Eat, Pray, Love: Italy

I decided to read Eat, Pray, Love for the second time in December because I find it comforting to revisit books I liked. (Right after my Dad died I re-read the 7th Harry Potter because I wanted to be with characters who felt like friends. Coincidentally, I think Eat, Pray, Love might have been the next book I read.) It has been about 2 years since my last trip through Italy, India and Indonesia with Liz and, considering the VERY different personal space I am in, thought I may feel differently about the thoughts and revelations of that book. Here are my notes (I am such a student...):

Page 37

Total delight! Liz has been to the gelato place near the Pantheon in Rome that I have literally been raving about for a year and a half!

Il Gelato di San Crispino has some of the most original flavors of gelato I've ever seen (and I've seen a lot of extensive flavor selections between Italy and Spain). Liz even mentioned specially the cinnamon-ginger ice cream I craved (with McDonald's french fries of all things) for at least a year after my Italy trip with my students. I admit now that this is not the most enlightened note I have in the book. Lisa will be the only person who reads this and understands the truly transformative experience of this particular gelato.

(Note the picture is mine of the menu at San Crispino. That's how much I love this place; I took a picture of the MENU!)

Page 41

When I don't know what I'm doing, I look like I don't know what I'm doing. When I'm excited or nervous, I look excited or nervous. And when I am lost, which I frequently am, I look lost. My face is a transparent transmitter of my every thought. As David once put it, "You have the opposite of a poker face. You have, like... miniature golf face.

My thought: Oh! Me too! Me too! That's why I can't lie or pretend. It's why my students like me and sometimes my bosses think I'm not respectful enough - I can't hide anything. I can't fake it. I don't know how. I'm just ... me... all the time. For real. And real me thinks everyone should be able to share what they really feel. (I've found that this is not as well-received in the World of Work as I think it should be.) The only thing I would say differently is that when I am lost, which I too frequently am, I look so damn confident about where I am going that not only do I not necessarily look lost, but people with good senses of direction will actually follow me into the complete unknown assuming I know exactly where I am going. When traveling the confidence is good, the lack of direction is awful. The miniature golf face is a bit of a liability when traveling alone, too.

Page 62

For me, though, a major obstacle in my pursuit of pleasure was my ingrained sense of Puritan guilt. Do I really deserve this pleasure? This is very American, too - the insecurity about whether we have earned our happiness.

I think one of the reasons I like this book so much is because I identify with Liz in many ways. I'm a good student, a good planner, someone who sits in the first row of class and takes genuine self-worth from whether or not my teachers (bosses, colleagues) like me. I'm good at following the rules and doing what I'm supposed to do. At an early age (I usually say 16, but 12 if I'm being honest) I put my life on a scheduled path of school and hard work and degrees and a job that would make it all worth while. I'm not good at idleness. Too much relaxation makes me feel lazy. My self worth is too closely tied to job performance and productivity. That's why unemployment was so difficult for me in the beginning. For about 4-6 months I suffered a kind of mild depression because without work I felt indulgent, irresponsible and lazy. How could I justify being happy if I wasn't doing my part to contribute to society?

But as I said in my 2009 blog, I realized that being happy itself is a contribution to society. Happiness is a natural right. You don't have to earn it. The size of my paycheck and the number of hours I spent slugging away at a job do not correlate to how much enjoyment I am allowed. This concept, expressed in just a few sentences, has taken about 2 years to really believe and there are still days when it slips my mind completely.

Page 95

It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.

They should make a bumper-sticker out of this one. It's just a great motto to live by. I want to hang it on a wall somewhere.

Page 115

You were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight.

My mom and I have discussed this concept at length in the last 2 years. Somehow in our Puritan society self-sacrifice has become the ideal many women strive for. "Look how successful I am! I do everything for my husband and kids and parents and friends and never think of myself at all!" Or, better phrased for my taste, when asked if she ever has needs of her own Jane (in 27 Dresses) says, "No. I'm Jesus."

But this ideal has it all wrong. You can only offer yourself to the people around you if there is something there to offer. Self-care is not a luxury, it's a necessity. If I don't take the me-time to rest, read, breathe, and do whatever I need to do to rejuvenate myself occasionally, what exactly am I offering to the people I love? Finding and experiencing beauty and joy and tranquility as often as possible is not indulgence. Living a life of balance is not something that we should feel guilty for, it is a basic human necessity.

Stay tuned for India...