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Message: [QUOTE="Karoline, post: 9034"] [URL='https://lissarankin.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Elizabeth-Gilbert-all-the-way-to-the-tiver-book-011525-c932ba4fdbc2483f9524cfe4128774f8.jpg'][IMG]https://lissarankin.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Elizabeth-Gilbert-all-the-way-to-the-tiver-book-011525-c932ba4fdbc2483f9524cfe4128774f8-1024x683.jpg[/IMG][/URL] Like almost everyone else I know, I loved Liz Gilbert’s [I]Eat, Pray, Love.[/I] I read it right after I blew up my own life by quitting my stable job as a doctor to pursue an unknown life of God knows what, and I wanted to be Liz Gilbert. I hadn’t published any books of my own yet, although I dreamed of doing so. Like Liz, I’d gone through a divorce that was my own choice. I’d been to Italy but not India or Bali, and I longed for more adventure than an OB/GYN doctor’s life of hospital commitments would allow me. I was a little full of myself and lacking in humility after martyring myself for twenty years of medical training and practice and then deciding I deserved a more fulfilling life after losing my physician father far too young. But it would be years before I would spot the red flags of young Liz’s narcissistic tendencies, born out of a reactionary rebellion against her codependent tendencies, something I could indeed resonate with in myself. I went to an Eat, Pray, Love book event in San Francisco, just so I could bask in Liz’s glow, and I was shocked when she got on stage and said something to tune of “What are you all doing, going to Italy, India, and Bali and trying to recreate my Eat, Pray, Love experience? Why don’t you go on your own pilgrimage and find your own story, rather than copying everything I’ve done? Unless you want to join the Liz Gilbert cult, in which case there will be an offering plate at the back of the room and you’re welcome to give me all of your money.” I felt like I’d been slapped. Here I was, unemployed and scraping by on $200,000 of debt I was floating while trying to figure out how to earn a living next, and I’d just spent a lot of money to be there, and now I was getting accused of being a cult junkie? It all felt really weird and soured me on Liz Gilbert as an actual person. But because she’s such a wonderful writer, I still read all the books she put out since then, including her latest. Just now, I finished reading Liz’s new memoir [URL='https://www.amazon.com/All-Way-River-Love-Liberation/dp/0593540980']All The Way To The River[/URL], and what I missed before is staring at me baldy from between these pages. This is where unbridled codependency and an uncontained obsession with other people meets unearned privilege, love addiction, and madness. Spoiler alert. If you haven’t read the book and you want to be surprised, stop now because I’m going to give you a summary. The Liz at the beginning of the book is married to the Brazilian man she met in Bali during the Eat, Pray, Love years when finds out that her best friend Rayya, who she’s been secretly harboring a crush on for many years, has a terminal cancer diagnosis. She confesses her undying love to her husband, divorces him, and hooks up with Rayya, which I remember Liz announcing years ago on social media. [I]“Rayya experienced an “unrestrained ecstasy” at the clarity and simplicity of her terminal diagnosis, telling Liz: “Let’s just blaze out … let’s just live balls to the wall until I die!” [/I] So they do, hurtling into unbridled codependency and love and sex addiction for Liz and unrestrained drug addiction for Rayya, the details of which are not spared, crescendoing into the moment when Liz decides she’s going to murder Rayya, not as a mercy killing or to help her die with dignity, but as a cold-blooded murder to put Liz out of her own misery because Rayya has cut her off from the drug of her choice- Rayya’s adoration, validation, affection, touch, sex, and all the juicy yum goodness of euphoric romantic fantasy. [HEADING=1][B]Vulnerable Disclosure Or Overdisclosure?