I been in a different situation in my life, maybe I wouldn't like it either. Either way I still think she's a good writer and it's a good story. Like all great art, it made me feel deeply and understand more. If it had been a novel it would have done the same.
Ultimately, it was a companion to my own lived experience, NOT a set of life directives to emulate. True, travel doesn't cure you. But it's just a metaphor for the act of removing oneself from one's set routine in order to gain insight into themselves. The reason this metaphor and all travel stories resonate is because it works as a "clarifier" for some people. It worked for me. I have never felt more myself than I did in the Taklamakan Desert, and that experience allowed me to return home with clarity and direction. It's just one way out of a thousand ways to know thyself.
I think Liz's book about magic/creativity is so much better than Eat, Pray, Love. It was a life-changer for me as an artist
Big Magic, for me it was also an inspirational and groundbreaking view, for somebody who is not an artist but enjoy creative hobbies
Traveling itself won't fix your problems, but you may discover things that will help you figure out how to solve or at least ease your problems.
Wow I loved that! Books and films like this really can give you a problematic approach to life. Critiques like yours are really needed. Well done!
Many women resonate with this so much because they have a constant and massive lack of confidence. They need stuff like this because by themselves they are way too insecure to ever try to risk being themselves.
that’s why this genre is often referred to as “divorce porn”
the narrative often sold to middle aged women is that their lives will be better if they just get divorced. & in terms of abusive, unhealthy, or unhappy marriages i completely agree. but it’s not always going to make your life better. too often people don’t actually realize that a healthy marriage takes work & communication. that goes for men as well- they statistically uniate divorce far less often bc it’s less advantageous, but a lot of the times they’re unwilling to fix the problems in their marriage to avoid it.
Kinda short sighted to just chalk it up to confidence. Maybe they don’t have the financial support to drop everything and travel for a year? Maybe they actually did have kids before realizing it wasn’t a good fit and now they have a family to take care of? Maybe they have parents or family that need them or are in health crises that might need them around? There’s nearly unlimited reasons why people don’t take a year+ long catharsis trip, try sympathizing.
@@trashketchum9782men don’t ask for divorce bc the court system. But will drag and cheat though out the marriage
@@trashketchum9782of course it will not your life better but at least you will have your life. I have seen way too many women give up their lives trying to save marriage and even out their life in the line
Yeah, it's not just insecurity. It's societal conditioning telling women you HAVE to be xyz and making them feel like failures when they can't or self indulgent bitches when they refuse to.
In 2006 I read "Eat Pray Love" when a friend passed it on to me. She proclaimed it a work of depth and genius. I thought it was "interesting" enough, but no masterpiece of a relatable human evolving. And now that I read that Ms Gilbert divorced her husband for another man she was seeing, I now see the book, in retrospect, in most of the words that have been used here: Privilege, Unawareness, Whining (that might be my word), Self-indulgent. I didn't see the film because I thought a Julia Roberts-as-lead treatment would take this in a direction I didn't much care about. It's funny how something can grip so many people when it comes out, then a few years later and a few hours' thought, you wonder what on earth all the acclaim is about.
I read this book when I was very young and fell in love with the idea of travelling to find myself. I’ve been travelling and living abroad for almost 10 years now and although I had lots of fun along the way I’m depressed and I feel I don’t belong anywhere, not even where I come from. I guess what I’m trying to say is - no, travelling won’t heal your problems and make you a better person in life.
My mom made me read this book for her while I was in high school.
I was not the right audience for one and I was in my first long term relationship. This book made me second guess my own relationship and so many of the themes did not resonate with me.
I was so mad with the idea of escapism, I was so confused and angry that she couldn't find happiness where she was.
Thank goodness this book didn't make me leave that relationship because now I'm happily married for 6 years and riding on 15 years together.
Maybe the book had merit but it was not for me
I think the success of Eat Pray, Love can be explained by the joseph campbell quote: "People are not looking for the meaning of life. They're looking for the feeling of being alive." Gilbert was just running low on soul coal.
Loved this! (She says 12 minutes in knowing full well she will watch the whole thing).
It is interesting that the first book I read from Elithabeth Gilbert was her historical fiction novel "The signature of all things" and I have to say it's a very interesting and nuanced book, something that I've been searching in a modern literature for a while. Couldn't get through the "Eat pray love" though as if it was written by a different person.
"travel won't cure you"
It might, unless you try you will never know.
What a great - and yes, nuanced - analysis. The attitude towards anti-depressants feels very 2002; would be curious to know if she's updated it.
i enjoyed how balanced your review of the book and movie is... it helped me view it with more compassion than i would have if I'd reviewed it myself. but the shot of Julia Roberts wearing a bindi and sari still made me jump 😂
I actually never read the book, mostly because of overexposure. My first job was at a bookstore the year this book came out. All I would see would be people looking for the same book, and I realized just how much influence one person's recommendation could have on the masses. After the contract job was over, I ended up realizing how I wanted to make sure to read and watch what I liked and not what others told me I ought to.
