Eat Pray Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia

“‘Ambivalent” was the word I used, avoiding the much more accurate description: ‘utterly consumed with dread.’”

This is Liz’s attitude toward getting pregnant when she turns 30. It is also a source of tension in marriage and difficulty in her sex life with her husband. She is so consumed with guilt about her attitude toward a child and her failed marriage, that she finds it difficult to admit it. Much of Eat Pray Love is the story of Liz healing and strengthening her relationship with her sexuality in the face of society’s expectations and her history of unhealthy relationships.

“I do not address my prayers to The Universe, The Great Void, The Force, The Supreme Self, The Whole, The Creator, The Light, the Higher Power or even the most poetic manifestation of God’s name, taken, I believe, from the Gnostic gospels: ‘The Shadow of the Turning.’”

Liz explains her direct address to “God” whom she regards as “Him.” These other names feel impersonal to her, and “God” to her is the most accurate name for the indescribable. Even though Liz presents journalistic detail about the world’s religions and practices, the research reveals Ketut’s conclusion is right when he says “all” is a “circle” and all religions are the “same.” Liz’s ashram devotion demonstrates to her that God is within.

“In a way, this little episode has all the hallmarks of a typical Christian conversion experience—the dark night of the soul, the call for help, the responding voice, the sense of transformation.”

This passage is the beginning of a religious conversation that will open an “exploratory dialogue” that brings Liz closer to God. Although much of the spiritual evolution described in Eat Pray Love takes place at a Hindu ashram, Liz’s pivotal encounter with the divine is recognizably Christian.