[/B][/HEADING] I couldn’t help wondering “Is this brave, vulnerable disclosure?” as Oprah suggested in her glowing [URL='https://www.amazon.com/All-Way-River-Love-Liberation/dp/0593540980']Oprah’s Book Club interview with Liz Gilbert[/URL]. Or was this overdisclosure and boundary violating TMI? We just did a whole session in [URL='https://courses.lissarankin.com/the-writers-calling']The Writer’s Calling,[/URL] answering this provocative question regarding our own writing. Where is that edge of riveting transparency that we all love in memoirs- and when does it become sensationism, trauma porn, and boundaryless overexposure? Especially when we’re talking about someone else’s addiction, where is that edge? Who owns our story when it includes other people? How much transparency is good writing versus when is it what Brené Brown calls “floodlighting?” When are we going “one up” by telling about someone else’s bad choices, and when are we just being honest and transparent? [URL='https://courses.lissarankin.com/the-writers-calling']If you’re writing to heal or to publish and you’d like to watch this week’s The Writer’s Calling recording, you can get access to it here.[/URL] [HEADING=1][B]I Felt Like A Voyeur[/B][/HEADING] What’s my two cents? Honestly, I felt voyeuristic reading it, like I couldn’t put it down but I felt guilty every time I picked it up, like I was violating Liz’s (and Rayya’s) boundaries without wanting to. But then, when I’m invited to do so- is it still a boundary violation? It was very confusing for my parts. I had a strong mother hen part that wanted to protect Liz, to put some skin on her and keep her warm and safe. I worry that she will regret publishing this some day, and then it will be too late. But maybe I’m just waaaay overprotective of someone I have only ever met once. Maybe she needed the money after all she went through. Who am I to judge? Many times during the book, I felt uncomfortable being let in so close to two women’s very private struggles. I felt like I was reading Liz’s journal, something that she should absolutely write- for herself, but which might be too private to splay all over the internet, especially when it contained so much personal detail about someone who is now dead. Especially because it included little doodle drawings and very personal poems, it felt designed to let us peek inside her journal, rather than curating the experience for the reader so it felt like a book about us, the readers, rather than like Liz was expecting us to be narcissistic supply for her vanity publication. I felt like I had just paid full price to read a book that wasn’t really written for me, the reader, but maybe more for Liz’s healing process. I’m a big fan of writing memoirs we never need to (or should) publish. Thank God my first memoir never got published, even though, God knows I tried! I look back now and think how embarrassed I would be if that rant against the medical industrial complex- and my own feelings of victimhood- had been published in its unrestrained voice. I now see that I needed to write it, to get that rage out of my system so I could teach doctors and those we treat. But nobody else ever needs to read that book. [HEADING=1][B]Did She Have Consent?[/B][/HEADING] I wondered as I was reading if Liz had permission to tell the very private- and not at all flattering- story of a dead woman and was disturbed when, on the Oprah Book Club interview, she reveals that Rayya came to her five years after her death to tell Liz that she had to write this book. Really? Are we sure? Did Rayya’s spirit really come to Liz and give her permission to share the worst moments of Rayya’s unimaginably horrific end of life addiction spiral with millions of people? Or is that Liz’s magical thinking mixed in with a little delusion, justifying what maybe she knew was too private to disclose without someone’s expressed consent- but she wanted to publish it anyway? I’ve had feelings like this while reading memoirs before. When Glennon Doyle published her book [URL='https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250075734/?bestFormat=true&k=love%20warrior%20book&ref_=nb_sb_ss_w_scx-ent-pd-bk-d_k0_1_12_de&crid=1ZVP7NT9UD77&sprefix=love%20warrior']Love Warrior [/URL]about her husband’s sex addiction and the toll it had taken on their marriage, I was shocked at the level of detail she revealed. I’d known these things already. Glennon had told me, privately, in emails, when we were talking woman to woman about the endings of our marriages. But when I read the beautifully written book, I couldn’t help thinking, “What will her children think when they grow up and