This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Eat Pray Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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What are the best Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love from her book Eat Pray Love? What can these quotes teach you about love?
These four Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love talk about romantic love, self-love, and heartbreak. On her journey, Elizabeth Gilbert learned about all different types of love.
Read these four Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love and the lessons she learned.
Elizabeth Gilbert Quotes on Love
Eat Pray Love is about loving yourself, recovering from heartbreak, and starting anew. As a result, there are many fantastic Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love that help explain parts of her journey.
“This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something.”
Despite the reassurance of the voice the night before, Gilbert struggled the next day. She couldn’t stop the anguished thoughts about David. And she couldn’t get over her anger at having to relive those feelings again. Meditating was nearly impossible. She was angsty and snippy with everyone who crossed her path.
Richard told her that David was needed to help her leave her marriage. His purpose was to diminish her ego and break her heart wide open. And he was her pathway to her finding her Guru. Without David, she wouldn’t have been desperate enough to seek help. She wouldn’t have recognized a need for transcendence. He did his job, and it was time for him to go. Her need to cling to hope for reconciliation was fear of being alone and facing her truths. If she let the space David filled become empty, God would fill it with light and love. This is one of the Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love that discusses recovering from heartbreak.
“To be fully seen by somebody, then, and be loved anyhow – this is a human offering that can border on miraculous.”
. Wayan could see that Gilbert was devoid of love and started praying that she would find romance again. Within days, Gilbert met a man named Felipe. Felipe was a 52-year-old Brazilian who’d come to Bali years before to get over his divorce. Gilbert felt an instant connection to him, and they became close.
Gilbert resisted his attempts at affection at first. She’d come this far in her celibacy and spiritual journey and didn’t want to threaten her progress by opening her heart to a man again. But she could see that Felipe was a different kind of man. He was an adventurer like her and already had grown children. He wanted nothing from her other than to love her, and she eventually let him. Their relationship blossomed, and she fell in love with him, as well.
“To lose balance sometimes for love is part of living a balanced
life.”
One of the best Elizabeth Gilbert quotes on love is about balance. Gilbert had decided on a plan for her future by the time she returned home. She couldn’t ignore the premonition of the Balinese medicine man and needed to find a way to get to Indonesia again. The trouble was she also wanted to visit Italy and India. The other trouble was she wasn’t yet free to travel.
The first problem was simpler to figure out. The appeal of Italy was its cultural focus on beauty and pleasure. The appeal of India was spiritual guidance from her Guru. The conundrum was the same one she’d posed to Ketut. How can she balance her desire for earthly pleasures and that for internal awakening? She remembered the drawing of the headless figure and decided she didn’t have to choose. She would find a way to do both.
“In desperate love, we always invent the characters of our partners, demanding they be what we need of them, and then feeling devastated when they refuse to perform the role we created in the first place.
For nearly two months, Gilbert snuck out of bed each night in her home in Upstate New York that she shared with her husband. She hid in the bathroom, feeling ashamed, confused, and guilty about wanting to be free of her marriage. One night, she became so overwhelmed that she cried and prayed for the first time in her life. She asked God for help and a sign of what to do. Suddenly, she heard a voice. It sounded like her voice but also different. The voice told her to go to bed and rest. She would need it for what was to come. Seven months later, Gilbert separated from her husband. She wanted the divorce to be amicable, but her husband was too hurt. He refused all settlement offers and held her hostage in the marriage for years. This is one of the Elizabeth Gilbert quotes one love about losing love. Luckily, she is able to find her own self love later in the book.
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Like what you just read? Read the rest of the world's best book summary and analysis of Elizabeth Gilbert's "Eat Pray Love" at Shortform .
Here's what you'll find in our full Eat Pray Love summary :
- Why Elizabeth Gilbert needed to divorce her husband
- How she was able to find joy again in Italy
- How Gilbert was able to find balance with Felipe
