Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month

Elizabeth Gilbert's Blog, page 82

March 19, 2014

NERVOUS. In a few hours, I’m speaking at the TED conference, and I’m nervous. I…

NERVOUS.


In a few hours, I'm speaking at the TED conference, and I'm nervous. I should be well accustomed to public speaking at this point, but I just have to say: There is something about speaking at TED that makes people shit their pants.


I want to tell you this because is my second time here, and it's really intimidating, and everyone I know who gets on that stage (except the one genuine sociopath whom I met once) is terrified. Everyone thinks they're the only ones who shouldn't be here. Everyone things they're the fraud, the idiot, the fool. Everyone: The heads of major companies, the artists you most admire, the fearless activists, the polar explorers, the researchers who are curing cancer and the physicists who are decoding our very universe. Be assured: I have spoken to lots of them, and right before they get on that stage, they are all shitting their pants. (And for weeks leading up to it too.)


But we do it anyhow. We lock our shaky knees and stand up there and share our ideas, our research, our dreams, our most vulnerable reveals.


Today I watched a beautiful woman (a model, actually) named Geena Rocero stand up on that stage and talk (for the first time in public) about how she had been born a boy, and about her early realization that she had accidentally been assigned the wrong gender — and what she did to remedy it and become the woman she always wanted to be. Even her modeling agent didn't know this secret about. It took incredible guts to share this. She got a giant standing ovation for it, too, after asking us "Will you accept me as I am?"


Which is the big question, of course, whenever we put ourselves out there.


Sometimes the answer is NO. If the answer was always YES, then it wouldn't be brave to ask the question, would it. So you kind of have to do it, anyhow, even with all the risk.


As I always say to myself right before I go on stage, "This is terrifying. But what else are you gonna do with your life, Liz? NOT speak?"


So. No choice but: ONWARD,
LG



via Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook Wall


The post NERVOUS. In a few hours, I’m speaking at the TED conference, and I’m nervous. I… appeared first on Elizabeth Gilbert - The Official Website | ElizabethGilbert.com.

View more on Elizabeth Gilbert's website »
 •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on March 19, 2014 13:51

RESURRECTION ENGINES AT WORK!!! Dear Ones – Many of you have sent me links to…

RESURRECTION ENGINES AT WORK!!!


Dear Ones -


Many of you have sent me links to this story, and I just needed to share it myself — along with a big fist pump in the air for Alma Whittaker, who is very happy somewhere in fictional-character Heaven right now.


So these scientists found some "dead" 1600 year old moss under the ice in Antarctica, and revived it.


A really complicated process to revive the stuff, too: They just squirted some water on it.


Alma used to call mosses "resurrection engines" — my god, she would have loved this.


And she would have said what I always say, when people ask me why I wrote my novel about moss: "You don't get to be the oldest land plant on earth by being stupid or boring."


MOSS LIVES!


http://bit.ly/1iCNUGN


Heart,
LG



Back from frozen limbo: 1,600 year-old Antarctic moss that seemed dead thawed and grows again
http://ift.tt/s2TgY7
WASHINGTON – Scientists have revived a moss plant that was frozen beneath the Antarctic ice and seemingly lifeless since the days of Attila the Hun.


via Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook Wall


The post RESURRECTION ENGINES AT WORK!!! Dear Ones – Many of you have sent me links to… appeared first on Elizabeth Gilbert - The Official Website | ElizabethGilbert.com.

View more on Elizabeth Gilbert's website »
 •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on March 19, 2014 08:16

March 18, 2014

“UNLEARN THE LESSON OF OBEDIENCE.” Last night at the TED conference, I wept whi…

"UNLEARN THE LESSON OF OBEDIENCE."


Last night at the TED conference, I wept while listening to Ziauddin Yousafzai speak about his daughter, Malala.


You have have heard of Malala Yousafzai. She is the brave young Pakistani girl who was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman for speaking up on behalf of education for girls.


Her father began his extraordinary speech by saying that in tribal and patriarchal societies, a man is known by his sons. "But I am one of the few fathers who is known by my daughter," he said. "And I am proud of that."


He spoke about how, in rural Pakistan, when a girl is born, it is never cause for celebration, but rather shame. As she grows up, she is taught only one virtue: Obedience.


Yousafzai refused to follow suit. He celebrated his daughter from the day she was born, and wrote her name in the family tree — a 300 year-old document that had never mentioned a female. He put Malala in school — not only so that she could know her own potential through education, but also for the mere political defiance of writing his daughter's name on an enrollment form, thus signaling her very existence as a human being. (He had never seen the names of any of his 5 sisters on any document whatsoever; they simply did not exist within their own country.)


And most of all he said, "I taught her to unlearn the lesson of obedience."


Which was such a shocking transgression that a Taliban gunman shot her for it. (I always think it's particularly telling that she was shot in the head — shot in the MIND. Anything to shut down that female brain.)


She survived, famously, and still fights for education for girls. (She spoke last night to us from a video feed — she couldn't come to the conference because she's in SCHOOL — and she dazzled.)


This girl is extraordinary; this father is extraordinary.


He finished his speech by saying that people always ask him what he did to make Malala into such a strong warrior. He says it's not what he did; it's what he DIDN'T do: "I didn't clip her wings."


I was so honored and emotional to be there last night to hear this, and wanted to share it with you all.


Unlearn your obedience, women.


Teach your girls to unlearn their obedience.


And let a star shine in the crown of this father, and all parents, who guide their daughters to grow strong.


Onward,
LG



via Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook Wall


The post “UNLEARN THE LESSON OF OBEDIENCE.” Last night at the TED conference, I wept whi… appeared first on Elizabeth Gilbert - The Official Website | ElizabethGilbert.com.

View more on Elizabeth Gilbert's website »
 •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on March 18, 2014 16:13

March 17, 2014

Question of the night: WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO GIVE UP, IN ORDER TO BECOME WHO Y…

Question of the night: WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO GIVE UP, IN ORDER TO BECOME WHO YOU REALLY NEED TO BE?


Dear Ones –


Your very tired traveler has made it to Vancouver, to the TED conference, which started tonight and is already inspiring.


I will try to keep up with dispatches throughout the week, of highlights from some of the speeches. But I also wanted to share this photo. The TED organizers invited some former speakers to ask questions to the whole community, which they then posted on interactive pillars throughout the convention hall. This question is mine. (Always has been!) It was really cool to see it there, and to see people answering it already.


I ask this question because everything good I've ever gotten in life, I only got because I gave something else up.


And there's always something more to give up, something to work on releasing, so you can reach for the next iteration of yourself.


We all know, at all moments, what we need to give up next.


What are you ready to finally let go of?


ONWARD,
LG



via Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook Wall


The post Question of the night: WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO GIVE UP, IN ORDER TO BECOME WHO Y… appeared first on Elizabeth Gilbert - The Official Website | ElizabethGilbert.com.

View more on Elizabeth Gilbert's website »
 •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on March 17, 2014 20:58

March 16, 2014

On the way to the TED conference! I just got on the flight to Vancouver. Been i…

On the way to the TED conference!


I just got on the flight to Vancouver. Been in the air so much lately that my brain has basically just quit even trying to guess the timezone anymore…which is just the way I like it, babies.


Onward!
LG



via Elizabeth Gilbert’s Facebook Wall


The post On the way to the TED conference! I just got on the flight to Vancouver. Been i… appeared first on Elizabeth Gilbert - The Official Website | ElizabethGilbert.com.

View more on Elizabeth Gilbert's website »
1 like ·   •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on March 16, 2014 19:20