read about their father? How will he ever find another date, now that his very private struggle is well known to millions of people?” It made me careful with what I’ve disclosed about my own life and relationships and led me to do many therapy sessions around boundaries for writers like me. I’m sure I still get it wrong, but for 15 years, I’ve always asked for the consent of anyone you’ve read about here on this blog, including my mother, who gave me permission to write anything I wanted about her after her death- if I thought it might help me or anyone else heal. I imagine I will still look back when I’m older and wiser and think “What were you thinking? Really?” But I do try to at least consider how what I write will impact the people who might read it. [HEADING=1][B]“Priv Lit”[/B][/HEADING] The other discomfort I kept noticing impacted my social justice parts. I had the cringey feeling I get when I’m reading the kind of chick lit that exposes unearned privilege without naming it or owning it. I’m sure I’ve been guilty of it myself but it helped to put language to it. I’ve heard it called “priv lit,” a term coined by journalist Jennifer Niesslein and popularized by writer Astra Taylor and Jennifer Schaffer, but most notably analyzed in a 2010 essay by Jessica Knoll and Jennifer Baumgardner in the now defunct Bitch Magazine titled Eat, Pray, Spend. Priv-lit (short for “privileged literature”) refers to a genre of self-help and spiritual growth media marketed primarily to affluent, educated, white women. It mixes empowerment rhetoric with consumerism, wellness culture, and lifestyle branding, positioning personal transformation as both a moral duty and a purchasable experience. This article[URL='https://theconversation.com/wealthy-whiny-and-wildly-tone-deaf-elizabeth-gilberts-new-memoir-exemplifies-priv-lit-264372'] Wealthy, Whiny & Wildly Tone Deaf [/URL]about Liz Gilbert’s new book through the lens of priv lit is provocative (*hat tip to cult journalist Anke Richter, author of [URL='https://www.amazon.com/Cult-Trip-Inside-coercion-control-ebook/dp/B09ZCVCJJN']Cult Trip[/URL], who I filmed 3 conversations with[URL='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzEu20ZyoYw'] here[/URL], [URL='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvHBfPTia6U&t=36s']here,[/URL] and[URL='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5GMjThOqU8&t=12s'] here[/URL], for sending me this article.) They write, “Priv-lit, as the pair explained, refers to literature or media whose expressed goal is one of spiritual, existential, or philosophical enlightenment contingent upon women’s hard work, commitment, and patience, but whose actual barriers to entry are primarily financial.” They go on with: [I]In the six months that followed, the pair embarked on a deranged, drug-fuelled bender during which Rayya, a former heroin addict, became increasingly volatile and unwell, and Liz, a self-proclaimed sex and love addict, desperately tried to care for Rayya by emotionally overcompensating and showering her with lavish gifts – a Range Rover, piano, and Rolex; a penthouse rental in the East Village (Rayya’s dream home); recording sessions in Detroit and New York. This consumption-driven model of wellness – defined by reckless spending and material excess, all cloaked in the language of self-empowerment – positions Gilbert as both unmistakably privileged and profoundly unhinged, embodying the heart of priv-lit.[/I] Priv lit marries spiritual materialism, a focus on individualism with a cluelessness about systemic inequalities, with an aestheticized enlightenment as a lifestyle- serene, Instagram-worthy, and tasteful- often equating spiritual worth with beauty, thinness, or a minimalist aesthetic. Self-realization becomes tied to consumption: “you can manifest your dreams” by buying a course, a supplement, or a spiritual accessory. Authors and brands often associated with priv-lit include Liz Gilbert, Brené Brown, Gabrielle Bernstein, and Oprah’s SuperSoul brand – though many of these women also critique the very structures that priv-lit depends on, which makes the genre and the critique of it complex. Critics argue that priv-lit reinforces privilege by assuming access to time, money, and leisure for self-actualization, depoliticizes suffering by treating trauma or dissatisfaction as personal failings rather