This story also started the trend of signs hanging in every kitchen and dining room 😂
After reading through her wiki bio, it’s clear she has some kind of issue she needs to deal with. Her reasons for love seems incredibly superficial and she’s always leaving one person for another. Bleh..
so this is who's to blame for this dumb sign I was gifted that I now use as a laptop lap platform. I wondered how that happened. I hate those signs. Very disingenuous and shallow. Mine says "Happiness is a vegetable garden." And I"m like, I have very complicated thoughts about "happiness" per se, and I don't like this.
Some of ya’ll really be that miserable huh. Hope you can seek help you need.
@@hanatemonstas4485 you don't need to be miserable to be nuanced, but yeah I am pretty much miserable too -- guilty lol.
@@dotnothing5620 I never really understood the hate towards decorations with words on them. Like "Happiness is a vegetable garden" is the least offensive thing. Yet people still be mad about it. Sometimes taking words at face value is fine.
@@titandarknight2698 at face value, it's wrong, exaggerated, selling life short and missing the whole point. You have to understand the ethos of the signs themselves to think the thing makes any sense. Even the most ardent gardener thinks its takes a lot mroe than a vegetable patch to be happy.... like.... why am I having to argue this, it's obs. that's why people hate the signs. at face value, they're worthless.
I’m gonna be real she reads more as bipolar than just depressive from how she interacts with her life and how she flows between states and people.
to me, she sounds more borderline
Really? :(
@@nataliyasattarova9423as someone whos both, she could definitely be both bipolar and borderline
please don't diagnose her. God no
Its called a spiritual awakening
This was a wonderful analysis and really pinpointed things i felt was off about the whole era of eat pray love. I found myself self-reflecting on things i never realized i had internalized as well, so this was very refreshing. Thank you!!
The nothing changes by the ending criticism reminds me of My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness - she starts out basing her self-worth on her parents' opinion, but in the end she writes a comic that gets praised and starts basing her self-worth on her readers' opinion. The tangible thing changed but the problem remained the same, which is that she bases her self-worth on others' opinions.
It's hard to really change how you operate, but it's frustrating for readers to watch someone's journey following along the same grooves when you know it will cause pain for them.
Oprah turned a pretty penny on paeudo spirituality
I travelled to my country of birth (The Canary Islands) age 20 in 1990 all on my own and lived and worked there until age 24 in 1994. I had spent the entire previous year in my first job (aged 19 and a traineeship) saving up for it. It wasn't privelage that gave me that chance but hard work. I got to experience first hand what it was like to romanticise travel, adventure and get a cultural experience. I did read the book but I was disappointed. I found it sorely lacking and realised my own life experience was more fulfilling than reading about someone else's travel adventure. I'm now 53, married with a 15 year old son. I never regretted my early adventure in life as it shaped me into the person I am today. Although I didn't travel to escape anything or try to create space for thoughts. The best advice I can give for anyone contemplating travel to escape something is the saying "Wherever you go, there you are."
To summarize: Liz is fine . She is inventing most of her problems and then coming up with solutions.
I hated this book and did not see the movie. The takeaway for me was the way to heal your self-involvement and ego centricity is to find another man. She did not become more self aware, merely more rich and privileged. Any spiritual enlightenment claimed was only short lasting and superficial. Loved this essay. Glad I found you as I was rummaging around the podcast offerings. I have subscribed. Keep up the excellent work. Stay mighty.
I see you were wondering why an elephant shows up randomly. Let me tell you, though rare, its not that odd here(India).
But I gotta say, its been years since I saw one. I rarely go out of my house anymore anyways, so that is probably the reason.
oh man, you just unlocked a core memory of some people coming to my little suburban street with camels and elephants that you could ride for fifty bucks (needless to say, my lower middle class mom never let me or my sister do that)
@@daalimbe Same here... I just used to watch other kids ride elephants, but I never did.
My therapist told me there have been studies where after natural disasters or life changing events people usually want to speak about there romantic relationships. My therapist shared this with me after I expressed my guilt for speaking about my recent heartbreak at therapy instead of my grandmothers death. 10:13
This is so true.. I grew up in a very violent and abusive household, never had anyone who cared for me either.. But I remember that I was known as the weird girl who "fell in love" and swooned over someone else every couple of months! Just swooning and constantly talking about those boys and putting myself into heartbreaking situations.. Everything was better than thinking about the horrors of my personal life I had no control over as a child and teenager... I just was on survival mode and tried to unsee all of it somehow by stupid nonsense like romance.. And this all went of from age 6 to 30! I'm 33 now and learned to be happy all on my own, in my peaceful quiet home
Irving Yalom in his last book describes how some patients of his had very strong sexual urges right after the death of a close one. It is okay. The soul and body search for a proof that life still goes on.
