Feeling Lost & Unhappy in Life? Find Meaning with Elizabeth Gilbert

Marie
For women who feel lost and unmotivated. Unhappy. What would you say are the two biggest things keeping them from a life of theirs?
Liz
Holy moly, we're jumping right into that. Are you shitting me? We're just going. I'm just going. Me? We're just going straight into it, Marie Forleo. Okay. I'm actually going to.
Narrow it down to one. For the sake of efficiency. And this.
Liz
Is a tried and true piece of.
Wisdom because it comes from the Bhagavad Gita. That's like years old. Right? So this is time honored and tested. There's a line in the Bhagavad Gita that says, it is better to live your own life imperfectly than to live a perfect imitation of somebody else's life.
Liz
Which feels like some influence.
Or just put that on Instagram.
Liz
Like with a really pretty background. But it's from like one of the deepest.
Most ancient sacred texts. And, and it's that like, I think it's that for women and, and I know this because I spent my s creating a perfect imitation of somebody else's life, and it was note perfect. I mean, it was Christmas card perfect. It was Hallmark Channel perfect. And and I was dying inside of it. And the way that I'm living now, years later, is is completely different from that and very displeasing in its form to culture and family.
Your friend in mine, Martha Beck, often says that if you want to be free, it's quite simple. You just have to walk away from culture and family. In other words, it's not simple. But what she means by that is not necessarily literally never seeing your family again or moving to another country. Which of course you can do that if you need to.
Both of those things. But walking away from everything that you were taught as a woman would make you be a good and most of all, pleasing woman. I think that's what kills women is what they were taught by family and what they were taught by culture. It's it's what killed me. And the closer I get to living that way, the further I get for myself, and the more I want to die, and the closer I get to living my true self imperfectly, the less I want to die and the more displeasing I am to the world.
And I'm fine with that.
Liz
What are some daily habits?
Marie
Small ones or small practices, that we can do to find a little more happiness or contentment or joy or meaning in our lives?
I heard somebody say recently that at least once a day, your head should be where your feet are. And and that is a sort of code for meditation. But it doesn't have to be sort of sitting in lotus position on the edge of an infinity pool, in a.
Liz
Unitard kind of meditation, or what it.
Looks like on the cover of Yoga Journal. If you fear the idea of being silent with yourself, there are many ways that you can find a way to make sure that your head is, that your head is where your feet are, and the primary thing is to separate any moment that you can steal your attention away from your phone.
I think it's a very good beginning, and I recently started doing a digital Sabbath one day a week. So every Thursday, actually, on Wednesday night at I lock my phone in a safe and I don't pick it up again until Friday morning at a.m.. And so for the entirety of Thursday, I am not reachable by the world.
Now, this is extreme, and I know that there it's not going to be feasible for everybody to do that. Super helps that I don't have a partner and I don't have.
Liz
Children, so nobody's.
Going to be checking on me to make sure that I'm okay. The first few weeks that I did this, it was terrifying because I actually felt I was in withdrawal from the addiction to the phone.
Marie
Did you find yourself reaching for.
It constantly and also a sense of fear? How? What if I go to the store without my phone and I'm in a car accident? What if I walk in the woods without my phone and I break my leg? What if you know, because the phone has trained us to believe that if the phone is not on and within reach, we are not safe and no one around us is safe.
And that's a lie, because for hundreds of thousands of years, people didn't have this thing attached to them. Yes. So that would be the primary thing is, even if you can steal an hour of your life away where you're not in the same room as your phone, and you can do something that's grounding, that can put your head where your feet are, then that's going to restore you.
Marie
I want to go back to this notion of culture and family and how it kind of conditions us and, and trains us. You know, one of the things that you and I have in common is we're child free. And I feel like we might have talked about this at dinner some times, but it's always a curiosity point for folks with me because they're like, you know, Josh and I, I'll even be like, I want you guys to have kids, you know?
Marie
And it's just like this thing which which is understandable. But a lot of people, especially women, have asked me over the years, like, how did you decide not to have kids? And I said, I never did. Meaning it wasn't a decision. It was my.
Truth. Yes. Like, I.
Marie
Knew from the time I was a really, really small girl. It was like that was not my path. Like I had little Bert and Ernie and my little carriage. You made me like that was cute. But I was like, oh, dude, can't wait to be mom. And like, no, I just liked my little doll. So like, that was.
Liz
Like, no, I'm going to run an empire.
Marie
And I remember when I met, you know, Josh, we're together now like years. And I was like, are are you a dad like, or do you need to have more? You know, he's how he told me he was a dad or he was like, okay. I was like, do you want to have more kids? He was like, nah, I don't really care.
Marie
And I was like, score like it. It was unbelievable because every relationship I had prior to that, it was like, so we're going to do this on this timeline or whatever. Was it a decision for you not to have kids, or was it a truth or what did that look like?
It wasn't as clear as it was for you. Because I was confused by the fact that I enjoy children, and I grew up as a babysitter and, like, a favorite auntie, and, you know, like I was, I always had kids around, and I'm, quote unquote good with kids, whatever that means. Yeah. And and it was so programed.
Speaking of family culture, it was so programed into me that it was like th grade. It's like the thing you do next, right? Like you get married and then you get a house and then you have kids and then you do that, you know, and and so I was marching toward that. I was married to somebody who wanted to have kids.
We bought the house. And then the closer I got to it, the more I felt like I was marching to my death. And that is how it physically felt to me. Every time we had a discussion about it, I felt like, and we it's at this time saying, when I'm because he was older, when I turned you know, we'll have kids then.
And as that date approached, I felt like I was marching toward a guillotine. So I had the reverse. Physically, my cells knew my mind hadn't caught up, but my body had the reverse of the ticking clock that so many women feel as they get older and they feel like they're going to die if they don't have a child.
I had the exact reverse, which was I'm counting down. I only have more days to live night, more days to live. And I kept marching toward it because somehow I didn't think I had a choice. I was already married. Yes. You know, the agreement had been made. I made that promise. I didn't know that you're allowed to say.
I said I would do something. And now that we're approaching it, I find that I cannot do it. I've had to learn in life that multiple times I've had to say that that might be a promise I'm not able to keep. Yes. You know, now that I've caught up with myself, I'm actually unable to do this.
Marie
It's so interesting that you say that in that way, because I was engaged prior to Josh, and it was that similar experience where my body started revolting. Any when we would tiptoe near like, okay, you're engaged, like, can we talk about a date? And it was as though my entire soul had a meltdown. And physically I was like, what is happening?
Marie
And I've thankfully that was like probably one of the clearest times, but I've had it in my career. I've had it at different times where it's like my I always got like Shakira says, your hips don't lie. I'm like, my body does not lie.
Never. It can't, it cannot.
Marie
And it has not let me, you know. Yeah, knock on all the things. But it has kept me true to myself. And it was so interesting that you said that, that you felt like because there's been so many times in my life, even though I know it's not the truth per se, but I have felt like I was like, I am dying a very slow death right now.
Marie
I'm watching myself wilt. I'm watching myself come to pieces. I'm watching myself, like, disintegrate into the ground. And it is miserable.
Yeah, yeah. And and the body will go take you right to death rather than let you continue to do something that's not in alignment. Yes. And not in accordance. And, Martha Beck said to me one time I was like, you know, it's almost like my body knew there was something I was talking about. It was like, oh, I was talking about being in love with Raya.
And I was like, it was almost like my body knew that I was in love with Raya before my mind did.
Liz
And she said, oh, she always. Only always, you know, like, it totally goes. So yeah.
My body fell apart. That's what happened. I mean, I was years old going to a flotilla of doctors. I had carpal tunnel syndrome, and every joint of my body I couldn't digest, I couldn't sleep, my hands didn't stop shaking. I was vomiting food up, which was so funny because it looked like morning sickness. But it was my body being like, I will kill you before I let you have a baby.
Wow, I will kill you. That's how serious this is. And I can see. I now see that as like the hand of God. Literally. Yes. You know, like I have a very different purpose for you. And in order for you to become what you need, what I need you to be and what you need to be, you're going to have to disappoint every single person you know.
Yes. And and the reason I'm the most unlikely poster child for that is because of how desperately I want everyone to love and approve of me. And that's why it's weird that I have become a poster child for.
