So, a few years ago I was at JFK Airport about to get on a flight, when I was approached by two women who I do not think would be insulted to hear themselves described as tiny old tough-talking Italian-American broads.
Prije nekoliko godina bila sam na JFK aerodromu upravo se ukrcavajući na let, kada su mi prišle dvije žene za koje mislim da se neće uvrijediti ako čuju da sam ih opisala kao malene stare Talijansko-Američke ženske jake na riječima.
The taller one, who is like up here, she comes marching up to me, and she goes, "Honey, I gotta ask you something. You got something to do with that whole 'Eat, Pray, Love' thing that's been going on lately?"
Viša, koja je otprilike ovdje, domaršira do mene, i kaže, "Dušo moram te nešto pitati. Ti imaš veze sa svim onim 'Jedi, Moli, Voli' koje je posvuda u zadnje vrijeme?"
And I said, "Yes, I did."
I rekla sam, "Da, imam."
And she smacks her friend and she goes, "See, I told you, I said, that's that girl. That's that girl who wrote that book based on that movie." (Laughter)
I ona udari svoju prijateljicu i kaže, "Vidiš, rekla sam ti. Rekla sam ti da je to ta djevojka. To je ta djevojka koja je napisala tu knjigu koja je temeljena na onom filmu." (Smijeh)
So that's who I am. And believe me, I'm extremely grateful to be that person, because that whole "Eat, Pray, Love" thing was a huge break for me. But it also left me in a really tricky position moving forward as an author trying to figure out how in the world I was ever going to write a book again that would ever please anybody, because I knew well in advance that all of those people who had adored "Eat, Pray, Love" were going to be incredibly disappointed in whatever I wrote next because it wasn't going to be "Eat, Pray, Love," and all of those people who had hated "Eat, Pray, Love" were going to be incredibly disappointed in whatever I wrote next because it would provide evidence that I still lived. So I knew that I had no way to win, and knowing that I had no way to win made me seriously consider for a while just quitting the game and moving to the country to raise corgis. But if I had done that, if I had given up writing, I would have lost my beloved vocation, so I knew that the task was that I had to find some way to gin up the inspiration to write the next book regardless of its inevitable negative outcome. In other words, I had to find a way to make sure that my creativity survived its own success. And I did, in the end, find that inspiration, but I found it in the most unlikely and unexpected place. I found it in lessons that I had learned earlier in life about how creativity can survive its own failure.
Dakle, to sam ja. I vjerujte mi, iznimno sam zahvalna što sam ta osoba, jer cijela ta stvar sa "Jedi, Moli, Voli" bila je velika prilika za mene. Ali me ostavila u dosta nezgodnom položaju kada se radi o mom napretku kao autora koji pokušava shvatiti kako uopće ponovno napisati knjigu koja će zadovoljiti bilo koga jer sam unaprijed znala da svi ti ljudi koji su obožavali "Jedi, Moli, Voli" će biti izuzetno razočarani što god sljedeće da napišem jer to neće biti "Jedi, Moli, Voli", i svi ljudi koji su mrzili "Jedi, Moli, Voli" će biti izuzetno razočarani što god sljedeće da napišem jer će im to pružiti dokaz da sam i dalje živa. Tako da sam znala da nema načina da pobijedim, i znanje da nemam načina da pobijedim me natjeralo da ozbiljno neko vrijeme razmišljam da samo odustanem od igre i da se odselim na selo da uzgajam korgije. Ali da sam to učinila, da sam odustala od pisanja, znam da bih izgubila svoj voljeni poziv, tako da sam znala da je zadatak bio taj da moram pronaći neki način da skupim inspiraciju da napišem sljedeću knjigu bez obzira na njen neupitno negativni ishod. Drugim riječima, morala sam naći način da moja kreativnost nadživi vlastiti uspjeh. I jesam, na kraju, pronašla tu inspiraciju, ali sam ju našla na najnevjerojatnijem i neočekivanijem mjestu. Našla sam ju u lekcijama koje sam naučila prije u životu o tome kako kreativnost može preživjeti vlastiti neuspjeh.
So just to back up and explain, the only thing I have ever wanted to be for my whole life was a writer. I wrote all through childhood, all through adolescence, by the time I was a teenager I was sending my very bad stories to The New Yorker, hoping to be discovered. After college, I got a job as a diner waitress, kept working, kept writing, kept trying really hard to get published, and failing at it. I failed at getting published for almost six years. So for almost six years, every single day, I had nothing but rejection letters waiting for me in my mailbox. And it was devastating every single time, and every single time, I had to ask myself if I should just quit while I was behind and give up and spare myself this pain. But then I would find my resolve, and always in the same way, by saying, "I'm not going to quit, I'm going home."