I read this book years ago (I'm 25F) and I was hooked, I read it again, watched the movie repeatedly. I still talk about it to this day, but today, I wanted to hear someone break it down in a new way. I feel like I hold these high ideas of grandeur for my life due to media such as this. I was annoyed how many gripes a this were literally just about Liz and her personality, it's a memoir and people have opinions and shortcomings. But I do think it creates a horribly idealized fantasy that is ultimately unattainable for the majority of people. I have always wanted to run away and just knew everything would work out because of shit like this, but I just never devoted to the idea out of fear, plus I'm still kind of a child lol
Don't worry, we pretty much all were at 25. And some of us still are at 35.
@@lonestarr1490 thank you 💛
Well, the both the book and the movie were made as products to appeal and to be consumed.. how else could they be if not fantasies that thrust people into consumption? Much how like companies use "influencers" to market their products in a way that normal pleb would want them in a futile attempt to be as "cool" and "successful".
Also, it sure seems that story is a high-point of what might as well be a small highlight of an entire life up until that point (how much sh*t did she have to get there.. not to mention her story did not end like the book and keeps going). Close the curtains and "neck yourself" when you think you'll be at your best.. is a terrible way to see life. Of course we would also get there! But we would need to go on. Your life will be whatever it needs to be, and you just have to "do something" to "pass the time" and try to enjoy it.
Don't downplay yourself because of your age. You're an adult in every sense ☺
This is a well thought-through criticism of what I suppose is called 'neoliberal feminism'. As I travel around the world I tend to bump into these ladies and I believe they did start with some idea they can attain certain experiences and then some revelation and enlightenment will be attained by them for them.
This book has always fascinated me as a phenomenon-even though I’m not a big fan of it, its popularity is an insightful view into sociology. The author is also fascinating to me as a person, and I appreciate that you included that clip from her house sale, as I have watched that several times, trying to understand her better.
i really appreciate how more and more people are reflecting on what the point of travel should be for them, the reality that wherever you go, there you are (you bring all your problems with you, you don't escape your life simply by going to a different location). and the class implications... i always felt conflicted about the idea of me, a white american, traveling to someone else's country to pay that community to host me and show me a good time... when i was a teen starting to form those opinions everyone in my life told me i was overthinking and being a stick in the mud, and even now 20 years later there are still lots of people in my social circle who tell me i'm bringing unnecessary politics to a non-political topic... i really appreciate videos like this giving more and more people the opportunity to reflect on these ideas.
I was 17 when I first read this book. It came at a moment of reflection of becoming a young woman, not knowing what to do with my life moving forward. What was the typical plan for a young woman to have from high school onwards? It helped me reflect on what I might want to for myself having been surrounded by women who had babies at 18 and marriage soon after.
The most important lesson I took from Liz’s memoir is to not be afraid of asking yourself what you want out of life. Whether she is a privileged white woman in her early thirties, or anything else, she was given one life, with no choice in what color her skin was, the sum of the bank accounts of the family she was born into, and the talents she acquired through birth or being raised by her family. But she was born with the right to ask herself the same important questions that everyone has asked themselves and should be allowed to ask themselves; What is the meaning of their life and what do they want to do with it? Whatever audience she reached, whether they look like her or not, the message I believe is still important and should be commended since there are many people who are too afraid to ask themselves those questions. Her book, it seems, certainly made others feel not as alone in their life's journey, and was enough of a cultural phenomena to leak into other facets of woman's culture in America, such as the choice to have children or not/ to go after a fulfilling career/the choice to be single, etc. Her memoir might have into been done perfectly, but it was one stepping stone for women to consider thinking about what they want in their lives, instead of being blindly lead down a chosen path.
Great introspective video, it made me reflect on what I picked up from the book when I initially read it and would be a great reread with these new insights.
Honestly, even the first section about how much the living is slower in Europe, in contrast to America, feels very disingenuous to me. It might be for a tourist, but to us normie natives it's just as hectic, or at least it has become that way in the last 20 years.
I was just sitting in a tiny local hair salon in my home town in Bosnia this morning and my mum and I were chatting to the hairdresser as she was drying my mums massive locks. She was commenting on how everything has to be done so hastily now, everyone can barely wait their turn and then they run along. It used to be that you'd spend half the day at the hair dressers, because all the shops are owned and operated by one woman, who maybe sometimes has one student who's studying the trade from her to help out. You'd sit there with the other ladies and sip on coffee, gossiping all morning while letting your hair dye or perm set. And all of that goes on like that till noon when all the hair is styled, the ladies go home to make lunch, the hair dresser has a wad of cash for her work and some tips, and the cafe next door also turned a tidy profit with the waiter bustling the coffee to and from the salon earning some tips as well.
