You know the old adage: Plant an expectation, reap a disappointment.
Elizabeth GilbertRead
To feel physically comfortable with someone else's body is not a decision you make. It has very little thing to do with how two people think or act or talk or even look. The mysterious magnet is either there, buried somewhere deep behind the sternum, or it is not.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Physical comfort with another person is instinctive and not a conscious choice.
In this quote, Elizabeth Gilbert suggests that the feeling of physical comfort or attraction to another person's body is not something that can be controlled or decided upon. It is an instinctual connection that exists beyond mutual actions, thoughts, or appearances, indicating a deeper, often unexplainable bond that lies within individuals.
Themes
LoveAttractionConnectionRelationshipsInstinct
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a discussion about the nature of love and attraction during a relationship seminar.
More from Elizabeth Gilbert
All quotes →Do not apologize for crying. Without this emotion, we are only robots.
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I had always been taught that the pursuit of happiness was my natural (even national) birthright. It is the emotional trademark of my culture to seek happiness. Not just any kind of happiness, either, but profound happiness, even soaring happiness. And what could possibly bring a person more soaring happiness than romantic love.
Elizabeth GilbertRead
When I tried this morning, after an hour or so of unhappy thinking, to dip back into my meditation, I took a new idea with me: compassion. I asked my heart if it could please infuse my soul with a more generous perspective on my mind's workings. Instead of thinking that I was a failure, could I perhaps accept that I am only a human being--and a normal one, at that?
Elizabeth GilbertRead
And when you sense a faint potentiality for happiness after such dark times you must grab onto the ankles of that happiness and not let go until it drags you face-first out of the dirt - this is not selfishness, but obligation. You were given life; it is your duty to find something beautiful within life no matter how slight.
Elizabeth GilbertRead
But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilling yearnings.
Elizabeth GilbertRead
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