Samo da se malo vratim natrag i objasnim, jedina stvar koja sam ikad željela biti cijeli moj život je pisac. Pisala sam kroz cijelo djetinjstvo, i kroz adolescenciju, kada sam bila tinejdžer slala sam svoje vrlo loše priče u New Yorker, nadajući se da ću biti otkrivena. Nakon fakulteta, dobila sam posao kao konobarica u zalogajnici, nastavila raditi, nastavila pisati, nastavila se jako truditi da me objave, i bila neuspješna u tome. Nisam uspjela biti objavljena gotovo šest godina. Tako da sam gotovo šest godina, svakog dana, imala ništa drugo nego odbijenice koje su me čekale u sandučiću. I bilo je poražavajuće svakoga puta, i svakoga puta morala sam se zapitati trebam li odustati dok sam iza odustati i poštediti se ove boli. Ali onda bih našla svoju odlučnost, uvijek na isti način, govoreći "Neću odustati, idem kući."
And you have to understand that for me, going home did not mean returning to my family's farm. For me, going home meant returning to the work of writing because writing was my home, because I loved writing more than I hated failing at writing, which is to say that I loved writing more than I loved my own ego, which is ultimately to say that I loved writing more than I loved myself. And that's how I pushed through it.
I morate shvatiti da za mene, ići kući ne znači vratiti se na obiteljsku farmu. Za mene, ići kući značilo je vratiti se poslu pisanja jer pisanje je bilo moj dom, jer sam voljela pisati više nego što sam mrzila biti neuspješna u pisanju, što će reći da sam voljela pisanje više nego sam voljela svoj ego, što u konačnici govori da sam više voljela pisanje nego sam voljela sebe. I tako sam to izgurala.
But the weird thing is that 20 years later, during the crazy ride of "Eat, Pray, Love," I found myself identifying all over again with that unpublished young diner waitress who I used to be, thinking about her constantly, and feeling like I was her again, which made no rational sense whatsoever because our lives could not have been more different. She had failed constantly. I had succeeded beyond my wildest expectation. We had nothing in common. Why did I suddenly feel like I was her all over again?
Ali čudna stvar je da sam se 20 godina kasnije, za vrijeme lude vožnje "Jedi, Moli, Voli" našla kako se identificiram ponovno sa onom neobjavljenom mladom konobaricom iz zalogajnice koja sam nekad bila, razmišljajući stalno o njoj, i osjećajući da sam ponovno ona, što nije imalo baš nikakvog racionalnog smisla jer naši životi nisu mogli biti više različiti. Ona stalno nije uspijevala, ja sam uspjela iznad svih mojih očekivanja. Nismo imali ništa zajedničko. Zašto se ponovno osjećam kao ona?
And it was only when I was trying to unthread that that I finally began to comprehend the strange and unlikely psychological connection in our lives between the way we experience great failure and the way we experience great success. So think of it like this: For most of your life, you live out your existence here in the middle of the chain of human experience where everything is normal and reassuring and regular, but failure catapults you abruptly way out over here into the blinding darkness of disappointment. Success catapults you just as abruptly but just as far way out over here into the equally blinding glare of fame and recognition and praise. And one of these fates is objectively seen by the world as bad, and the other one is objectively seen by the world as good, but your subconscious is completely incapable of discerning the difference between bad and good. The only thing that it is capable of feeling is the absolute value of this emotional equation, the exact distance that you have been flung from yourself. And there's a real equal danger in both cases of getting lost out there in the hinterlands of the psyche.
I tek kada sam to pokušala odgonetnuti napokon sam počela shvaćati neobičnu i neočekivanu psihološku poveznicu u našim životima u načinu na koji doživljavamo veliki neuspjeh i načinu na koji doživljavamo veliki uspjeh. Gledajte na to ovako: Većinu svog života, živite svoje postojanje ovdje u sred lanca ljudskih iskustava gdje je sve normalno, ulijeva sigurnost i uobičajeno je, ali neuspjeh vas katapulitra daleko ovdje u zasljepljujuću tamu razočarenja. Uspjeh vas katapultira, isto tako naglo i isto tako daleko na ovu stranu u isto tako zasljepljujući sjaj slave i priznanja i hvale. I jedna od ovih sudbina je objektivno viđena od svijeta kao loša, i druga je objekvitno od svijeta viđena kao dobra, ali vaša podsvijest je u potpunosti nesposobna razlikovati između dobrog i lošeg. Jedina stvar koju može osjećati je apsolutna vrijednost ove emocionalne jednadžbe, točnu udaljenost na koju ste bačeni od sebe. I postoji jednaka opasnost u oba slučaja da ćete se izgubiti tamo u bespućima psihe.
