I don’t fully subscribe to the idea that the universe has a plan and we simply have to ask for what we want in order to achieve our goals. A friend lent me a copy of The Secret a year or so ago and I still haven’t completed it. I simply can’t believe in it. Do I believe in Karma? Yes, to the extent that if we do good in the world, we are probably more likely to see good and therefore experience it, but for me it is not some sort of divine zero-sum game.
I feared that this book might be a little like that. Why did I read it then? Well, my September reading challenge was to read a self-help book and I chose this one because I am in the process of writing a book and I thought it might support me in what is proving a phenomenally difficult task! There are a thousand books I could have read about how to write my novel in a month, a week, or whatever, but I’m a bit cynical about those too! No, it was the subtitle that attracted me. I’ve been describing myself as a writer for over a year now, albeit rather quietly, but do not yet feel I have the legitimacy to call myself that on my tax return or my car insurance policy! Yes, I write, quite a lot, and did so for a long time before I ‘came out’ about it, but I don’t yet feel like a writer. I don’t feel like I own or deserve that title and I want to know when my sense of entitlement to that will commence.
Elizabeth Gilbert is probably best-known for her 2007 best-seller Eat Pray Love which was made into a film starring Julia Roberts. That was an autobiographical account of her journey towards happiness and balance in her life (I haven’t read it), whereas Big Magic is about incorporating creativity into your life. Her starting point is that it is part of our human nature to be creative, to make things, and to deny ourselves that is to impoverish our soul.
Gilbert is a writer, and uses examples and anecdotes from her personal journey to illustrate her points, but she is adamant that creativity takes many forms, from painting to poetry, from gardening to decorating, it is all legitimate.
“A creative life is an amplified life.”
The book is divided into six parts, each dealing with a different aspect of the creator’s dilemma: Courage, Enchantment, Permission, Persistence, Trust and Divinity. The messages that resonated particularly for me were that:
- It takes courage to accept your fears, but that most fears are irrational and a waste of valuable time – we simply do not have enough time on this earth to be paralysed by our apprehensions
- Talent and inspiration alone are not enough – creativity requires work to be realised and you will get good at anything that you practice
- The magic of creativity is in the journey not the result – do not fear the reactions of others, they are not your problem
- The path to success always involves some failures and these are also important lessons
- Do not burden your creativity with the need for it to make your living – that will certainly kill inspiration
- Do not strive to be perfect – “Done is better than good”
“Perfectionism is just a high-end haute couture version of fear. I think perfectionism is just fear in fancy shoes and a mink coat, pretending to be elegant when actually it’s just terrified. Because underneath that shiny veneer, perfectionism is nothing more than a deep existential angst that says, again and again, ‘I am not good enough and I will never be good enough’.”
She goes on:
“Perfectionism is a particularly evil lure for women.”
Creativity gives us the opportunity to liberate ourselves from the self-limiting roles that society has allotted to us. This gets to the heart of my own angst about my writing. I don’t know if I deserve to be called a writer yet, but I #amwriting (regular Twitter hashtag), I am creating. A few years ago I made soft furnishings for a (modest) living, but I called myself a cushion-maker; just because I cannot yet claim any authenticated ‘success’ as a writer, doesn’t make me less of one. After reading this book, I feel emboldened, but I might need to bookmark a few pages and re-read them from time to time to stir my courage!
An easy engaging read, that you will find inspiring at some level. Recommended.
Do you have difficulties with perfectionism or with claiming a title for yourself? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
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Julia's books 
I agree with her about perfectionism but I’m not so sure about done being better than good. Sometimes a botched job is worse than no job at all.
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True. Depends on what it is I guess. I’ve read some books recently where I really felt as if they had bypassed a decent editing phase in a race to get to print! And that can cost your reputation dear in the long-run.
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Oh, don’t get me on that soapbox!
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Ha ha ha!
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