Liz
Living your life in opposition to family culture, because I am far from somebody who walks around with two middle fingers up to the world. I'm just like to. And my pleasing. Do you like me? Did I did something wrong? Are you mad at me? Are we okay? Like, that's my that's my vibe, you know. So for it's ironic and paradoxical, which is how I know it's of God.
Liz
Yes. That I become the symbol for throw. Chuck it all away.
And goes be your true self. Yeah, but I had no choice because I was going to die.
Marie
Yeah, I remember my mom, who's, God bless her, she's still with us. I don't think we haven't caught up in this. We're all going to have dinner after this, you guys. So we have. Listen, I have a lot to catch up on, but my mom, who I love dearly, we almost lost her twice last year. But I remember when, you know, she was like, well, when are you gonna have kids?
Marie
Like, once again, happily. And it was, it was. And she really said, she's like, what's wrong with you? You know? And it's like the new Jersey attack, you know what I mean? That's what's wrong with you. And I was and I and me fiery. What's wrong with you? Like.
Liz
See, I took that in and I was like, I went on a four year investigation of what was wrong with me. And the answer was nothing whatsoever is wrong with me. And the older I've gotten, yeah, the.
More I've deepened into the gratitude, the greater attitude of not having that choice and the anger that I feel at the messaging that is still being just like.
Liz
Foie grudges force.
Fed into women across all cultures, saying that you will not be complete until you have these accouterments the ring, the house, the marriage, the blah blah blah and the actual sociological facts on this. And how much culture scares women of the fear of like, you're going to die alone and your cats are going to eat you kind of story.
Yes. Like, here's the actual actual facts. The actual facts are that women who do not have children and are not married live longer than women who are married with children. They earn more money, they are healthier. They are less likely to die of suicide. Women without children and without marriages less likely to commit suicide, less likely to to be victims of homicide, less likely to die in car accidents.
Less likely to suffer from alcoholism and drug addiction. Less likely to report themselves depressed and anxious and more sexually satisfied than women who are married with children. Right. It's like there's not a single, not a single way that you can measure success and well being on any cultural or sociological scale. That single, that unmarried and childless women do not outperform women who are married with children.
So the opposite is true of men. There is no sociological data. There is no way that you can measure it that married men do not outperform single men. And the reason for that is that women pour their lives into their partners, and so they literally exchange.
Liz
Literal years of their life by pouring.
Into their partner, uplifting their partner, who will then thrive and succeed and prosper. And the women will wilt in the giving which is what we are taught, because we're supposed to be the giving tree, right? So the messaging is the exact opposite of the reality. And that's what makes me mental.
Liz
Especially when I watch, like, romantic comedies with the dumb old trope of.
Some woman chasing a man and some man trying to get away from her. And I'm like.
Liz
If this was sociologically accurate, she would be running for her life and he would be doing.
Everything in his power to manipulate and beg her to marry him so.
Liz
That he could live seven years longer, earn a great deal more money, like have fewer diseases.
Yes. And she would give her life into him?
Marie
Yes.
Liz
So. No, I'm not doing it. Yeah.
Marie
You know, it's funny, I remember, you know, we have our B School program that I've had for it, which feels like forever now and like the digital world, I think it's like since or and it's when we're recording this.
That's a long time.
Marie
So long frickin time. And like sometimes I remember in the marketing of it because you know how much I love marketing, I love business, I love it, it's like playground for me. It's creativity time. And I would receive messages from these incredible women, beautiful women. And they were so scared, yet so excited about their idea, the thing that they really wanted to create and the thing that they were hopeful to build something around.
Marie
And I remember one particular message like, Marie, I would love to do this, and I need to ask permission from my husband to invest in myself. And again, I under I understand the landscape, I understand everything, but I remember just reading that message in the privacy of my own computer, my own home, and wanting to take my computer and throw it against like, smash it.
Marie
Like I just felt so much rage. And you were talking about, like, this is the kind of shit that makes you mental. Yeah, that was the kind of stuff. And there would be some people on my team that I would like cut and paste, you know, I was like.
This is why.
Marie
This is why I love helping women make a lot of money. This is why, like, you know, like, I would it would just like, fire me up in all of these ways because it just, it made me and made me crazy pants. Yeah.
Liz
Because it is crazy. It is.
Marie
Crazy pants.
Liz
It is crazy. Oh, God, the pants are crazy. I love you too, Marie. Okay.
Marie
And it's like. And and actually, I think even one of our emails about B School, like, if you're feeling crazy pants, it means you're wearing the damn right pants. Keep those pants on. Like, keep those pants on.
Liz
Oh, my God, I love it.
Marie
So I want to talk about letters from love. Like this. Wildly fun and popular and transformative and healing. And to me, it was scary as all get out beautiful Substack that you have. And like, I was like, oh my goodness. Like, I love sometimes seeing like really big numbers. And I'm like, there's over beautiful souls that are doing this.
Marie
So for those people who don't know what letters from love is, what is the practice? Why did you start this practice and why did you start the Substack?
Actually, I'll start by saying what Substack is because not everybody even knows with.
Marie
Yeah, no, I was I knew of it. Yeah. But I had never delved in. It was like a mystery to me. Yeah. You were my you are my gateway drug. Yeah.
Liz
And it's so good. It's so, It's it's it's actually I love it because it's.
Like a reverse technology. It's a return to blogging. It's essentially an email newsletter service. And a lot of writers are shifting off of what's now called traditional.
Liz
Social media, which is hilarious. Yes. Because it's already ancient. They're moving off of traditional social.
Media and they're moving on to Substack. So essentially you sign up, you go to Substack, and you sign up to receive a newsletter that your favorite writer creates. And so it's like a blog, and it comes into your inbox and then you get to read the newsletter. So I've been looking for a way to shift off of social media, because social media to me feels like a party drug.
That was really fun when you started using it, and now somebody described it so beautifully this way. Now everyone's addicted to it and no one's getting high off it.
Liz
Anymore, but we can't put it down because our systems have become addicted to it. It's it's not fun anymore. Like we're like, oh, my life is being destroyed by this thing, you know?
So I've been looking for ways to build community away from social media. So that's why Substack and then letters from love is a practice that I'm teaching people how to do. It's a spiritual practice that I've been doing almost every day for the last years, and I discovered it when I was in my first divorce and the worst depression of my life.
And the practice is that every day I write myself a letter from the spirit of unconditional love and so it's Dear Liz, this is what we want you to know. For some reason, love is a we like. It's like some sort of a conglomerate of like God and angels and saints and spirits and ancestors and maybe fairies.
Liz
Fairies all take fairies like it's a team, you know, it's like. It's like these are you. This is.
Your team. And, and and here's what we want you to know today. So it's extremely current. It's like, what do we want you to know today? And when I first started doing it, what mostly they seemed to want me to know is that you can't do anything to lose us. You can't do this wrong. You can't. This is exactly the opposite of the perfectionism that I was taught and that I have suffered under for so long.
You. You are so loved by us, and we're with you, and we'll be with you always. And if you end up living under a bridge in a cardboard box where you garbage bag spitting at people, we will just adore you and through that and will be with you through that. And a lot of the messaging is what you don't have to do.
Like we need you to slow down, have a drink of water, take your bra off.
Liz
Why are you still wearing a bra? It's You know, like, we just want to love you.
And we want to tell you that you're not alone in the cosmos. It's been the most healing and beautiful practice. And. And I've taught it in workshops for years. And then I just wanted to combat the awful self hatred and evil, the kind of malicious interior voices that were all taught or normal by teaching people how to push against it, by writing themselves these letters that start off as a kind of imaginative exercise, like what would unconditional love say to me if I could speak, but becomes a spiritual practice?
Because, as I'm sure you found when you did yours, you didn't really write it like something wrote it. You were downloading something that you were hearing or feeling that wants to be in communion with you and wants to tell you how loved you are. So every week, I share one of the letters I wrote to myself that week, and then we invite a special guest and you are a special guest recently, and we invite somebody to take the risk.