than social issues, and turns spiritual growth into performance, where wellness and self-awareness are signaled through consumption rather than lived transformation. Priv-lit is where feminism, capitalism, and spirituality intersect – offering women empowerment through self-help and consumption, but often without challenging the systems that cause disempowerment in the first place. As I read Liz’s book and thought about my own books through these critical lenses, I wondered where I have been guilty of the same. Is [URL='https://www.amazon.com/Anatomy-Calling-Doctors-Journey-Prescription/dp/1623365740']The Anatomy of a Calling[/URL] priv lit? Is [URL='https://www.amazon.com/Sacred-Medicine-Doctors-Unravel-Mysteries/dp/1683647424/ref=pd_lpo_d_sccl_3/137-4286058-2272917?pd_rd_w=xyHUR&content-id=amzn1.sym.4c8c52db-06f8-4e42-8e56-912796f2ea6c&pf_rd_p=4c8c52db-06f8-4e42-8e56-912796f2ea6c&pf_rd_r=E9669VYBSMNB7WWFEHRM&pd_rd_wg=OTCR0&pd_rd_r=0ade5b8b-e470-4e8c-ae1c-73111d6da9d3&pd_rd_i=1683647424&psc=1']Sacred Medicine [/URL]priv lit? Have I written anything that isn’t? This was good food for thought and a trailhead for further examination of my unearned privilege and how it might taint my writing in ways that can be unintentionally harmful. This is what we all unpacked in [URL='https://courses.lissarankin.com/the-writers-calling']The Writer’s Calling[/URL] this week- giving us all something to chew on and humbling us with the inquiries that deserved exploration at a deeper level. [HEADING=1][B]New Age Guru-isms[/B][/HEADING] I have to admit that the part of me that wrote my LOVE BIGGER book, which I’m drip-releasing on Substack [URL='https://lissarankinmd.substack.com/t/love-bigger']here,[/URL] about spiritual bypassing and social justice issues, was annoyed as shit with all of Liz’s guruisms, the kinds you regularly hear on Super Soul Sunday. She spouts as if it it’s for sure real that we’re all here on Earth School and our traumas are part of our curriculum, that our souls choose our traumas and choose the souls who will perpetrate trauma upon us, not acknowledging that this lands on most less blindly privileged people, like my BIPOC adopted sister Keli, as the biggest load of crap they’ve ever heard. “My soul would [I]never [/I]do that to me!” She’s big into all the recovery God language, about surrendering her ego (which my IFS parts don’t like), about listening for the answer (but how do you know it’s not a grandiose Self-like part, Liz, who thinks you’ve got the unquestioning 411 to God?) I know lots of people who were powerless over their addictions find solace in turning over their lives to a Higher Power of their understanding- which I can appreciate. But again, surrendering is not always the best advice for a queer BIPOC female in MAGA America. Surrender is maybe something privileged people should do more often, but to act like it’s the right medicine for all of Liz Gilbert’s millions of fans made me uneasy. A part of me wishes people with no medical degrees and no therapy degrees would just quit writing self-help books about topics they have no expertise to discuss. I know spirituality belongs to us all, and any recovering addict has a story worth telling. But I have to agree with the [URL='https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/08/books/review/all-the-way-to-the-river-elizabeth-gilbert.html']New York Times reviewer[/URL] who wrote: [I]“The book includes heartfelt meditations on grief, addiction, friendship and loyalty. These are watered down by poetry that manages to be both facile and inscrutable — a rare feat — and amateurish drawings accompanied by handwritten messages: “Turn it over and everything will be taken care of.” “Are you really helping or just getting in God’s way?” “Replacing fantasies with different fantasies is not a good idea.” And the printing isn’t even as legible as SARK’s. Had this book not been muddled by New Age extras and a whiff of solipsism, it might have packed a wallop…”[/I] While the Liz Gilbert of [I]Eat, Pray, Love[/I] gave me hope, inspired me, helped me envision a happier future than the past I had just blown up, I didn’t feel like she told me what to think or what to believe or suggested she had all the answers. I had some nostalgia for that Liz when I read the book, the open, curious Liz before she became a New Age guru selling me beliefs