But that doesn't really exist anymore and it never did for the tourists. So her writing about living authentically with the folks in her travels sounds so clearly fake and/or unaware, it's funny. Also, the whole orientalism and white saviour stuff in the next two parts really waft of early 2000s to me. Still, it's interesting to see/hear someone's thoughts so unreflected and unfiltered. Almost like a reality TV show.
If I could sum up this woman, I would use the word capricious. People put her and her book up on a pedestal, characterizing her as courageous for upending her life. but as she admits, she's upending her life and relationships every few years. This isn't courage it's childishness. at least she was responsible enough to decide not to have a family.
you sound very jealous and angry of your own life choices. If you weren't you wouldn't resent other's lives
Why is upending your life and relationships every few years childish?
What is the objective definition of being a responsible adult?
@@williampan29 responsible adult = a person who is aware of their actions/ decisions and their consequences; if you cannot maintain a relationship and feel like quitting it every few years then don't Bother others and don't waste their time/feelings, you'd better stay single and figure out what your problem is, people are not toys you can play with
@martun321 so supposed my partner has a sickness that render her unemployed or even crippled, I told her: "for the sake of my children's financial and family security, I need to get rid of you to reduce the cost of living and mental stress", thus divorce and kick her out, am I being a responsible adult? After all, I place my children and family before me as my motif. I'm not selfish.
This movie is great for anyone recovering from a broken heart. It is not for happily ever after people. If you are going through a bad relationship, you will get the message. It is very powerful for either men or women. I love the movie. I recommend it to all divorcees. It help me to forgive me instead of others. Traveling is a nice distraction, then come friends, then culture, and therefore healing at last. ❤
Finally a good comment!
No it won’t cure you, but I believe doing these things help give you a sense of purpose which could lead to a better life.
I feel like you explained the philosophy of half of the women I’ve dated. Great essay!
oof
You are brilliant, this essay is brilliant. Thank you for sharing with us.
I have to admit, this book is my guilty pleasure. I find Elizabeth’s writing to be an indulgence, and the passages about food in Italy are some of my favourite. However I went travelling, probably inspired in part by this book, and all my problems were just magnified. I realized how self absorbed I was (and still am sometimes). My perspective on Elizabeth changed quite a bit as I got older.
I didn't love the overall 'white person finding enlightenment in brown places' vibe either, but I actually thought her processing of the young Indian woman's arranged marriage was.... overall one of the least awful parts? It's been a while since I saw the film, but I got the impression that EG had a sort of automatic White Feminist Savior Complex initial reaction - like 'oh this poor child, I must help her escape her cultural oppression' - but ultimately realized she didn't understand the context, didn’t have the solution, and would do more harm than good by trying to 'liberate' the young woman according to White Feminist ideology. It's possible I remember it incorrectly, though. What should EG have done (regarding her young Indian friend and the wedding), do you think?
I enjoyed this! Excellent writing and production. I will just say, you must love yourself. Before you can love anybody else, you've got to love yourself!
You are so right
When I first saw that this video essay was a little over 52 minutes, in my head, I went "not one more of these" - but you've done such an excellent job analyzing Liz, her personality, and you've intertwined the information from the book and visuals from the movie in such an amazing way that the 52 minutes literally flew by! This was amazing!
I loved the comparison you made between visiting India to discover yourself to visiting Disneyland. Also, I think I should try out anti-depressants (18:11). :)
Pheww, I needed this. I have been feeling the urge to flee my own life, go and get a airbnb and put it on the credit card. But I have been feeling that I can put money and resources into things and practices that actually RELIEVE the stress I am feeling. Putting that money back into my hobbies and the community that comes with it to keep me grounded. Even putting resources into my garden so I can eat healthier and avoid some of this dread from the imbalance of nutrition in my life.
I was so skeptical at first in this video because I LOVED the Eat Pray Love movie, but now I realize that it was also romantic escapism, and that is how I have been forming my life as well. It was definitely a grounding and humbling experience to watch this video. Unique perspective, incredible structure of your essay, and you told the truths that we didn't want to hear... but we needed it!
My personal experience is that a good therapist and a professional psychotherapy taken seriously can be more helpful than anything. It's not cheap either, I know, still. Combine it with some yoga or whatever sport makes you happy...reduced my anxiety disorder to practically zero. Good luck for everybody.
THIS ESSAY IS EVERYTHING TO ME!!!
The only scene that I remember and that stuck with me was the cheering to button her pants in Italy. There was a cheerfulness and relaxedness that helped me a lot.