Elizabeth Gilbert talks BIG MAGIC

so who better than to speak to us about big magic than Elizabeth Gilbert this book just came out today and I'm I'm really nervous um it is such a vulnerable thing to make a thing and put it in the world and it doesn't matter how many times you do it it's a new experience every single time and every single time it has an unknown outcome and every single time it's scary um and that is what this book is about and it's still scary but it's about that what I wanted to write about was what it means to live a creative life that is not based on torment and suffering and martyrdom and angst but on a joyful collaboration with the mysteries of inspiration which is I think is the highest and most interesting way a human being can spend a life the other part of it is that ever since I gave that TED talk back in 2009 which some of you may have seen it's like I hung a sign around my neck that said please come to me with your questions and anxieties about creativity and and I'm glad because I actually have enjoyed those conversations enormous Lee and what I've learned is that when you talk to people there are people who are making and doing very interesting things out there and then there are people who want to be making and doing very interesting things and they have ideas and and they have inspiration and they're not making those things and so of course I immediately start to grill them as to why they are not making those things and they always have really articulate reasons for why they aren't doing that work and the reasons are real because the reasons are always real you know there's financial difficulties there's family problems there's a questions of time there's the wrong living in the wrong city having the wrong training not having the right collaborators there's always very good reasons that they can lay out almost in a legal document about why they are not engaging with creativity but when I start to scratch at those reasons it's always fear so um so I'm going to skip into um at the beginning of the book not the beginning beginning but the beginning is beginning I'm a writer I'm very articulate about where things are so this I believe is the central question upon which all creative living hinges do you have the courage to bring forth the treasures that are hidden within you look I don't know what's hidden within you you may barely know it yourself although I suspect that you've caught glimpses I don't know your capacities your aspirations your longings your secret talents but surely something wonderful is sheltered inside you I say this with all confidence because I happen to believe that we are all walking repositories of buried treasure I believe this is one of the oldest and most generous tricks that the universe plays on us human beings both for its own amusement and for ours the universe buries strange jewels deep within us all and then stands back to see if we can ever find them the hunt to uncover those jewels that's creative living the courage to go on that hunt in the first place is what separates a mundane existence from a more enchanted one and the often surprising results of that hunt that's what I call big magic you get the branding see how it all wraps room um all right I want to trip myself again when I talk about creative living here please understand that I'm not necessarily talking about pursuing a life that is professionally or exclusively devoted to the arts I'm not saying that you must become a poet who lives on a mountaintop or on Greece or that you've got to perform at Carnegie Hall or that you have to win the Palme d'Or at the Khan Film Festival though if you want to attempt any of those feats have at it I love watching people swing for the bleachers know when I refer to creative living I'm speaking far more broadly I'm talking about living a life that is driven more strongly by curiosity than by fear one of the coolest examples of creative living I've seen in recent years for instance came from my friend Susan who took up Figure Skating when she was 40 years old to be more precise she actually already knew how to skate she had competed in figure skating as a child and had always loved it but she quit the sport during adolescence when it became clear that she didn't have quite enough talent to be a champion for the next quarter of a century my friend Susan didn't skate why bother if you can't be the best and then she turned 40 she was listless restless she felt drab and heavy she did a little soul-searching the way you do on the big birthdays she asked herself when was the last time she had felt utterly light joyous and yes creative in her own skin to her shock she realized it had been decades since she had felt that way in fact the last time she'd experienced such feelings had been as a teenager back when she was still figure skating she was appalled to discover that she had denied herself this life-affirming pursuit for so long and she was curious to see if she still loved it so she followed her curiosity she bought a pair of skates found a rank hired a coach she ignored the voice within her that told her she was being self indulgent and preposterous to do this thing she tamped down her feelings of extreme self-consciousness at being the only middle-aged woman on the ice with all those tiny feathery nine-year-old girls she just did it three mornings a week she awoke before dawn and in the groggy hour before her demanding day job began she skated and she skated and skated and skated and yes she did love it as much as ever she loved it perhaps even more because now as an adult she finally had the perspective