But in both cases, it turns out that there is also the same remedy for self-restoration, and that is that you have got to find your way back home again as swiftly and smoothly as you can, and if you're wondering what your home is, here's a hint: Your home is whatever in this world you love more than you love yourself. So that might be creativity, it might be family, it might be invention, adventure, faith, service, it might be raising corgis, I don't know, your home is that thing to which you can dedicate your energies with such singular devotion that the ultimate results become inconsequential.
Ali u oba slučaja, čini se da je tu isti lijek za samo-oporavak, i to je da morate ponovno pronaći put kući što je brže i što je jednostavnije moguće, i ako se pitate što je vaš dom, evo vam mig: Vaš dom je bilo što na ovome svijetu što volite više nego što volite sebe. Tako da bi to mogla biti kreativnost, mogla bi biti obitelj, mogli bi biti izumi, avanuture, vjera, služba, može biti uzgajanje korgija, ne znam, vaš dom je ta stvar kojoj posvećujete svoju energiju sa takvom jedinstvenom predanošću da konačni rezultat postaje nevažan.
For me, that home has always been writing. So after the weird, disorienting success that I went through with "Eat, Pray, Love," I realized that all I had to do was exactly the same thing that I used to have to do all the time when I was an equally disoriented failure. I had to get my ass back to work, and that's what I did, and that's how, in 2010, I was able to publish the dreaded follow-up to "Eat, Pray, Love." And you know what happened with that book? It bombed, and I was fine. Actually, I kind of felt bulletproof, because I knew that I had broken the spell and I had found my way back home to writing for the sheer devotion of it. And I stayed in my home of writing after that, and I wrote another book that just came out last year and that one was really beautifully received, which is very nice, but not my point. My point is that I'm writing another one now, and I'll write another book after that and another and another and another and many of them will fail, and some of them might succeed, but I will always be safe from the random hurricanes of outcome as long as I never forget where I rightfully live.
Za mene je taj dom uvijek bilo pisanje. Tako da sam nakon čudnog, dezorijentirajućeg uspjeha kroz koji sam prošla sa "Jedi, Moli, Voli" shvatila da sve što moram učiniti je ista stvar koju sam uvijek morala činiti kad sam bila jednako dezorijentirana neuspjehom. Morala sam se vratiti na posao, i to je ono što sam učinila, i tako sam 2010. izdala zastrašujući nastavak "Jedi, Moli, Voli". I znate što se dogodilo s tom knjigom? Bila je užasna, i ja sam bila dobro. Zapravo, osjećala sam se otpornom na metke jer sam znala da sam razbila čaroliju i da sam našla svoj put kući pisanju zbog čiste predanosti tome. I ostala sam u svome domu pisanja nakon toga, i napisala sam još jednu knjigu koja je izašla prošle godine i ta knjiga je zaista divno primljena, što je jako lijepo, no to nije moja poanta. Moja poanta je da sada pišem još jednu, i da ću napisati još jednu nakon toga i još jednu i još jednu i još jednu i mnoge od njih neće uspjeti, i neke će možda uspjeti, ali ću uvijek biti sigurna od nasumičnih uragana ishoda dokle god ne zaboravim gdje s pravom živim.
Look, I don't know where you rightfully live, but I know that there's something in this world that you love more than you love yourself. Something worthy, by the way, so addiction and infatuation don't count, because we all know that those are not safe places to live. Right? The only trick is that you've got to identify the best, worthiest thing that you love most, and then build your house right on top of it and don't budge from it. And if you should someday, somehow get vaulted out of your home by either great failure or great success, then your job is to fight your way back to that home the only way that it has ever been done, by putting your head down and performing with diligence and devotion and respect and reverence whatever the task is that love is calling forth from you next. You just do that, and keep doing that again and again and again, and I can absolutely promise you, from long personal experience in every direction, I can assure you that it's all going to be okay. Thank you. (Applause)
Slušajte, ne znam gdje vi s pravom živite, ali znam da postoji nešto na ovom svijetu što volite više nego volite sebe. Nešto što je vrijedno, usput, tako da se ovisnost i zaluđenost ne računaju, jer svi znamo da to nisu sigurna mjesta za život. Je li tako? Jedini trik je da morate identificirati najbolju, najvrijedniju stvar koju najviše volite i onda izgraditi svoj dom točno na tome i ne odustajte od toga. I ako ćete jednog dana, nekako biti izbačeni iz svog doma zbog velikog neuspjeha ili velikog uspjeha, onda je vaš posao boriti se i vratiti u svoj dom na jedini način kako je to ikad učinjeno, trudom i radom, čineći sa marljivošću i predanoćšu sa poštovanjem i ustrajnošću bez obzira što je zadatak koji ljubav sljedeći priziva iz vas. Samo činite to, i nastavljajte činiti to ponovno i ponovno i ponovno i mogu vam bezuvjetno obećati, iz dugog osobnog iskustva u svakom smjeru, mogu vas uvjeriti da će sve biti u redu. Hvala vam. (Pljesak)