The Alchemist
This will be short for now, as I woke up at 4:00am this morning and am presently nigh exhausted from traipsing about in New York City with friends old and new. At JAX today I stopped to purchase a book for my flight, and wound up with two-- one by an accomplished chef about his restaurant empire, and the other a novel translated into English from Portuguese called "The Alchemist," by Paulo Coelho. It's not a new book at all; it's more than a decade old. However, it was perched at #5 on the bestseller list, and I was flying to New York to spend time with a Brazilian fellow, so it won me over.
It was at once a poignantly simple tale and one of overwhelming compulsion, the author casually strolling into meaning-of-life-type shit within the first twenty-odd pages. It may as well be a nursery rhyme intended for small children, and yet the lesson can only be applicable to those of age enough to have succumbed to so many worldly distractions.
Though only a few know the extent, my heart has been desperately and increasingly troubled of late. Years ago now [woeful as it seems to realize how long past] I visited doctors and hospitals to determine the nature of an ailment affecting my brain and speech patterns, only for them to attribute no physical cause. In my mind I concluded the prognosis to be self-inflicted, the byproduct of prolonged falsity, both to those around me and to myself. Once, long ago I met a man in a retail shop whose speech would clearly become impaired when he was lying. Even in my youth I could tell with complete certainty, and differentiate between his casual conversation and any form of conjured currency. I wondered how such a thing was possible, but when the medical community was unable to peg my glitch I suspected a like cause.
My glitch, however, isn't tied specifically to lying, but instead to almost any significant aspect of my life not related to exactly that which I SHOULD be doing. And the trouble in my heart grows with the scope of that malady-- I am, in effect, not doing almost anything I SHOULD be doing. Like Santiago's Baker in "The Alchemist" I have chosen the safe road. My Personal Legend is to at once and always to create, explore and develop, yet I do none of these things. I earn money from terribly uninspiring enterprises, I surround myself with those who are impressed by my purported greatness, and I likewise seek out more and more ways to convince myself that life not entirely focused on creation, exploration and development is perfectly acceptable. Just like almost everyone I know has done; we've grown up, accepted the terrible [as my heart knows it perfectly] norms of a flaccid, lackluster, disinterested existence, we work at our acceptable jobs, have seemingly meaningful relationships, pass time in ways that distract us from the Truth, grow old and die. Some of us die before we grow old.
For better or for worse I cannot do this anymore. The lesson of "The Alchemist" is that everyone has a Personal Legend. The only sincere happiness in this world is to pursue it. Neither material ambition nor any amount of passionate love, neither worldly achievement nor any substitute of any kind can fill the void in a heart cognizant of its purpose. The man aware of truth who takes another course of action will find only trouble in his heart, a trouble akin to that of the thief, but one who unwittingly steals from his own belongings. If a shepherd should instead be a baker, he must not tend a flock, even when it seems imperative that said flock needs a shepherd. He must bake.
I've often said [and believed, as it was believed also by those to whom it was said] that I'm the perfect human example of the Fundamental Principle of Economics-- you can always count upon man to want that which he does not have. In other words I'm never satisfied. When I had $5000 in debt, I wanted to be debt-free. When I had $5000 in the bank, I wanted $50000 and so forth. I bought an Audi, I want a newer, better Audi. If I buy it, I will want a newer, better one still. And now I know why.
My purpose is not money, though-- like Santiago-- I may have some skill at earning it. It is not a great car or a wonderful girlfriend. It is not a large home or even freedom, as I have often thought. While all those things are possible with purpose, they cannot come first. Only in pursuit of my Personal Legend can I be freed of the constant need for more, and until said pursuit is engaged completely my heart will not let me alone. It's time to face the hard and sad consequences of my errant ways.
It was at once a poignantly simple tale and one of overwhelming compulsion, the author casually strolling into meaning-of-life-type shit within the first twenty-odd pages. It may as well be a nursery rhyme intended for small children, and yet the lesson can only be applicable to those of age enough to have succumbed to so many worldly distractions.
Though only a few know the extent, my heart has been desperately and increasingly troubled of late. Years ago now [woeful as it seems to realize how long past] I visited doctors and hospitals to determine the nature of an ailment affecting my brain and speech patterns, only for them to attribute no physical cause. In my mind I concluded the prognosis to be self-inflicted, the byproduct of prolonged falsity, both to those around me and to myself. Once, long ago I met a man in a retail shop whose speech would clearly become impaired when he was lying. Even in my youth I could tell with complete certainty, and differentiate between his casual conversation and any form of conjured currency. I wondered how such a thing was possible, but when the medical community was unable to peg my glitch I suspected a like cause.
My glitch, however, isn't tied specifically to lying, but instead to almost any significant aspect of my life not related to exactly that which I SHOULD be doing. And the trouble in my heart grows with the scope of that malady-- I am, in effect, not doing almost anything I SHOULD be doing. Like Santiago's Baker in "The Alchemist" I have chosen the safe road. My Personal Legend is to at once and always to create, explore and develop, yet I do none of these things. I earn money from terribly uninspiring enterprises, I surround myself with those who are impressed by my purported greatness, and I likewise seek out more and more ways to convince myself that life not entirely focused on creation, exploration and development is perfectly acceptable. Just like almost everyone I know has done; we've grown up, accepted the terrible [as my heart knows it perfectly] norms of a flaccid, lackluster, disinterested existence, we work at our acceptable jobs, have seemingly meaningful relationships, pass time in ways that distract us from the Truth, grow old and die. Some of us die before we grow old.
For better or for worse I cannot do this anymore. The lesson of "The Alchemist" is that everyone has a Personal Legend. The only sincere happiness in this world is to pursue it. Neither material ambition nor any amount of passionate love, neither worldly achievement nor any substitute of any kind can fill the void in a heart cognizant of its purpose. The man aware of truth who takes another course of action will find only trouble in his heart, a trouble akin to that of the thief, but one who unwittingly steals from his own belongings. If a shepherd should instead be a baker, he must not tend a flock, even when it seems imperative that said flock needs a shepherd. He must bake.
I've often said [and believed, as it was believed also by those to whom it was said] that I'm the perfect human example of the Fundamental Principle of Economics-- you can always count upon man to want that which he does not have. In other words I'm never satisfied. When I had $5000 in debt, I wanted to be debt-free. When I had $5000 in the bank, I wanted $50000 and so forth. I bought an Audi, I want a newer, better Audi. If I buy it, I will want a newer, better one still. And now I know why.
My purpose is not money, though-- like Santiago-- I may have some skill at earning it. It is not a great car or a wonderful girlfriend. It is not a large home or even freedom, as I have often thought. While all those things are possible with purpose, they cannot come first. Only in pursuit of my Personal Legend can I be freed of the constant need for more, and until said pursuit is engaged completely my heart will not let me alone. It's time to face the hard and sad consequences of my errant ways.