I no longer believe are congruent with being a social justice activist or a person living in reality. [HEADING=1][B]What I Loved [/B][/HEADING] My favorite part of All The Way To The River is the last chapter, when Liz introduces us to little Lizzy, the 5 year old girl with duck fluff blond hair and big anxious blue eyes, the inner child who had been running Liz’s sex life, searching for one person after another who could fill the “God-sized hole” inside of her caused by little Lizzy’s pain. I assumed from reading it that Liz had been introduced to Internal Family Systems, and a quick Google search reveals a video of Tami Simon from Sounds True facilitating a conversation between Liz Gilbert and IFS founder Dick Schwartz, so yes. I guess she’s an IFS person, and the ending made that evident. Liz writes: [I]These were the eyes of someone who was terrified and lonely, and who had very nearly given up hope. I’d first heard this child’s voice at the end of my last relationship, when she called out to me one night as I was begging yet another unavailable person to love me—when she said to me these powerful words: Please get me out of here. Somehow, even in my madness, I had understood that the “here” this child referred to was not only this particular relationship but all of them. She was pleading with me to stop my lifelong pattern of self-betrayal—because she was the one who was injured and reabandoned every time I threw myself at someone new. She needed me to stop throwing myself away, because she needed my help. She needed my attention. She needed me. That voice—her plea—was the reason I finally came into the rooms of recovery for real. That said, I must confess that I did not necessarily always like this child, once I met her. She seemed to be a terribly big responsibility at first, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to take that on. She had so many needs, you see. In fact, I initially blamed her for every failed relationship I’ve ever had. It was her clinginess that had driven away so many partners, after all, and it was her hunger for love that kept sending me out there looking for salvation in one person after another. She was the reason I was oversensitive. She was the reason I experienced depression and anxiety. She was the reason I could never find peace or stability with anyone. She was often frightened and weepy, too—and that’s not hot. Nobody wants a crybaby. It makes sense, then, that I had worked my whole life to ignore her or throw her away. How hard I had tried to get rid of her! I mean, who wants to live with constant pain? Without her neediness and suffering, I could’ve been so freaking cool! I could’ve been amazing! Without her hurt and despair, I could’ve been just the “good parts” of myself—the shining and appealing parts that everyone liked and was attracted to! For so many years I had been abandoning this little girl (whom I have come to call Lizzy) or trying to make other people take care of her for me. I had outsourced her needs to any stranger who would take me/ her into their arms, demanding that they see this kid, protect her, defend her, and, ultimately, erase her.”[/I] I came away from the book like I’d just watched a car crash I should have looked away from, out of respect for the people who got hurt. But I wound up with a big-hearted tenderness for little Lizzy. I hope she’s with Liz now, getting the love she finally needs from the one person who can really give it to her reliably- Liz. Which reminds me, if you’re interested in going deeper with your own IFS work, my peer-to-peer parts processing partner Emma Harper and I will be co-leading a weekend Zoom Peer To Peer Parts Processing training. [URL='https://courses.lissarankin.com/peer-to-peer-home']You can learn more and register here.[/URL] If you read Liz’s book, I’d love to hear what you think! I started a Facebook thread to discuss it [URL='https://www.facebook.com/lissarankin/posts/pfbid02UnpTsiM6CyodC5PCMS7cEcAVFnavs8kAoHw9Zx5Jj88GFgoXDNoBaB1BfVBg1pFpl']here. [/URL] The post [URL='https://lissarankin.com/is-liz-gilberts-latest-memoir-vulnerable-disclosure-or-tmi-overdisclosure/']Is Liz Gilbert’s Latest Memoir Vulnerable DIsclosure Or TMI Overdisclosure?[/URL] first appeared on [URL='https://lissarankin.com']Lissa Rankin[/URL]. [/QUOTE]

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