to appreciate the value her own joy skating made her feel ageless she stopped feeling like she was nothing more than a consumer nothing more than the sum of her daily obligations and duties she was making something of herself making something with herself it was a revolution a literal revolution as she spun to life on the ice revolution upon revolution upon revolution please note that my friend did not quit her job did not sell her home did not sever all her relationships and move to Toronto to study 70 hours a week with an exacting Olympic level skating coach and no the story doesn't end with her winning any medals it doesn't have to in fact this story doesn't end because Susan is still figure skating several morning's a week simply because skating is still the best way for her to unfold a certain transcendence with in her life that she cannot seem to access in any other manner and she would like to spend as much time as possible in such a state of transcendence while she's still here on earth that's all that's what I call creative living and while the paths and the outcomes of creative living will vary wildly from person to person I can guarantee you this a creative life is an amplified life it's a bigger life a happier life and expanded life and a hell of a lot more interesting life living in this manner continually and stubbornly bringing forth the jewels that are hidden within you is a fine art in and of itself because creative living is where the big magic will always abide so let's talk about courage now if you already have the courage to bring forth the jewels that are hidden within you terrific you're probably already doing really interesting things with your life and you don't need this book rock on but if you don't have the courage let's try to get you some because creative living is a path for the brave we all know this and we all know that when courage dies creativity dies with it we all know that fear is a desolate boneyard where our dreams go to desiccate in the hot Sun this is common knowledge sometimes we just don't know what to do about it so let me list for you some of the many ways in which you might be afraid to live a more creative life you're afraid you have no talent you're afraid you'll be rejected or criticized or ridiculed or misunderstood or worse of all ignored you're afraid there's no market for your idea and therefore no point in pursuing it you're afraid somebody else are did it better you're afraid everybody else already did it better you're afraid somebody will steal your ideas so it's safer to keep them hidden forever in the dark you're afraid you won't be taken seriously you're afraid that your work isn't politically emotionally or artistically important enough to change anybody's life and therefore not worth doing you're afraid your dreams are embarrassing you're afraid that someday you'll look back on your creative endeavors as having been a giant waste of time effort and money you're afraid you don't have the right kind of discipline you're afraid you don't have the right kind of work space or financial freedom or empty hours in which to focus on exploration and invention you're afraid you don't have the right kind of degree you're afraid you're too fat I don't know what this has to do with creativity but pretty much everyone is afraid they're too fat and it seems to stop them from doing a lot of interesting things so let's put that on the anxiety list for good measure you're afraid of being exposed as a hacker a fool or a dilettante or a narcissist you're afraid of unleashing your innermost demons and you really don't want to encounter your innermost demons you're afraid that your best work is behind you you're afraid you never had any best work to begin with you're afraid you neglected your creativity for so long that you'll never get it back you're afraid you're too old you're afraid you're too young you're afraid because something went well in your life once and obviously nothing can ever go well twice you're afraid because nothing has ever gone well in your life so why should it begin now you're afraid of being a no hit wonder you're afraid of being a one-hit wonder listen I don't have all day here so I'm not going to keep listing fears it's a bottomless list and a depressing one I will just wrap up my summary this way scary scary scary everything is so goddamn scary and please understand that the only reason I can speak so authoritative Lee about fear is that I know it so intimately I know every inch of fear from head to toe I've been a frightened person my entire life I was born terrified I'm not exaggerating you can ask anyone in my family and they will confirm that yes I was an exceptionally freaked out kid my earliest memories are a fear and pretty much all the memories that come after my earliest memories are also of fear growing up I was afraid not only of all the commonly recognized and legitimate childhood dangers like the dark and strangers and the deep end of the swimming pool I was also afraid of an extensive list of perfectly benign things sno nice babysitters cars playgrounds stairs Sesame Street the neighborhood telephones board games the grocery store sharp blades of grass any new situation anything that dared to move I was a sensitive and easily traumatized creature who had fallen to fits of weeping at any disturbance in her force field my father exasperated named me pitiful pearl we went to the Delaware Shore one summer when I was 8 years old and the ocean upset me so much that I begged my parents to stop all the people on the beach from going into the surf I just would have felt a lot more