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Elizabeth Gilbert Quotes - Page 23

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Look - I understand that an unexamined life is not worth living, but do you think I could someday have an unexamined lunch?

Look - I understand that an unexamined life is not worth living, but do you think I could someday have an unexamined lunch?

Elizabeth Gilbert
Thinking, Lunch, Looks
Elizabeth Gilbert (2010). “The Complete Elizabeth Gilbert: Eat, Pray, Love; Committed; The Last American Man; Stern Men & Pilgrims”, p.148, A&C Black

We live in this society where you must constantly be reinventing yourself. The big question is what are you doing next. The only thing they want is composed of these three elements: They want you to do it the exact same way because they want more of it; but they want it to be totally different; and they want it to be better. That's all you have to do. You just have to do something that's exactly the same, totally different, and better.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Different, Three, Elements
Goodreads Interview, www.goodreads.com. January, 2010.

I can see how the authorities could not like Todd [ Willingham], because he's not a person who is going to give you respect if you don't deserve it just because you say something.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Giving, Authority, Persons

Women have always been more critical of marriage than men. The great mysterious irony of it is - at least it's the stereotype - that women want to get married and men are trying to avoid it. Marriage doesn't benefit women as much as men, and it never has. And women, once they are married, become very critical of marriages in a way that men don't.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Men, Trying, Benefits
Goodreads Interview, www.goodreads.com. January, 2010.

Just having walked into a prison environment, sat there for two hours, the effect that it had on me. ... I couldn't imagine the effect it would have on a person 24 hours a day. So then I became more intrigued, and we began a correspondence, and I began visiting [Todd Willingham].

Elizabeth Gilbert
Two, Prison, Environment

As a writer, you always read in two minds: You read as a reader and you enjoy it, and you look at it as a writer, and you just admire the architecture and the construction.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Book, Two, Mind
Goodreads Interview, www.goodreads.com. January, 2010.

I went to Shea Stadium and used the men's room. Terrifying. There was this little kid looking at me through the crack [in the stall]. and I was like, "If you tell anyone what you've seen..."

Elizabeth Gilbert
Kids, Men, Cracks

The story he [Todd Willingham] told me was this: He woke up to a fire. He ran out of the house and couldn't run back in to save his children, and that was enough to get me interested. ... There's a writer in me that's like, ... this is a great story. ... I have a good friend, who was my neighbor at the time, and I told her about it. ... She had been a reporter, and she was like, "Let's go investigate it."

Elizabeth Gilbert
Running, Children, Good Friend

The idea that a prisoner would confess to a complete stranger that he had committed a crime - I just didn't buy that.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Ideas, Stranger, Crime
"Frontline (Death by Fire)". TV Series, www.pbs.org. October 19, 2010.

There was really only one person who - and I remember to this day - he was a fireman, and he said, "You'll never know what you'll do when you're in a fire." Everyone else was like: "I don't care; I would have saved my children; I could have done it. Even if I was asleep I would have woken up and saved my children." But the fireman said, "You never know what's going to happen unless you're in there."

Elizabeth Gilbert
Children, Fire, Done
"Frontline (Death by Fire)". TV Series, www.pbs.org. October 19, 2010.

[My friend and I] decided, we'll go to Corsicana, and we'll see what the people in Corsicana say. ... We just started meeting people and talking to them, and the more I heard the stories, the more red flags kept popping up. There was this disconnect between this person [Todd Willingham] that I'm reading in the court records, the prosecutor's statements, and this person that I'm learning about.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Reading, Talking, Red Flags

Todd's mother had several children by different fathers, and Todd [Willingham] had been abandoned in California. ... He's a good-looking man. He was a witty man, you know? Funny, caring. He wasn't arrogant, but he was kind of set in his ways. If he thought something, it was one way. You could show him an alternative, but he was still going to stick by his particular view. But I could see how to women he could be a very charming, good-looking guy, especially when he was younger.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Mother, Witty, Children

If Todd [Willingham] was guilty of anything, it was just his self-preservation. He got up and ran out of the house and then thought about the children after the fact.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Children, Self, House

When I read the article [in The New Yorker] by David Grann, I was very struck by people responding to the article, of people thinking I was such a hero and what a wonderful person I was, and I didn't feel that at all. I felt like I had very much, like Todd [Willingham], taken a path of self-preservation.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Taken, Hero, Thinking

I promised Todd [Willingham] that I would attend the execution. ... It was impossible for me to go. I was incapable of that sort of travel. Sitting in a chair that long, driving to Huntsville just wouldn't have happened. ... I'm sure I would have been there. It's something I know. I would not have denied him that, but the accident kept me from being there. At some level, the universe was giving me the excuse for not being there. ... The universe was like, "Oh, you don't have to watch this." ... It would have been a horrible thing, but I'm sure I would have gone.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Long, Giving, Watches

I was just really appalled, and I really kept quiet until I saw the governor [Rick Perry] get on and repeat the same words that the prosecution had used in the penalty phase: that he [Todd Willingham] was a monster. And that got me to get on to the computer and connect with some of the media and say: "I have his letters. He wasn't a monster. He was a caring individual." Let them see another side.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Caring, Media, Monsters

I think how badly things can go wrong in our judicial system. All it took was one person saying that this was a deliberately set fire, and then a whole chain of information became malevolent.Criminal past - that worked all in their favor to create this "monster" - and they even used the word "monster." It's like, let's ensure that the public thinks he's an evil individual.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Past, Thinking, Fire
"Frontline (Death by Fire)". TV Series, www.pbs.org. October 19, 2010.

In order for marriage to endure it has to change along with us, and it does that very graciously. And in the end I find there is something kind of moving about it: the fact that people continue to insist on choosing somebody to build a life with.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Moving, Order, People
Goodreads Interview, www.goodreads.com. January, 2010.

When you want to do something creative and you want to do something new, you have to start with the thing that's making you want to jump up out of bed in the morning.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Morning, Creative, Want
"Elizabeth Gilbert, ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ Author, On What It Takes To Get Inspired". Interview with Chantal Pierrat, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 11, 2013.

A man that can cook you a proper meal that is like a weekday meal - which I think cannot be better than in the form of a roast chicken - that's the greatest.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Men, Thinking, Meals
"Elizabeth Gilbert Serves Up a New Classic". Interview with Michael Hainey, www.gq.com. May 24, 2012.

The world needs women who stop asking for permission from the principal. Permission to live their lives as they deeply know they often should. I think we still look to authority figures for validation, recognition, permission.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Thinking, Validation, Needs
"Elizabeth Gilbert, ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ Author, On What It Takes To Get Inspired". Interview with Chantal Pierrat, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 11, 2013.

If you want to know the world, sometimes you have to get out and roll around.

Elizabeth Gilbert
World, Want, Sometimes
"Our interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love". Interview with Natalia Hawk, www.mamamia.com.au. September 30, 2013.

Nobody's life is interesting enough to warrant a third memoir.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Interesting, Life Is, Enough
"Our interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love". Interview with Natalia Hawk, www.mamamia.com.au. September 30, 2013.

For the entire decade of my 30s and the early part of my 40s, I didn't write a word of fiction. I just left behind a dream of my life.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Dream, Writing, Fiction
"Elizabeth Gilbert, ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ Author, On What It Takes To Get Inspired". Interview with Chantal Pierrat, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 11, 2013.

We alter and customize the thing every century, every generation, every day - both in the courts and in our own homes. And marriage accepts our modifications gracefully. Marriage adapts, evolves and (in a manner that I find miraculous and kind of inspiring) somehow keeps chugging along.

Elizabeth Gilbert
Home, Generations, Kind

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