Book: Paris Letters
Author: Janice MacLeod
Genre: Memoir
Rating: 5+ Stars
Favorite Quote: “We must know how to design our lives. We are all artists, and each day is a
canvas (240).”
Written by Janice MacLeod, Paris Letters is the book that inspired
me to go out and create my own life. As I read her book I often found myself
forgetting that it’s a memoir not fiction, especially since it focuses only on
one portion of her life (roughly three years).
Paris Letters is Janice MacLeod’s story of trying to save
enough money to give her a work free year, quit her copywriting job, and travel
through Europe. During her stay in Paris she finds love and a new career doing
what she loves, painting.
Words cannot explain how much I love this book. To give you
some sort of idea of how much I love the book, I first borrowed the book from
the library and after I finished reading it I decided that I had to own a
copy. Since I bought my own copy
of the book, I have reread the book twice.
Although her book does not focus on minimalism or living
light, in trying to downsize to one suitcase for her travel, she got rid of
many things and instead of emptiness she felt content. This part of her story inspired me to
look into minimalism and begin my own personal journey to living light.
Her discontent with her advertising job also made me realize
that I don’t know what I truly want to do. Although we all need to work in order to support ourselves
do we really need to sacrifice our happiness? Janice Macleod’s story proves that it is possible to do what
we enjoy and live the life we want.
Janice Macleod’s story, unlike any other memoir,
surprisingly impacted my life in so many ways. Paris Letters inspired me to want to find and go after
something I am interested in (working on it), live light/embrace minimalism
(working on that too), travel (still dreaming), and most importantly it has
reminded me that we can live the life we want.
안녕!!
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