And a lot of people that we invite won't do it because it's so vulnerable and so frightening, and they're afraid. I think that love won't arrive if they call it, but it always does. Yeah. And the question that you ask is, dear love, what would you have me know today? And then you bring the answer and we share the person's answer on the Substack.
And then people share their own letters. And as of last count, we have almost people doing this every day. It's a movement. So all are welcome. Please join. It's it's it's it's also, I do believe, the kindest corner of the internet.
Marie
It's fantastic. It is so, so good. It gave me all the feels of like, internet back in again. Because, like, I start, I started my business. I'm. I'm using bunny ears because it was like, no, the business. It was like, I'm a life coach, you know, I don't know what I'm doing, but I, I knew something, you know what I mean?
Marie
I knew enough that there was some impetus for me. But in like right. And then when every there was more people online in like and Yeah. It was like, this is really fun.
Liz
This is funny. If you talk to people from all over the world, it's bringing the world together. This book is going to bring the world together. LOL.
Marie
Doing cartwheels with like how much joy I would get from blogging and like the connection. And I remember when I logged into the Substack for the first time because I was so filled with anxiety to do mine for you and for everyone. If you hadn't caught it like we put mine on social, you have to check out Liz's, letters from level.
Marie
Put a link for it below this video and all that good stuff. But I remember when you had asked me to be a guest, I basically just said yes, not knowing what I was saying yes to. Besides, you gave me a very good description, but I was just like, I don't know. Yes, please, I love you, you know what I mean?
Marie
And then when I dove in, I was like, this feels like the internet back in the day in the best way. Yeah. B when I watched not only your letters, but also the other guest letters. I think I told you and Margaret this who helps you was, I cried so much and instantly like it was just tears.
Marie
And then I was like.
Oh.
Marie
What did you say yes to? How are you going to do this? You know, like it was just but it was the best thing. It was the best thing ever. So I'm just saying that because this practice is so good and so incredibly transformative and my own experience, I had the fear and anxiety because I've done a practice called guided writing.
Marie
And I have, which is not dissimilar, but it's not clear. It's not as clear, direct or like, you know, asking love for a particular thing. And I will tell you, my guided writing practice in a similar way. Something else is coming through. And when I go back and read those journals or those entries, I'm like, that is not me.
You know?
Marie
I'm like, I don't use that phraseology. There is a certain energy, there is a wisdom, there's a simplicity there. Like there's so much stuff that I don't identify as Marie and it's mystical, magical, amazing healing.
Of blah. Like it's not shrouded behind, you know, like you don't have to go to a medium. You don't have to. The thing I love so much about that community, what I say to them all the time is, you're doing this. Nobody's this is your own received guidance. Yes. This is not scripture. That was somebody else's received guidance.
Yes. This is you downloading an incredibly personal message. I heard a beautiful description one time of God as the feeling of God sends is the feeling of deeply relaxing in the presence of somebody who, you know, is incredibly fond of you. And most of us were not taught that as God. But what comes through in these letters is that there is a presence that is so delighted by us that thinks we're adorable.
One of the ways that you open up the practice is you speak the first line, dear love, what would you have me know today? The first line should be an endearment like sweetness, penguin cheeks, little potato, honey head, monkey. But you know, like this. Because love wants to endear, you know. And it cracks through the it cracks through the veneer of the public persona and the the myth of adulthood.
And it also cracks through, the fog of self hatred because it speaks to a very young aspect of yourself, like a sweet little one. Yeah. No. Like so many of people, when I read their letters, the letters are addressed to Little One, like something recognizing how it is to be small and human and how dear it is and how frightening it is and how it's okay.
Like you're doing great.
Marie
You just passed the one year anniversary of this. Are you enjoying the experience of being on Substack? Like was there any was there any hesitation where you just like, is this going to turn into another thing?
Liz
Well, yeah. Do I want another thing like, is this is this also going to go the way of.
The internet and become something awful? No, I think it was more that. Are people going to do this? Yeah. Does anybody care? Because this is a practice I've been doing quietly in my bedroom for years. Does does anybody else want this? Yeah. It was more the feeling.
Marie
You this might already be in the docket, but the moment I was in, you know, the moment I was in the world and I'm like, okay, I'm in the universe and I'm absorbing, you know, I my mind just goes to, oh my gosh.
This is a book.
Marie
Animal and a whole thing. Again, it might not be your desire or whatever, but I was like, oh, like I got all of the feels and the vibrations because it is, it is so powerful and it is so simple and it is so accessible to everyone. Yes. And I loved I, I heard you said, you know, we touched on this a little bit, but this notion of, a two way prayer.
Yeah.
Marie
And you've talked about that.
So two way prayer came up out of the same group who founded AA, which is called the Oxford Group. And they were a pretty radical group of, spiritual beings who got together in the s and s and decided to investigate what it would be like to live their lives in complete surrender to the gods of their own understanding.
So very much a wild thing to come out of white, male, capitalist, Christian, top of the heap, you know, like they were like, what if it's not about our will? What if it's not about trying to get everything we can get? What if it's about? I always think of it as the Dao. What if it's about listening to the way there's a thing that wants to happen next, and I'm part of something I'm not the I don't have to be the most important thing in something.
And if I get quite enough, what they learned was that if they got quiet enough and they asked, what is your will for me? And listened, a very loving, guiding voice would come through. And if they did what they were told, their lives became in alignment and they suffered less, and they were more connected to each other. And life became a kinder experience, right?
So they they taught it as two way prayer. And Bill W, who founded AA, used to say that two way prayer was the single most important tool that an addict could have in recovery. More than going to meetings, more than sponsorship, more than doing the steps. Although all of those were important too. You needed to have a direct, conscious contact with the higher power of your own understanding, which cannot be stressed strongly enough because nobody will ever surrender to a God who was forced upon them.
Marie
Okay, I want to talk about work and time and productivity, because this has been like a big, big running theme in my life. And I'm curious how you think about work and time and productivity, like at this point in the game, has it changed over the past few decades? What's it look like now? Like, for my own experience of life?
Marie
Like, I know in my s, in my s, I can see this now. I didn't necessarily see it then in those ages and decades. I had the feeling it was very tied to my motivation and my ambition. All beautiful things. And I think partially that is true. But as I look back, I know a lot of it was fear.
Marie
You know, the fear of like needing to make it and needing to prove myself and, you know, wanting to never depend on anyone. Like there was so.
Much.
Liz
You know, what you need.
Marie
Right there.
Liz
For me, both. Uhhuh.
Marie
And then as I've matured and as time has gone on, I've really started to question a lot of my own patterning. And, you know, and I, I've talked about this a lot, like how workaholic I can be. And in some ways, and this is the truth, because I love my work so much, I can get really, really lost in it.
Marie
And so I don't want anyone to, like, leave me alone. Like, you know, just because you don't have my.
Liz
You say workaholism like it's a bad thing.
Marie
Yes. And when? Because it's such a rare thing to love what you do so much, you get lost in it. But I do know that there are times when it is also an escape mechanism. Right? And it allows me to be in an area where, hey, I can control the outcome or at least have more probability of like winning in it, where all of these other areas I'm like, emotions messy laughs.
Liz
Yeah. Like yeah yeah yeah.
Marie
Thank you. So same so so as I've gotten older though and I think as the clock for me in my experience ticks and you know Josh is much older than I am like my parents I almost lost both of them last year. Things like that. As you know, life events, circumstances, loss, grief or the potential of it puts things in new perspectives.
Marie
Yeah. And for me, I started asking like, what the hell is all this for? And do I want to keep going at the level of from a.m. to here? I mean, to keep doing that. So that's why that's where all of this comes from, because it's a really interesting. Yeah, question that myself and so many creatives that I know are just getting curious about God.
Listen, you're going to have a difficult time finding two women who love their work more than us. Yeah. And and my work has saved my life. So many times. And, and it was my first connection to the divine, because from a very early age when I was writing, I was talking about this with somebody. Just today, I felt like, this is really good, you know, like, this is good.
I like what I'm doing, like, I like, and other people seem to like it as well. And it feels good to do this. And anyway, you know, there was so much that was wrapped up in it, in my identity, I am I'm not ready to stop. I'm not ready to slow down. And and I'm and it's getting a little harder to be on the road as much as I've been my whole life, because I'm also a road dog and a traveler.
