Here’s a great interview of Elizabeth Gilbert by Marie Forleo in regards to unleashing your creative self. Ms. Gilbert is an entrepreneur, author, and motivational speaker. Below the video are my notes from this amazing interview. It’s sure to lift your spirit and keep you motivated as you pursue your creativity.
Jon’s Notes on Marie Forleo’s interview of Elizabeth Gilbert – Author
Latest Book: “Big Magic”
Nugget’s Wisdom: The real reason we don’t move creatively ahead is always and only fear.
Afraid they don’t have talent; afraid of rejection; afraid of criticism.
Nugget’s Wisdom: I have no desire to become a fearless person.
Only people who are fearless are psychopaths and toddlers.
Fear is a necessary companion.
Fear is the reason why we’re alive today. Fear protects us.
Nugget’s Wisdom: Creativity will always provoke your fear.
Acknowledge the importance of fear and invite it along. I’m just writing a poem. It’s not life or death.
Nugget’s Wisdom: You can’t let fear have control over your creative choices.
Fear can shut your creative choices one by one. No don’t do that – No, too risky.
Nugget’s Wisdom: Guaranteed it’s already been done, but it’s not yet been done by you.
40,000 years of the art and pretty much it’s been done before.
Shakespeare borrowed stories and told them in a way that’s never been told before.
Artists have always been responding to stuff but you can add to the pile.
What moves me is the humanity in the authentic piece of creation. My heart and mind has changed. The world looks different.
“All love eventually becomes help.” Inspired by Paul Tillich.
You will radiate a thing that people wants to be near.
Every pursuit comes with a shit sandwich. What do you love but willing to eat the shit sandwich?
7 years of rejection letters. Are you willing to still eat the shit sandwich?
Even when you succeed, your shit sandwich will be media criticism, people criticism, etc.
Is this still better than nothing doing it? If yes, then you’re on the right path.
Nuggets of Wisdom: People murder their creativity by insisting they’re not truly creative unless their creativity pays the bills.
Jump and the net might catch you. What would do even if failure wasn’t a word you’re thinking of.
You may or not get everything you want.
Don’t be fixated on how much money your creativity makes. You work on your creativity because you love to work on it.
Don’t get so battered that you lose your house, family, etc. that you shut down and never want to work on your creativity.
Be child-like, not childish. Don’t be childish – I want it and I should get it. People get rage, resentment etc. for failure. Do be child-like and be open to creativity like a child.
I wish there was a shortcut for personal and spiritual growth, relationships, health, but there’s not. It takes a lot of work.
Nuggets of Wisdom: Perfectionism is a serial killer.
I don’t want to be perfect, I want it to be finished.
There’s a lot of good unfinished work.
If your standards are so high, you’ll never finish you work.
The contract I made was to be a writer, not a good writer.
I promised the universe that I would be a writer, not a good writer.
I don’t want to go to my grave with 50 pages of an unfinished novel.
If you don’t like it, go write your own fucking book. And you know what, you won’t.
Nuggets of Wisdom: What will make you finish it is not discipline, but self-forgiveness.
Forgive yourself for not doing well.
I’m not Hemingway, but I’ll keep trying.
Nuggets of Wisdom: There’s no better thing to spend your life doing that saying yes to that invitation.
When did inspiration promise you anything – other than the amazing experience you have dancing with it for some time? Inspiration will watch you fall off the cliff and smile and ask you, “Do you want to do it again?”
Find ways to cushion the fall. Despite the pain, one of these days, you will say yes to inspiration again.
You will create something that you love and then you may hate it later. You love it and you dismiss it. It’s okay.
It’s not a baby. It’s just a thing I made. People will criticize it, attack it, hate it.
It’s independent of you. Your creativity was making you as you were developing it. When you finish it, forget about it.
Nuggets of Wisdom: There are two kinds of creators in the world: the martyrs, and the tricksters.
Reject the martyr way. I will do this even if it kills me.
Trickster: I didn’t come here to get hurt.
Tricksters do things in a transgressive way. They play with things, turn things upside down. Down have to treat things as a holy way.
Trickster trusts the universe. Put it out there and see what happens. Don’t be so heavy. There’s no one way.
We live in a take, take world. When our energy is drained to the point where our health begins to fade, it’s time to pause to review our life and then make the changes necessary to recover.
To combat this, we have to focus on those who fill us with positive energy and who truly care for who we are. We also need to work on what we’re passionate about and provide value that helps others. Somehow, when we do this, good things come back to us.
At times, our greatest enemy is ourselves. Our negative thoughts push aside our positive ones, which in turn, affects our actions and everything around us. We get hard on ourselves for our failures when there was so much that we gained from taking that journey. We dwell on the past and what we don’t have, when the future is so bright with endless possibilities. We mourn the dead even though they never did leave us. Meanwhile, there are so many people who love us, and many more who are cheering us on to make our next move. So why stay still and let the darkness consume us? We have to make our move, and then another, and then many, many more. The future is relying on what we do now. To maximize what’s ahead of us, we need to be alive in the here and now. By practicing gratitude and compassion, we can transcend past our fears and into the light of happiness.
Below is a song called “Spirits” by the Strumbellas that reflect my feelings in my journal entry above.
JON RIKI KARAMATSU 