"Eat Pray Love" author Elizabeth Gilbert finds loves one year after losing partner
It has been a little over a year since the Eat Pray Love author Elizabeth Gilbert lost her partner of two years and the beloved writer has found love again in her “sweetheart.”
Taking to Instagram to share the new relationship, Gilbert announced with a sweet photo and a “sense of rebirth and renewal” she was “in love” – and with an unlikely friend who was write under her nose.
The new partner was introduced as Mr Simon MacArthur who is a photographer from the UK.
“Of late, Simon and I have found our way to each other’s arms. And now here we are, and his heart has been such a warm place for me to land. I share this news publicly, despite the fact that our love story is so new and young and tender…,” the novelist wrote on Instagram.
The pair have been friends for years and met through Gilbert’s late partner Rayya Elias, who was a housemate of MacArthur's many years ago.
“They lived together in London over 30 years ago, and they adored each other forever like siblings,” she said. “This, as you can imagine, means the world to me.”
While the relationship is new, the 49-year-old writer said she decided to share her romance with fans to help people feel “normal” about being in love after losing a loved one.
Elizabeth Gilbert and Rayya Elias
“Your heart is a giant cathedral. Let it open. Let it love. Do not let your gorgeous loyalty to the deceased stop you from experiencing the marvels and terrors of your short, mortal, precious life. It’s OK to live, and to love,” her caption read on Instagram.
Both Gilbert and her late partner had been close friends for 15 years, but her feelings changed for her long-time pal after she was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic and liver cancer.
Both she and Elias decided to go public with their relationship in 2016 following a divorce from her husband of nine years, Jose Nunes.
The author added it’s OK to be scared of new experiences, but to do them anyway.
“…If you are falling in love in middle age and it’s terrifying, because you feel just as dumb and crazy and excited and insecure as you did at 16? Well, let me normalize this for you.
“It’s OK. You will always feel 16 when you are falling in love… Love who you love.”