But I'm not ready to stop. And and I think it's okay to love your work that much. I really do like, it's funny because we're we're taught to be so productive, but they were also taught to be ashamed of ourselves. If we love our work as much as we do. I heard an interview with Michael Chabon once the novelist, and he said, he's got five kids and, I think or kids.
And he said, look, writing books is great, but your books can't love you back. And I was like, but my books let me that.
That my books love me about it. Yeah. Like they love me back. They love me into life. They bring me back into vitality. You know, a couple weeks after Ray died, I started working on a novel because I needed to remember who I was without her in the world. Yes. And people can say, like you threw yourself into your work to avoid your grief.
There's nothing you can do to avoid grief. Grief is coming for you. It knows your home address and.
Liz
You can't get out from under it. And it's. And like the grief was.
Happening and the work was a place of of sanctuary for me, where I'm like, oh, I'm also I'm not just grieving widow, I'm also gifted novelist. And I love to be with my gift. And to be present to it. The one thing I'll say about productivity, actually, I'll say two things. When I was working on Big Magic, I put a message out on Facebook, and this is back.
Liz
When we were all on Facebook and loving Facebook, going back to the social media.
Aspect of things. And I said to everybody, because Big Magic is my book about creativity. And I said, what is the one obstacle in your life that all of you have that is preventing you from being able to be as creative as you want to be? And thousands of responses came flooding in, and I would say % of those responses said, I don't have enough time.
I'm so busy. My life is so busy. I don't have enough time on Facebook.
Marie
No irony there. Yes.
Liz
On Facebook. Yep. Right? Yep. And I was like, do you guys know you're literally on a social media app right there? Like you're literally on at this moment typing into a social media app.
That you don't have any time.
Liz
So I'm going to call you.
All out on that right now. Not that I don't love that you follow me, but.
Liz
Like.
Can you get really honest about how much of your life you're staring at your phone? Yes. And have you looked at the stats on Instagram of how much of your life you're staring at your phone? Could you write a novel in that many hours a week? And the other thing I always say is that I don't think of myself as a particularly high energy person.
I need a lot of sleep. I get overwhelmed very easily. But I have like three really good hours a day.
Liz
You know, like, if I get.
The right, if I go to sleep at the right time and I wake up between and a.m. those first three hours of the day, my brain is electric. And if I'm eating the right food and if I go to bed at the right time, and then the rest of the day, I'm sort of like, you know, at half mast.
But the question I always have for people is identify what the three good hours of the day everyone has like or pretty sharp, bright, electrified online, not on the internet, but like online hours of the day. Who or what is currently eating that time? Take it back. Yes, take that time back so that it's almost like pay yourself first, but it's give everybody else your garbage hours.
They won't even notice.
Liz
You know, like give everybody else the time. So for me, a really.
Important part of, of productivity is my mornings are mine. You cannot have them like you cannot have them. You can have you can have.
Liz
Me like we set this thing for late in the afternoon. I'm like, I love you, Marie, but you're getting me at %.
Marie
Absolutely. Because like, when does this work for me?
% is mine.
Liz
Yes. Right. And so that's like.
The thing about, again, taking back especially for women, taking back that which you have poured into others. Glennon Doyle said so beautifully that she had a realization when all three of her kids were young, that the only thing she had to do to be a writer was to go to bed. At the same time, her kids went to bed, which meant she had to give up the finish line reward of watching TV after they went to bed, and staying up till and feeling like an adult and having the house be quiet.
When they went to bed, she went to bed. She set her alarm for a.m. and she gave herself two hours before they woke up. That was hers. So there's this like stubborn, demanding of pulling back some hours of the day that no one else is allowed to have. And making those hours absolutely sacred.
Marie
Yeah, I do it. And actually, you know, Josh and I have had some tumbles about this because, like you, my morning is my magic time and my brain is. It's like I'm closest to the other side. I am closest to all of the sparkles. I'm closest to everything. And he'd be like, but what about our coffee in the morning?
Marie
I'm like, Saturdays.
Liz
You know? You have the coffee. Yeah, with you on Saturdays.
Marie
Or there's certain times, but. And we've had the love he knows. And I'm like, look, you actually get a better Marie when I'm not resenting you because I'm sitting here with my coffee going, this is my in time, dude. Yeah. And like we and again, we've been together so long that we have real talk ten all the time, you know, and as, as things go and it's it's just great though because he's an amazing human and he.
Is I love him.
Marie
He's so playful and he's so funny, so intuitive and he's so real. And but what I love about us is we have these real conversations. And I said, look, this is not about you. It's about me.
Yeah.
Marie
And you'll see me when I'm doing my morning pages and I'm on my little ritual, you know, all my little things. Yeah, but that is my creative time. And, it is, it's like I've had to fight for it sometimes because of my own internal messaging. Oh, if I was a better partner, you know, because he really how.
Quick we are to throw it away.
Marie
Yes. He really needs me right now. Or did it at the does. And meanwhile it's just a conversation. Yeah. I just have to have a conversation. The real talk with like, hey, no.
There was I wish I could remember her name, but I heard it, I saw an interview with an an older female visual artist. Actually, it was in her obituary. She said at one point she had this huge awakening of realization that her solitary time had no value to anybody but herself, because everybody else in the world valued her based on what they could get from her.
So the only person to whom her solitude had value was her. And because it had no value to anybody else, nobody else had a vested interest in protecting it for him. And so that would be her job. Yes. Because nobody else has any reason to let you have solitude. Yes. Because what they want is what you can do for them.
And so you have to fight for it. You have to fight for it.
Marie
So you're and I said this on, letters from love. It's like you're Liz frickin Gilbert. Like a it's just you're incredible. Like, I think we pray. Love. million at this point may be higher.
It's up at million.
Marie
Jesus, that was an old stat.
Yeah.
Marie
How on earth do you decide what writing projects or speaking engagements or collabs or invitations like? I at certain points in my journey, I have sometimes use like a little device, like a filter. Question is, it's getting me closer to whatever I like to call my primary project. It could be more freedom, right? It could be, you know, more dancing.
Marie
It could be a particular creative project that I want to get done, a specific goal, like, you know, you can fill in. Yeah, that thing, whatever, that kind of thing that my heart really wants at this particular stage or season. And I would use that filter question right to help me back down, you know, % of what was coming in that was like a shiny object that maybe stroked my ego, or.
Liz
Maybe five years earlier in.
Your career would have been a prize.
Marie
Correct.
But that's a hard thing to remember. It's like just because your younger self would have died for the opportunity to do this doesn't mean that it suits you. Now. Yes. And you have to say no to those things a lot.
Marie
Yes. So yeah, I'm curious how you navigate that. Like do you have like a team of folks, let's say, from the literary side, or do you really mean like different folks who can process to a certain degree? And I know obviously things have to come to you because you're Liz and you get to decide how you'd like to spend your time and your energy.
Marie
But I'm curious if you have any reflections on what that looks like.
You know, I, I, I delete a lot of emails without responding to them. It's a gift I give to myself.
Marie
I used to, in the early days of email, be like, I'm responding to every email. And now I'm like, absolutely.
I have a permanent out of office message. Yes. It's and I refresh it every month and sometimes change the language a little bit. But the, the out of office message that I have on my email says please forgive delayed responses or none at all. And, and now the reasons that I list are I'm trying to gain liberation from the robot overlords and not spend my life looking at screens.
And that means I can't respond to everything. Yeah. And I'm always working on a new book, and I'm always working on a new project, and, you know. So just. If you don't hear back from me, please be cool, you know? Yeah. And I go through my inbox every week, and I delete things. Yeah. Without having the decency or the kindness to respond, if I, I could hire someone to do that, or I could just delete the message.
Yeah. And I just delete the message, and it's, it's it's one of the most empowering things that I've given to myself is like, you are not just here's a rule. And it goes for personal life, family life, career life. Just because somebody wants a response from you doesn't mean they get to have one. That's not a good enough reason.
Somebody wanting your response is not a good enough reason for you to stop what you're doing and respond. You don't. You actually don't have to. So that's that's a huge thing. I still do more than I should. But I get excited and I want to say yes to not everything, but there are things that I want to say yes to.
