Julie & Julia

I finally got to watch the amazing movie Julie & Julia today. I can't describe how much it spoke to me. The women, their personalities, their lives, their newly discovered passions.

As Julie Powell describes it herself in the last post of the famous blog:

'Who knows how it happens, how you come upon your essential gift? For
this was hers. Not the cooking itself so much – lots of people cook
better than Julia. Not even the recipes – others can write recipes.
What was Julia’s true gift, then? She certainly had enormous energy,
and that was a sort of gift, if a genetic one – perhaps the one thing
about her you can pin down on the luck of the draw. She was a great
teacher, certainly – funny, and generous, and enthusiastic, with so
much overbrimming confidence that she had nothing to do with the
surplus but start doling it out to others. But she also had a great
gift for learning. Perhaps that was the talent she discovered in
herself at the age of 37, at the Cordon Bleu School in Paris – the
thirst to keep finding out, the openness to experience that makes life
worth living.'

What got me was these normal women finding their drive and purpose in life. Wanting to break out of something and channelling their energy into something they found meaty. This is right up my alley and makes my heart sing and my heart pump a little faster!

Julie's character and situation really spoke to me because I am in a similar place right now: Working in a job that I don't mind, but is not what I want to do; wanting to do more in my passion projects, but finding it hard to find the energy at the end of the day to get stuck into my meaty things. Perhaps setting a deadline, like she did, will keep me more focussed and help me build momentum. So, I'm going to blog at least every three days!

The other thing that touched me is the negativity that can come from others, even from those that we idolise or highly respect. I've been there before - getting disappointed after meeting someone you 've thought was amazing for a while, and the encounter was nothing like you had envisaged. Or showing some work to someone whos opinion you respect and you get shot down. It's like being let down by someone you idolise. Julie Powell received a lot of flak after the movie for a variety of reasons. Julia Child experienced book rejection. But what I'm learning is that you have to deal with that disappointment and continue to move forwards if you truly believe in what you are doing, because someone else will love it, someone else will benefit, someone else will see its worth, someone else's life will change because of it.

I don't proclaim to be someone who knows everything about creating an amazing life (I am still at the bottom of the mountain, dreaming about the climb - wanting to set up amazing strategies - wanting to become a better person). But I want to have the experience, I am on that journey. I have 'the thirst to keep finding out, the openness to experience that makes life
worth living.'.

Do you have it my SSS's?