comfortable if everyone had safely stayed on their own towel quietly reading with their back to the ocean as I was was that too much to ask if I'd had my way I would have spent that entire vacation indeed my entire childhood indoors on my mother's lap in low-light with a cool washcloth on my forehead this is a horrible thing to say but here goes I probably would have loved having one of those awful munchausen syndrome by proxy mothers who colludes and pretends that their child is sick to get attention I would have completely cooperated with that kind of a mother in pretending that I was sick weak and dying in creating a completely helpless child given half the chance but I didn't get that kind of mother not even close instead I got a mother who wasn't having it she wasn't having a minute of it which is probably the luckiest thing that ever happened to me my mom grew up on a farm in Minnesota the proud product of tough Scandinavian immigrants and she was not about to raise a little candy-ass on her watch my mother had a plan for turning around my fear that was almost comic and it's straightforwardness at every turn she made me do exactly what I dreaded the most scared of the ocean get in the ocean afraid of the snow time to shovel the snow all the neighbors snow that year I remember can't answer the telephone you're now officially in charge of answering the telephone in this house hers was not a psychologically sophisticated strategy but it was consistent and I resisted her I cried and sulked and deliberately failed I refused to thrive I lagged behind limping and trembling I would do almost anything to prove that I was emotionally and physically totally enfeebled to which my mom was like no you're not I spent years pushing back against my mother's unshakable faith in my strengths and abilities and then one day somewhere in adolescence I finally realized that this was a really weird battle for me to be fighting defending my weakness that's seriously the hill I wanted to die on as the saying goes argue for your limitations and you get to keep them why would I want to keep my limitations I didn't as it turned out I don't want you keeping yours either over the years I've often wondered what finally made me stop being pitiful pearl almost overnight surely there were many factors involved in the evolution of this the tough mom factor the growing up factor but mostly I think it was this I finally realized that my fear was boring mind you my fear had always been boring to everyone else but it wasn't till mid adolescence that it became at last boring even to me my fear became boring to me I believe because I finally noticed that it was the same thing every single day around the age of 15 I somehow figured out that my fear had no variety no depth no substance no texture I noticed that my fear never changed never delighted never offered a surprise ending or an unexpected twist my fear was a song with only one note only one word actually and that word was stop my fear never had a single more interesting or subtle thing to offer them that one word repeated at full volume on endless loops stop stop stop stop stop which means that my fear always made particularly boring decisions like a choose your own ending book that always had the same ending which was nothing I also realized that my fear was boring because it was identical to everybody else's fear I figured out that everyone's song of fear has exactly the same tedious lyric stop stop stop stop stop true the volume may vary from person to person but the song never changes because all of us humans were equipped with the same basic fear package when we were being knitted in our mother's wombs and not just humans if you pass your hand over a petri dish containing a tadpole the tadpole will flinch reflexively beneath your shadow that tadpole cannot write poetry and it cannot sing and it will never know love or jealousy or triumph and it has a brain the size of a punctuation mark but it damn sure knows how to be afraid of the unknown well so do I so do we all but there's nothing particularly compelling about that do you see what I'm saying you don't get any special credit for knowing how to be afraid of the unknown fear is a deeply ancient instinct and an evolutionarily vital one but it's not particularly smart for the entirety of my young and skittish life I had fixated upon my fear as if it were the most interesting thing about me when in fact it was the most mundane in fact my fear was probably the only 100% mundane thing about me I had creativity within me that was original I had a personality within me that was original I had dreams and perspectives and aspirations that were original but my fear was not original in the least my fear was not some kind of rare artisanal object it was a mass-produced item available in the shelves of any generic box store and that's the thing that I wanted to build my entire identity around the most boring instinct I possess the panic reflex of my dumbest inner tadpole now now you probably think I'm going to tell you that you must become fearless in order to live a more creative life but I'm not going to tell you that because I don't believe it's true creativity is a path for the brave but not a path for the fearless and it's important to recognize the distinction bravery means doing something scary fearlessness means not even understanding what the word scary means if your goal in life is to become fearless I believe you're already on the wrong path because the only truly fearless people I've ever met were straight-up sociopaths and a few exceptionally reckless three-year-old children and