And I say I don't have, like, a social life in the literary world. Yeah. Like, I, you and I are having dinner on Friday night. Yes, with some people from Substack. And that's the first time I'm going to say in, like, three years that I've been to something that you might call a party within my industry.
Yes.
Liz
With, like, my colleagues. Yeah. You know.
Like, I don't go to those, like, I don't go to those because I need if I'm going to write books, I have to be in bed at and I can't go to those things and be in bed at am not interested in going to those things. So I say no to like a ton of social stuff, and I just hang with my very small group of people who I hang with all the time, my friends and neighbors.
And then as far as writing projects go, that one is like, God, I don't even know how to explain it, the mysticism of it, but it's like and listening, like there's something that's trying to get my attention that wants me to collaborate with it. And like, right now there's an idea that I've had for or years and I'm circling it and it's circling me, and we're listening to each other, and it's way too soon to begin.
But I can feel that it's going to be the next, that it's going to be the next project.
Marie
I actually love that I need to do that I want to talk to, because that I tend to marinate on some ideas for a while. Like I remember when, my agent was like, everybody wants a book from you. I'm like, yeah, but I'm not ready. Like, the idea is not ready. The thing's not ready. And I have all these other little babies, you know what I mean?
Marie
That I'm nourishing and and giving life to. And there's a couple more that have been hanging around for a few years, and I'm like, oh, I don't want to lose them, but I it's like that nice little dance. I need to talk to some of my ideas and let them know I'm coming.
You know, I, I sometimes have a team meeting with my ideas. Okay. And I love it. I mean, I'm such a pagan. Everything to me is animated with life and spirit.
Marie
Oh, Satan.
And, you know, so I so oftentimes people will ask me about like, what do you do when you've got multiple ideas and you only have the one energy stream? And in that case, I mean, I'm like the president and they're my.
Liz
Joint Chiefs of staff, right? They're coming to me with like.
And so I'll just I'll just say like, what's your what's your idea and how formed are you? Because sometimes it's an exciting idea. But when I pin it down like that and say to the idea, what do you want me to do? You want me to give years of your life for what? And it's vague. Yes. And I'm like, okay, we'll come back when you're more formulated.
Marie
Yes.
Because right now there's an idea here that's pretty formulated. Yeah. And it's ready to go. And so we're going to work on that. I don't work on two things at the same time with books. I don't have the energy for that.
Marie
That's really cool. Yeah. So it sounds like if I'm hearing correctly, because I love talking about process, I just find it.
Liz
So it's so interesting.
Marie
So interesting, and it's so fun, especially because it is such it, I think in both of our opinions, this cosmic, magical, mysterious process. Yeah. So it's almost as if, okay, you're fully in all in this project. Yes. When that one signed, sealed, delivered, let's call it a book.
Yep.
Marie
Hub, we know that there's the marketing dance that we all have to do to get something out into the world. How long typically passes before you're like, oh, I've got another little baby on the conveyor belt.
Liz
It's it's on the conveyor belt.
Marie
It's on the conveyor belt.
Liz
You know, I, I've got three conveyor, I've got three babies deep. Yeah. The conveyor.
Belt now.
Liz
But the third and furthest.
Away one probably won't be in the world for or years. Yeah. You know, because it takes me such a long time to write these things and to create these things, I. Yeah, but but yeah, I like working.
Liz
Yeah. You know, I always say I.
Want to rest and then like a day of that.
Liz
You know, a day of that's about enough. And then I'm like, okay, I'm like, my mind starts create like.
It wants to create a.
Marie
Yeah. Whenever I'm on. Like, Josh and I were in Italy for the first time in several years, this, just, earlier this summer and it was like a week of, you know, just being in the sea and doing all the things that one does in Italy. And then I just got downloads, you know what I mean? And it wasn't like working on projects like checking up on things or cleaning things like new ideas.
Liz
Yes, ideas. Adding to the.
Marie
Sheet, adding the inspo. You know, I have like a Google doc that's like pages about a project that you and I have actually talked about years ago having Indian. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's just like more in there and it's I can feel her getting ready. Yeah. You know what I mean. She's like oh okay now's the time.
Marie
But but that's that's really cool. Okay. Shift. Let's talk hair.
Yes, yes.
Marie
Let's talk about what inspired you to shave it off. Was there any part of you that was, like, afraid or after it was totally okay. And, like, was it like, regretful or was like, yeah, okay. Yeah. Tell me.
Liz
It was like, why didn't I do this literally years ago? So I've been dreaming about shaving.
My head.
Liz
For a really long time. I remember reading.
An article in the Village Voice, like in the s, like early s, like when Shannon O'Connor was at her peak. And there was there was like a gallery of photos of women with shaved and buzzed heads. And I remember thinking, every single one of them looks amazing. Every single one of them looks amazing. And I remember one caption of one woman saying, it's so cleansing.
I do it every week, and it's like going to the gynecologist and the dentist on the same day, which I still.
Liz
Remember is like one of the funniest things I've ever heard anybody say.
And and I have, I have difficult hair to make. Look, the way that culture and family says pretty hair looks like. I know, I know how to make it look nice. Yeah, I know what I have to do to make it look nice. I know what it costs in time and money and it's a lot. And I've been doing it for years and playing that game, and I've been getting increasingly resentful, about like, my one wild and wonderful and precious life is spent hours and hours and hours in a chair getting highlights and getting, keratin treatments and getting blowouts and getting, like, just having somebody do it so that I look a certain way and can pass for something like whatever that thing is, or can pull attention or can be be seen as pretty or attractive or whatever it is. And, so I went to a party in New York, I don't know, almost a year ago. And I was looking around and it was a bunch of people our age, s, s, and I was like, and this is New York.
Liz
So this is like a liberal, you know, artsy sort of.
Event opening kind of thing. And I'm looking around the room and I'm like, every single one of these men who are my age have their hair buzzed and they look great, like they're a bunch of silver foxes. They've got really cool cropped hair. A lot of them had thinning hair, so they were like, I'm getting rid of it.
I'm not dealing with this anymore. You know, lined faces, weathered faces, handsome. They looked fantastic. Every one of the women, every one of the women had some version of silky, flowy, complex looking. And I could know because I can price it out. Expensive hair.
Liz
Loss. Right. And I was like, okay, I am facing. This is a choice, a.
Choice moment in my life. I can complain about the different beauty standards for men and women in terms of aging, an expectation of how you're supposed to present. Or I can just claim the entitlement that these men have and just do it. Like I can just take it. And it's something that I've done so many times in my life where I'm then like, well, I can complain about how unfair this is about women, or I can just step into this space that men own and dominate it, and I'm going to do that again.
Liz
Like I'm going to do that like I did it.
As a writer. I did it as a journalist. I did it as a solo traveler. I did it as somebody who claimed the entitlement of not needing to raise children. Like, I'm like, I'm taking.
Liz
Like having my own money.
You know, all of these things. I was like, I'm, I'm taking this, like, I'm taking this. And I'm also going to stop doing Botox and fillers, which I've been doing for years and which I loved because it made me look all dewy and fresh.
Liz
But I'm, like, humanely dewy and fresh for like who? Like, why don't you be dewy? Like why I am so I can't tell you how much I want to get, like a tattoo, like in gothic thing. That's like thug life. But it says Hagley. Like I'm. So I'm like, I'm just going to go full hag like, like.
Liz
And I also thought.
And around that time I spent a week with Byron, Katie and Byron. Katie's or like white haired, heavily, you know, like. And it's radiantly beautiful and so captivating. And I just thought I had this. I mean, maybe this seems very elementary, but I had this thought of, like.
Liz
It is a fundamentally weird thing. It's a fun, a weird fear to be afraid of getting older.
Yeah. Like that's a weird thing to be in, in resistance against. Like, what is the fear? Like, what is what if there isn't it? What if there isn't a fear? What if there just isn't? What if you decide to not buy that story anymore? And what if I get to keep all my money now? And what if I get to keep all my time now?
And what if I just go to Walmart and get a $pair of clippers? And that's the last money I'm ever going to spend in my hair. And and I bust my hair once a week over the toilet.
Marie
When was the first time, like, did you do it at home?
