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‘Eat, Pray, Love’ author is real deal

As soon as I pounced on the invitation to interview “Eat, Pray, Love” author Elizabeth Gilbert, I regretted it. What if she turns out to be nothing like the woman portrayed in her memoir? What if I end up feeling disillusioned and deceived?

She didn’t disappoint. Our conversation only confirmed that her journey had been genuine, and the glorified “chick lit” that lifted me out of a seven-year existential funk deserved to be on the pedestal where I had placed it.

Though the conversation was by phone and not over a glass of wine as I would have preferred, it was still deeply personal. She seemed surprised that I had copies of “Eat, Pray, Love” on a shelf at home, ready to inscribe for the next friend who gets her heart broken and loses the will to live or love again.

“I don’t think I intended it to be any kind of manual or prescription for anybody other than myself,” Gilbert reflected.

Oh, but it was.

You see, there comes a point in a woman’s life when she must decide whether to spend her life decoding the opposite sex or make some mature decisions about her present and future. At age 34, that’s where I am and so was Gilbert.

Once a regular writer for GQ, Gilbert’s livelihood came from exploring the bizarre species known as the American man.

“Part of my fascination in my 20s was extracting their feelings,” she explained. “It was such an alchemy if you could actually get a man to share with you what he was experiencing and what it truly felt like to be him.”

But that fascination wore off when Gilbert turned 34 and encountered an existential crisis. After an ugly divorce and a trip across three countries beginning with the letter I (talk about carrying self-examination to the extreme), she wrote the perfect antidote for the breakup blues: “Eat, Pray, Love.”

Gilbert’s “search for everything across Italy, India and Indonesia” shows readers — men and women alike — that breaking up shouldn’t leave you broken. Instead the end of a relationship can be an opportunity to reclaim what you lost or find yourself for the first time.

Of course, it’s a message that applies to any of life’s transitions. But in my circle of friends, the end of a relationship is the most common and traumatic rite of passage.

Unlike many of our mothers and grandmothers, when we bet on relationships (commitment, kids, the works), we often put other opportunities on the line — world travel, professional fame and fortune, spiritual enlightenment. The possibilities are endless — thank God — but also overwhelming.

It’s hard not to second-guess every step we take and every door we choose when we lose those bets.

Everyone warns that gambling is a dangerous addiction. But Gilbert showed me how a gamble or two can pay off. When I picked up this book, I wasn’t immediately sold. For 35 pages, I condemned her for walking away from her marriage and leaping into another romance before she was healed.

But as the pages turned, I realized the transformative power of a woman who had tuned out voices like mine, faced down her uncertainty and inspired others to do the same.

In her first public appearance in Chicago, on Monday, Gilbert promises to address that uncertainty that haunts us all — a promise I hope she keeps. Fellow fans and disciples, do not be afraid. She won’t let you down.

Elizabeth Gilbert will speak at 7:30 p.m. Monday at Auditorium Theatre, 50 E. Congress Pkwy. Tickets are $35-$75; visit auditoriumtheatre.org.

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More with Gilbert: For more of the conversation with Elizabeth Gilbert, go to chicagotribune.com/seeker.