those are not good role models for any of us the truth is you need your fear for obvious reasons of basic survival evolution did well to install a fear reflex within you because if you didn't have any you would lead a short stupid crazy life you would walk into traffic you would drift off into the woods and be eaten by bears you would jump into giant waves up the coast of Hawaii despite being a poor swimmer you would marry a guy who said on the first date I don't necessarily believe people were designed by nature to be monogamous I don't know where I got that one so yes you absolutely do need your fear in order to protect you from actual dangers like the ones I have listed above but you do not need your fear in the realm of creative expression sincerely you do not just because you don't need your fear when it comes to creativity of course doesn't mean that your fear won't show up trust me your fear will always show up especially when you're trying to be innovative your fear will always be triggered by your creativity because creativity asks you to enter into realms of uncertain outcome and fear hates realms of uncertain outcome your fear programmed by evolution to be hyper-vigilant and insanely overprotective will always assume that any uncertain outcome is destined to end in a bloody horrible death basically your fear is like a mall cop who thinks he's a Navy SEAL he hasn't slept in days he's all hopped up on Red Bull and he's liable to shoot at his own shadow in an absurd effort to keep everyone safe this is all totally natural and human it's nothing to be ashamed of it is however something that very much needs to be dealt with here's how I've learned to deal with my fears I made a decision a long time ago that if I want creativity in my life and I do then I will have to make space for fear too plenty of space I decided that I would need to build an expanse of enough interior life that my fear and my creativity could coexist since it appeared that they would always be together in fact it seems to me that my fear and my creativity are basically conjoined twins as evidenced by the fact that my creativity cannot take a single step forward without fear marching along beside it fear and creativity it seems shared the womb they were born at the same time they still share major vital organs this is why we have to be careful about how we handle our fear because I have observed that when people try to kill off their fear they usually end up inadvertently murdering their creativity in the process so I don't try to kill my fear I don't go to war against it instead I make all that space for it heaps of space every single day I'm making space for fear right this moment I allow fear to live and breathe and stretch out its legs comfortably it seems to me that the less I fight my fear the less it fights back if I relax it relax us too in fact I cordially invite fear to come along with me everywhere I go I even have a welcoming speech prepared for fear which I deliver right before embarking on any new project or big adventure and it goes like this dearest fear creativity and I are about to go on a road trip I understand you'll be joining us because you always do I acknowledge that you believe you have an important job to do in my life and you take your job seriously apparently your job is to induce complete panic in me whenever I'm about to do anything interesting and may I say you are superb at your job so by all means keep doing your job if you feel you must but I will also be doing my job on this road trip which is to work hard and stay focused and creativity will be doing its job which is to remain stimulating and inspiring there's plenty of room in the minivan for all of us so make yourself at home but understand this creativity and I are the only ones who will be making any decisions along the way I recognize in our respect that you're part of this family I will never exclude you from our activities but still your suggestions will not be followed you are allowed to have a seat you're allowed to have a voice but you are not allowed to have a vote you don't get to touch the roadmaps you're not allowed to suggest detours you're not allowed to fiddle with the temperature dude you're not even allowed to choose the freaking snacks but above all else my dear old familiar friend you are absolutely forbidden to drive and then we head off together me and creativity and fear side by side by side forever marching once more into the terrifying but marvelous terrain of unknown outcome why is this worth it it isn't always comfortable or easy carrying your fear around with you on your great and ambitious road trips I mean but it's always worth it because if you can't learn to travel comfortably alongside your fear then you will never be able to go anywhere or interesting or do anything interesting and that would be a pity because your life is short and rare and amazing and miraculous and you want to do really interesting things and make really interesting things while you're still here I know that's what you want for yourself because that's what I want for myself too that's what we all want and you have treasures hidden within you extraordinary treasures and so do I and so does everyone around us and bringing forth those treasures to light takes work and faith and focus and courage and hours of devotion and the clock is ticking and the world is spinning and we simply do not have time anymore to think so small so thank you you

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Id: uwjbvhRReZo

Length: 21min 9sec (1269 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 29 2015