I did it at home. And my friend Shankara helped me because she used to be a punk in the s, because I actually didn't know how to physically do it. Yes.
Liz
Like, so I got a short haircut first. The other thing was every time I went to my hairdresser, I love.
And I would say, one of these days I'm just going to have you just shave this off.
Liz
I kept like for years. I've said that to her.
Marie
So it was a fantasy that was kind of like years.
Liz
And she was like, well, let me just give you a really.
Good short haircut. But a really good short haircut is really hard to maintain. Yes, it's harder to maintain the long hair. Yeah. And.
Liz
And I'm like, why are we just dicking around with it? Like, what if we just did it?
What if we just did it? So yeah, my friend did it and she did the first half of it, and then I did the second half and the I think.
Liz
She took a video of me like.
When.
Liz
I did this, like one.
Swipe across and then felt it and there's a video of me and I look like and I'm like, it's amazing. Like, this is the most. And I said, this is the most important thing I've ever done.
Liz
Maybe a little hyperbole, but maybe not, because like, every day I love it. Yeah, every day I wake up and I wake up and I'm like, oh, my hair's perfect. It is like I get out of the shower. I'm like, my hair's perfect. I get out of the bathtub, my hair's perfect. Yes, I jump into the river, my hair's perfect.
Liz
I jump in the ocean, I come up, my hair's perfect. We're shooting in two minutes. My hair's perfect. Yeah.
Like there's no moment where. There's no moment that I don't like it. And what I find really interesting is that women are, like, fascinated by it, like they're drawn in and they, they get this, like, faraway look of longing and they're like, I wish I could do that someday. Like, it's so out of reach. Like, it's like I have a villa in France.
Liz
And not just a $buzzed haircut, you know? Yeah, yeah. And the other thing.
That every single woman says is I would do that, but I have a weird shaped head. Now, listen, it can't be true.
Liz
It can't be true that %.
Of women have weird shaped heads. Who.
Liz
What is this story line about? Weird shaped.
Marie
Heads. Yeah. And what is a weird?
Liz
Like, what is a weird shaped head? Like what is so there?
Like, I would do that and have a weird shape. You have a good shape head. I'm like, I have a head.
Liz
Is shaped like a head shaped similar to your head. Yeah. Oblong. Yeah. And it's got ears sticking out of it. I don't know what it was. What is it? Weird shaped head. Yeah. So.
It's been the coolest. And here's the thing. I waited so long to do it because I had to wait till I felt like I was post vanity.
Liz
You know, where I was, like, am I post vanity yet? Like, am I ready to just give up? Like, am I? Am I like hanging it up? Am I like done trying to be pretty? Am I done? Yeah. And I was like, I'm willing.
To give that up to be free because freedom is by foremost.
Liz
Virtue.
Marie
Like for number one value in the world, freedom, freedom.
Liz
So I'm like, all right, I'll give up pretty for freedom like I and and I'll sacrifice. And I'm going to look old and like a weird hag.
But I'm going to do it. And then I didn't.
Liz
I was like a good I was like, amazing. I really like it. Like, I actually think it's better than my weird blond hair. Anyway, I love it. And that's the story of shaving my head. And how long's it been spent? Almost a year.
I can't imagine any reason to ever have hair again.
Marie
Kind of amazing. These, like. I mean, you have so many gorgeous adventures and unfolding and happenings in your life, but I'm thinking, okay, letters from love. About a year you had shaving about it. I don't know, it just feels to me.
Liz
Right.
Marie
Like there's some maybe.
Liz
There's a Saturn Return.
Thing happened.
Marie
Or so I think there's some gorgeous evolution expansion thing. Freedom liberation thing.
Liz
That's why Sam and Sam, I hold.
Marie
It in that, hey, if you're ready to start living a life true to you, grab my free audio training called How to Get Anything You Want in the link right below this video. So whether you want to publish a book, buy a house, start a business, travel the world now is your time. So get this free audio training app.
Marie
Marie loves you.com/get anything. Or if you're watching this episode on video, scan the onscreen QR code. Now let's talk about one of my favorite topics. Money.
Liz
Okay. Money.
Marie
Okay. million copies of eat, pray, love. And that's just one of your how many books?
Ten. Yeah.
Marie
Let's just wherever we want to go with money and creativity and freedom and how you think about money these days. And if whether or not that has changed my.
Liz
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So I been worried.
About money my whole life. My parents sat me down on an eight with a spreadsheet and told me the exact amount of money I was going to need to raise in order to go to college. And I remember going to school the next day. I was in third grade, and this pit of anxiety in my stomach that I don't think lifted until a few years ago, that was like, how am I going to come up with that kind of money?
I'm eight. I did it, you know, like I did it, but but I started saving money and worrying about money at the same time. And then, I was always super self reliant and never had anybody support me when I was a waitress and a bartender, I always loved saving money and accumulating money, and I knew that it meant freedom.
But I was never not thinking about it in an anxious way and running through, like, even when I had a ton of it. Like after eat, pray, love. Suddenly I had a ton of money. But I was always worrying it like worry beads in my mind.
Marie
Was it worrying that it was going to go away? And I'm curious, did you start working with like a money manager? Like, did you have anyone around you that you could trust? These are the kind of questions like, yes, I.
Had an accountant who I trusted okay. Dearly. And, and he was just such a godsend to me. And, I mean, I knew I kind of knew how to manage money because my parents are obsessed and anxious about money and they know how to management. So I knew how to like, you know, I knew how to put it in the right places and do the right things with it.
What I didn't know was how to stop feeling frightened. Just a general aura of fear all around it. Like, I don't know, you know, I'm looking back at it down and being like, is it that there won't be enough? I think it's a scarcity anxiety thing. And that was a big pressure in our household was just like you have, you know, like there will never be enough.
You have to save more. You have to save more. You have to save more. You have to save more.
Marie
That's also true in our society. Yeah. I mean, just that I feel like from my observation, we just live in this world that's taught us that there's not enough of of luck of anything. Exactly.
Yeah.
Marie
Especially money, especially money.
So I had that. And then the other thing that happened is I'm such a ferocious blackout codependent, that when I got money, I started wildly giving it away. And I think part of it was like I couldn't bear. I can't bear to see anybody not get anything they want or need. So I became kind of like a fairy godmother, just giving everybody everything that they wanted and needed, which had mixed results.
Sometimes really beautiful results, sometimes really destructive results. And, and then my relationships have always been really expensive. My divorces are expensive.
Liz
My like I pour, you.
Know, I pour into people. You know, so I poured, I poured a great deal of myself away into the people who I loved and called that love. And when I came in to step recovery five and a half years ago, my sponsor said to me, A year in, I'm not going to be able to keep working. You're going to love this, Marie.
I'm not going to be able to keep working with you if you don't get money sober. And and I was like, what do you mean by money sober? And she said, you're still trying to manipulate people and buy love and control people with money. But most of all, you're trying to buy love with money, and you might as well just throw your whole recovery and sobriety, like, wadded up and throw it over a cliff.
If you're going to keep doing that because there's a desperation in it and so I set out to get money sober for the first time in my life, and I found somebody to work with. So I'd worked with financial advisors, but I found a financial therapist who was both an accountant and a social worker who worked with people's money trauma.
So it wasn't about I'd always been able to manage the money from like a logistical standpoint, but not from an emotional standpoint. And we sat down and she did like a two hour long intake with me and went through my history with money, my family's history with money. Like what all of these relationships were. Where is my terror?
Where is my trauma? What is what are my goals? And and then she wrote me like a story about myself that was like Liz's money story. And I read it and I started crying because I was like, this has been such a huge trauma in my life. In this person totally gets it. And so we have quarterly meetings and we go over my numbers.
And she also said to me, she went through I gave her two years of all of my back, everything, so she could get an idea of where my money was going. And she said, do you know she would call me while she was doing it and say, like, there's a $check. Who's this person? And I might, I would be like, I don't know, like, I was writing these enormous checks and forgetting that I had done it every single fundraiser online, right?
Liz
Every single appeal that anybody had.
I was like, here.
Liz
Take it. You know, like and part of that was the.
