Mary
asked
Elizabeth Gilbert:
When your ideas for writing seem to fade away, what do you do in your down time? How do you make them come back?
Elizabeth Gilbert
You can't make ideas come to you, Mary — you have to go to THEM. Most of the inspiration I found in life was because I went looking for it. I spent my 20's traveling all over the country world, working in all sorts of different jobs, talking to everyone I met, seeking ideas everywhere. I've never really had an idea "come to me" — mostly, I think of myself as a truffle hound, rustling around in the woods, looking for buried hints of inspiration. My suggestion is that you get rid of your "down time" and replace it with "search time" — go to interesting movies and plays, explore new parts of your town that you've never investigated, talk to the stranger on the bus next to you, spin around in the library and pick up the first book you see and read it....search, search, search. Do not wait for it to find you.
More Answered Questions
Erica
asked
Elizabeth Gilbert:
"The Signature of All Things" moved me, I felt so many magical nerves shift as I finished! One curious habit of a couple characters really had me wondering, that of Reverend Welles forgetting that others actually eat and Mr. Pike's proclamation that he could have lived off the sun alone. Were their habits related? Have you known someone that's done this? Is it the human-plants-earth connection the made you include it?
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