Low self worth of I'm not allowed to have anything. And part of it was just like, I, I'm personally responsible for holding the world because I have a hyper sense of responsibility for everybody. And so when she was done doing the assessment, she said, do you know what percentage of your money over the last two years you have given away to people?
Not necessarily just charity, but giving to friends, helping people out, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I said, no. She said, would you like to take a guess? And I was like, I don't know, like %. And she said, you have given % of your money over the last two years away to other people. Did she know that it's okay if that's what you want to do, but did you know that you were doing that?
And I did not know that I was doing that. I was blind to my own. And that's what addiction looks like, is you're doing stuff behind your own back that you don't even know you're doing because it's so subconscious. And so she was like, let's talk about that, and let's talk about how much money do you actually want to give away to people, and how much do you want to keep and safe?
Are you allowed to keep any and save any? And so we settled on % that I gave away. And so the funnest part of our conversation every quarter. And then the rule is I'm not allowed to give any money away until I run it by her. And so I have a brake, a braking system to prevent me.
Yes. And and then she reviews the quarter and then she. The big reveal is how much money I'm allowed to give away. She's like, you've got this much money that you're allowed to give away. And it's so fun at that point because I know I'm not over giving. And the other thing I said was, I want to pay myself back for everything that I gave away and lost in all of my romantic relationships.
Marie
Tell me more about that meaning as more earnings come in or as more money.
Yeah.
Marie
Flows in. You want to. And let me know if I'm getting this right. Yeah. This is all fascinating to me.
Yeah.
Liz
You thought you'd be that.
Marie
Yeah I love it. Reclaim it. And let's say whether we put it in savings or investment or some form of the nest egg that is like this is continuing to support Liz, her, her current, her future and anything else that she may want to flow towards as we move forward in life. Okay. Yes.
Yeah. And it's a it's a living financial amends. Yes. That I'm making to myself for the decades that I spent not believing that I was allowed to keep what I had earned. Wow, wow. Here's the thing. Ever since I started working with this person, I don't think about money anymore. So money was on my mind all the time.
In a worried way. Yes, but now I've got what we would call in the rooms. God. Good. Orderly direction. Yes. And she gives me a pie chart every month and she's like, here's your percentages of what you're. And it looks she's always like, your numbers look good. It's even you're balanced. You're spending a little bit on yourself, a little bit on others.
You're saving some and you're giving some way, and and you're not holding yourself responsible for saving the entire world anymore.
Marie
Okay, let me ask you this question. This may not be in an area where you're like, I give zero. You know what I mean? This may be a zone where Liz Gilbert's like, nope, don't care. Not interesting. One of the things in this topic of money that's been super interesting to me is, just kind of like playing and gaming out.
Marie
How long do I believe that the physical vessel of Marie Forleo is going to be on the planet doing her thing, right? Whatever her thing may evolve into being? Yeah. And whether that entails creative projects, philanthropic projects, traveling projects, a joy projects, you know, all the things that we can't even begin to imagine that may unfold in the next few decades.
Marie
Hopefully, God willing, then I'm still here. And I love talking with my. I have a financial woman who helps me keep track of all the things, and we have so much fun because I love to run potential scenarios by her and like, oh, I'm thinking about X, Y or Z or what if I wanted to do this or, you know, come back from Italy.
Marie
And of course, I have downloads of like, I'm thinking about this. What I love is that knowing my numbers for me is helping me heal. Remember we were talking earlier about so much of my s and s are like running and it's so fear based and it's like, I have to have to have to because I don't think I'm going to have enough to survive.
Marie
Scarcity, scarcity, scarcity. Now, knowing my numbers helps me start to unpeel that onion and start to find a little bit of peace and freedom and relaxation. Because I know in me it's like, oh, the program is still running me, right? I'm chasing, I'm chasing a, you know, and like, so I have a couple of very dear friends who are like, what are you going to do with it all?
Marie
You know what I mean? Like, oh, you got holes in your socks. I'm like, oh yeah, I do, you know, like, I think you can get new socks. You choose your stuff, you know what I mean? So I'm just now starting to get into the place of going. Am I allowed to enjoy.
Yeah.
Marie
What I've created. Yeah. Anyway, so.
No, I love that. Yeah. Are you.
Marie
Oh, yes. We'll talk more at dinner, but. Yeah, but I was curious. I didn't know if you guys, if you play with that number at all of like.
Liz
How long am I going to live. Yeah.
Marie
You know, just playing and then, but looking at that through the lens of finances and saying, oh, if Liz ever you, you don't want to slow down and you want to keep working, but should you ever. And this is my other question about this as well. How does money play a part in what you decide to say yes to?
Marie
Or if somebody rolls up and it's a speaking engagement or an invitation, do you know what I mean? Yeah. Of of like, God, do I want to do this from my heart just because I'm like, I actually really like this project, or I like this audience and I would love to come speak to them for free or whatever it is.
Marie
Yeah. Versus what you actually say yes to that does continue to have abundance flow. Do you in for money?
I just got back from teaching. I teach a there's a workshop that I teach that's like a weekend long creativity and self examination and spiritual workshop, and I can make more money giving a minute corporate speech than I can make in three days of like, full on six hour days with hundreds of people. Deep engagement. But I love doing that.
Yeah, I love doing the workshops like I, I'm making money from it, but it's like.
Liz
Yeah.
Marie
Comparison.
You know, I would rather do that several times a year and be able to watch people's unfolding and, and be like the doula to the thing that they're finding in themselves and have the intimacy and the one on one connection with that room. Yes. Than just go talk to Coca Cola. Yeah. To a bunch of executives, which I'll do.
Yes. But it's because those are people, too. Yeah. But but I really love being able to do that.
Marie
And does knowing your numbers help, you know? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That I'm that I'm allowed that I'm allowed to do that.
Marie
Yeah, yeah I always I love talking about this with, especially with women because I have a lot of my own colleagues are like, yeah, but I have to keep them like but do you really.
Right.
Marie
Do we always ask our, you know, each other, but do you really are we running an old program that's been there for, do you know, I mean s and s. They have to have to have to. Right. Or do we know what's happening financially and in your money life where you can start to make perhaps newer, braver choices that are really, really aligned with your heart?
Marie
Yes. Anyway, now.
Liz
I love it, I love it.
Marie
It's it's good stuff. Okay. So, for people watching, right now who want to actually achieve their dream life, but it feels so far away from how they're living right now. Is there a simple framework to start creating or living into that new, perhaps truer version of themselves?
It's about, I think, getting greedy with your time, and this is something we've been touching on a lot in this conversation, and so I'm glad that we can circle back to it again. So my favorite poet is a poet named Jack Gilbert, who I talk about a lot. No relation to me, who died recently and lived a very free life.
Freedom was a rare and high value for him above anything else, including fame and success and hustling and promoting his books. And he would routinely disappear for years at a time and go live in Greece, on a mountaintop, in a shepherd's hut and just watch the light change and write poetry and walk. He lived in the mountains of Japan for a while.
Like he would just vanish into nature to be alone with the voices that only he could hear. And toward the end of his life, he wrote this poem. And he had gone back to Italy, and he was living in the middle of nowhere, on the top of a mountain. And, and in, in the poem he's, he's he's like bought a fish from a local fisherman and he's preparing his dinner with a tomato and a fish and an onion, and he's living in an old shepherd's hut with a lit fire, and he's making his food, and he's having a conversation with God, and God is asking him all these questions about why are you like this? I gave you like, Florence and Rome and London, and you choose to be here in the middle of nowhere, like in a stone hut. I give you.
Liz
A world full of.
Women, and you choose to be here alone. I gave you the opportunity to be incredibly successful and well known, and you kept going away from it to come and be alone. And the whole time he's talking to God, he's just preparing his fish. And then he prepares this fish and he sits outside by himself, and he's watching the birds and God says, why are you so stubborn?
And he says, I'm not stubborn, I'm just greedy. Get greedy about your time, you know, and this is a thing that women are never taught. Or if.
Liz
The word greed is.
Used, it's about hoarding more and more material things which will not do it in terms of your satisfaction.
Liz
Your soul is.
Greedy for something and start getting greedy in that way of like you can't have. Greedy to me means you can't have this. Like you can't have this. Like the reason I don't live with anybody anymore is because I'm greedy for my mornings, for my quiet evenings, for my bath time, for my own food. You can't have it. I'm not giving it to you.
And I know that for a lot of people, life is so real and so intrusive, and you've got so many commitments and obligations and you've been trained as a woman, that what will make you a good woman is to only give until you literally die. And where in your life can you take some of it back, and can you start to get greedy?
That's how it begins.
Marie
Do you have a secret dream? Is there anything that you've wanted to do or be that hasn't come on to the main stage quite yet?
I just want to be a swamp witch. I like just want to be a hag. I just want to be like a weird old lady. And that's coming in time. I'm still out in the world a lot. And and I have a big life of people who I love. But what my secret dream is, is like deep solitude.
Deeper and deeper and deeper levels of solitude. Next summer, I'm doing this, darkness retreat. Have you ever heard of that? No. It's one of those things. Sometimes I hear about something and I'm like, well, I guess I have to do that now. And somebody I knew did it, and I was like. Like, I find my whole body leaning in, and I'm like, what, what, what what did you do in this place in Oregon where you go in the mountains and they have these little cabins, and they put you in a cabin for four days in pitch dark and silence.
And I'm doing that because I'm greedy for that experience of what? What I will see, in in that deep solitude and deep darkness, it's like sort of going into the cave and coming out four days later. I did a future self meditation once, and I saw myself living, in my late s on the side of a mountain in Costa Rica, and I was so cool looking.
I it was before I shaved my head and I saw myself with the shaved head, and it was all white and like my nose, it just got bigger and bigger. Bigger, you know, like, and and I'd gotten really, like, sinewy and muscly and brown and spotted and I looked like a hawk. And I saw myself just sitting with these David Bright blue eyes alone.

Marie
Or if somebody rolls up and it's a speaking engagement or an invitation, do you know what I mean? Yeah. Of of like, God, do I want to do this from my heart just because I'm like, I actually really like this project, or I like this audience and I would love to come speak to them for free or whatever it is.
Marie
Yeah. Versus what you actually say yes to that does continue to have abundance flow. Do you in for money?
I just got back from teaching. I teach a there's a workshop that I teach that's like a weekend long creativity and self examination and spiritual workshop, and I can make more money giving a minute corporate speech than I can make in three days of like, full on six hour days with hundreds of people. Deep engagement. But I love doing that.
Yeah, I love doing the workshops like I, I'm making money from it, but it's like.
Liz
Yeah.
Marie
Comparison.
You know, I would rather do that several times a year and be able to watch people's unfolding and, and be like the doula to the thing that they're finding in themselves and have the intimacy and the one on one connection with that room. Yes. Than just go talk to Coca Cola. Yeah. To a bunch of executives, which I'll do.
Yes. But it's because those are people, too. Yeah. But but I really love being able to do that.
Marie
And does knowing your numbers help, you know? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That I'm that I'm allowed that I'm allowed to do that.
Marie
Yeah, yeah I always I love talking about this with, especially with women because I have a lot of my own colleagues are like, yeah, but I have to keep them like but do you really.
Right.
Marie
Do we always ask our, you know, each other, but do you really are we running an old program that's been there for, do you know, I mean s and s. They have to have to have to. Right. Or do we know what's happening financially and in your money life where you can start to make perhaps newer, braver choices that are really, really aligned with your heart?
Marie
Yes. Anyway, now.
Liz
I love it, I love it.
Marie
It's it's good stuff. Okay. So, for people watching, right now who want to actually achieve their dream life, but it feels so far away from how they're living right now. Is there a simple framework to start creating or living into that new, perhaps truer version of themselves?
It's about, I think, getting greedy with your time, and this is something we've been touching on a lot in this conversation, and so I'm glad that we can circle back to it again. So my favorite poet is a poet named Jack Gilbert, who I talk about a lot. No relation to me, who died recently and lived a very free life.
Freedom was a rare and high value for him above anything else, including fame and success and hustling and promoting his books. And he would routinely disappear for years at a time and go live in Greece, on a mountaintop, in a shepherd's hut and just watch the light change and write poetry and walk. He lived in the mountains of Japan for a while.
Like he would just vanish into nature to be alone with the voices that only he could hear. And toward the end of his life, he wrote this poem. And he had gone back to Italy, and he was living in the middle of nowhere, on the top of a mountain. And, and in, in the poem he's, he's he's like bought a fish from a local fisherman and he's preparing his dinner with a tomato and a fish and an onion, and he's living in an old shepherd's hut with a lit fire, and he's making his food, and he's having a conversation with God, and God is asking him all these questions about why are you like this? I gave you like, Florence and Rome and London, and you choose to be here in the middle of nowhere, like in a stone hut. I give you.
Liz
A world full of.
Women, and you choose to be here alone. I gave you the opportunity to be incredibly successful and well known, and you kept going away from it to come and be alone. And the whole time he's talking to God, he's just preparing his fish. And then he prepares this fish and he sits outside by himself, and he's watching the birds and God says, why are you so stubborn?
And he says, I'm not stubborn, I'm just greedy. Get greedy about your time, you know, and this is a thing that women are never taught. Or if.
Liz
The word greed is.
Used, it's about hoarding more and more material things which will not do it in terms of your satisfaction.
Liz
Your soul is.
Greedy for something and start getting greedy in that way of like you can't have. Greedy to me means you can't have this. Like you can't have this. Like the reason I don't live with anybody anymore is because I'm greedy for my mornings, for my quiet evenings, for my bath time, for my own food. You can't have it. I'm not giving it to you.
And I know that for a lot of people, life is so real and so intrusive, and you've got so many commitments and obligations and you've been trained as a woman, that what will make you a good woman is to only give until you literally die. And where in your life can you take some of it back, and can you start to get greedy?
That's how it begins.
Marie
Do you have a secret dream? Is there anything that you've wanted to do or be that hasn't come on to the main stage quite yet?
I just want to be a swamp witch. I like just want to be a hag. I just want to be like a weird old lady. And that's coming in time. I'm still out in the world a lot. And and I have a big life of people who I love. But what my secret dream is, is like deep solitude.
Deeper and deeper and deeper levels of solitude. Next summer, I'm doing this, darkness retreat. Have you ever heard of that? No. It's one of those things. Sometimes I hear about something and I'm like, well, I guess I have to do that now. And somebody I knew did it, and I was like. Like, I find my whole body leaning in, and I'm like, what, what, what what did you do in this place in Oregon where you go in the mountains and they have these little cabins, and they put you in a cabin for four days in pitch dark and silence.
And I'm doing that because I'm greedy for that experience of what? What I will see, in in that deep solitude and deep darkness, it's like sort of going into the cave and coming out four days later. I did a future self meditation once, and I saw myself living, in my late s on the side of a mountain in Costa Rica, and I was so cool looking.
I it was before I shaved my head and I saw myself with the shaved head, and it was all white and like my nose, it just got bigger and bigger. Bigger, you know, like, and and I'd gotten really, like, sinewy and muscly and brown and spotted and I looked like a hawk. And I saw myself just sitting with these David Bright blue eyes alone.
And I said in my meditation to her, what do you do all day? And she said, we talked to God. And I said, what about all the people? And she said, we left them all behind. And it was one of the most exciting things I had ever seen in my entire life was the glee in her face. We left them all behind.
So that is my secret dream to become a crone hag, old hawk, sitting on the edge of the mountain, talking to God all day alone.
Marie
Absolutely perfect.
And.
Marie
Stunning and exciting. And I love it. Oh, I love it so much. I'm like. I'm like, everything in me is like, I'm. I'm doing cartwheels all around, like. And pom pom and high kicks.
Liz
And.
Marie
Everything. Liz Gilbert, I continue to adore you, love you, respect you. Thank you so much for making the time to be with us today. I'm so excited for all the goodness coming. I am so excited to continue. I need to do more of my letters from Love Practice because there's there's a lot more that I think every day.
There's something for you there, something for me. You just go claim it, get it, get get greedy about it. And I could not love you more, Marie for Leo. And I always love talking to you and being with you. And now we're going to go eat some Italian food, right?
Marie
Yes, please. That's what you promise? It's happening. We'll see you soon. Everyone.
Liz
Everybody, we love you.

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