Paulo Coelho's Warrior of the Light - As if it were the first time

Issue n°145: As if it were the first time

I would like to believe that I am going to look on this new year as if it were the first time that 365 days have unfolded before my eyes. To see the people around me with surprise and amazement, happy to discover that they are by my side and sharing something so often mentioned and so seldom understood, called love.

I shall climb on the first bus that comes along without asking where it is going to and I shall get off as soon as I see something that catches my attention. I shall pass by a beggar who asks me for some spare change. Maybe I’ll give him something, maybe I’ll think that he will spend it on drink and just walk past – hearing his insults and understanding that that is the way he has to communicate with me. I shall pass by someone who is trying to wreck a telephone booth. Maybe I’ll try to stop them, maybe I’ll understand that they are doing that because there is nobody to talk to on the other side of the line and that is their way of chasing off loneliness.

On each of these 365 days I shall look at everything and everybody as if it were the first time – especially the small things that I am not used to and whose magic I have forgotten. The keys of my computer, for example, that move with an energy that I fail to understand. The paper that appears on the screen and for a long time has not been revealed in a physical manner, although I believe that I am writing on a white sheet where it is easy to make corrections by pressing a key. At the side of the computer monitor are some papers that I do not have the patience to put in order, but if I feel that they are hiding something new, than all these letters, memoranda, newspaper cuttings and receipts will gain a life of their own and will have odd stories of the past and the future to tell me. So many things in the world, so many paths trodden, so many entrances and exits in my life.

I am going to put on a shirt that I wear a lot and for the first time I shall pay attention to the label and the way it was sewn, and I am going to imagine the hands that designed it and the machines that changed this design into something material and visible.

And even the things that I am used to – such as my bow and arrows, the breakfast coffee mug, the boots that have become an extension of my feet after wearing them so much – will be coated in the mystery of discovery. Let everything that my hand touches, my eyes see and my mouth taste be different now, although they been the same for many a year. In that way they will no longer be still-lifes and start to convey the secret of having been with me for such a long time, and they will show me the miracle of coming into touch again with emotions already worn down by routine.

I want to look at the sun for the first time, if the sun comes out tomorrow, or at cloudy weather, if tomorrow is overcast. Above my head there is a sky for which all of humanity - over thousands of years of observation - has given a series of reasonable explanations. Well, I shall forget everything I have ever learned about the stars, and they will once more turn into angels, or children, or anything else that I feel like believing in at the moment.
Time and life have changed everything into something perfectly understandable – and I need mystery, the thunder that is the voice of an angry god rather than just a simple electric discharge that sets off vibrations in the atmosphere. I want to fill my life again with fantasy, because an angry god is far more curious, frightening and interesting than a phenomenon of physics.

And finally, let me look at myself on each of these 365 days as if it were the first time that I was in contact with my body and my soul. Let me look at this person who walks, feels and talks like any other, let me feel surprised at his most simple gestures, like chatting to the mailman, opening his correspondence, contemplating his wife sleeping at his side, wondering what she is dreaming about.

And so I shall remain what I am and what I like to be, a constant surprise to myself. This I who was not created by my father or by my mother, nor by my school, but by all that I have lived so far - suddenly I forgot and am discovering it all over again.

Copyright @ 2007 by Paulo Coelho
Warrior of the Light, a www.paulocoelho.com.br publication

Selected Warrior of the Light issues are available as free e-books (PDF format) from the Smink Works Books site

Paulo Coelho's Warrior of the Light - Manual for conserving paths

Issue n°144: Manual for conserving paths
1] The path begins with a crossroads. There you can stop and think what direction to follow. But don’t spend too much time thinking or you’ll never leave the spot. Ask yourself the classic Castañeda question: which of these paths has a heart? Reflect a lot on the choices that lie ahead, but once you have taken the first step, forget the crossroads for ever or else you will always torture yourself with the useless question: “did I take the right path?” If you listened to your heart before making the first movement, you chose the right path.

2] The path doesn’t last for ever. It is a blessing to travel the path for some time, but one day it will come to an end, so always be prepared to take leave of it at any moment. However enraptured you may be at certain landscapes, or scared whenever you have to make a great effort to go ahead, don’t get too used to anything. Neither to the hours of euphoria, nor to the endless days when everything seems so difficult and progress is so slow. Don’t forget that sooner or later an angel will appear and your journey will reach an end.

3] Honor your path. It was your choice, your decision, and just as you respect the ground you step on, that ground will respect your feet. Always do what is best to conserve and keep your path and it will do the same for you.

4] Be well equipped. Carry a small rake, a spade, a penknife. Understand that penknives are no use for dry leaves, and rakes are useless for herbs that are deep-rooted. Know also what tool to use at each moment. And take care of them, because they are your best allies.

5] The path goes forward and backward. At times you have to go back because something was lost, or else a message to be delivered was forgotten in your pocket. A well tended path enables you to go back without any great problems.

6] Take care of the path before you take care of what is around you. Attention and concentration are fundamental. Don’t be distracted by the dry leaves at the edges or by the way that others are looking after their paths. Use your energy to tend and conserve the ground that accepts your steps.

7] Be patient. Sometimes the same tasks have to be repeated, like tearing up weeds or closing holes that appear after unexpected rain. Don’t let that annoy you - that is part of the journey. Even though you are tired, even though certain tasks are repeated so often, be patient.

8] Paths cross. People can tell what the weather is like. Listen to advice, and make your own decisions. You alone are responsible for the path that was entrusted to you.

9] Nature follows its own rules. In this way, you have to be prepared for sudden changes in the fall, slippery ice in winter, the temptations of flowers in spring, thirst and showers in the summer. Make the most of each of these seasons, and don’t complain about their characteristics.

10] Make your path a mirror of yourself. By no means let yourself be influenced by the way that others care for their paths. You have your soul to listen to, and the birds to tell what your soul is saying. Let your stories be beautiful and pleasant to everything around you. Above all, let the stories that your soul tells during the journey be echoed at each and every second of the path.

11] Love your path. Without this, nothing makes any sense.

Copyright @ 2007 by Paulo Coelho
Warrior of the Light, a www.paulocoelho.com.br publication

Selected Warrior of the Light issues are available as free e-books (PDF format) from the Smink Works Books site

Paulo Coelho's Warrior of the Light - Seventh Deadly Sin Sloth

Issue n°143: Seventh deadly sin - Sloth
Here we are, almost in the middle of the year. I’ve never believed in coincidences, but feel that having written the series about cardinal sins without thinking about the calendar, and noting that sloth ends up being published when many of our decisions on January 1 are already underway or abandoned, should be a sign for all of us.

Dictionary definition: feminine noun, from the Latin Prigritia. Aversion to work, negligence, indolence.

For the Catholic Church: all live beings that move should earn their daily bread with the sweat of their face, and not be always thinking about safe and immediate results. Sloth is lack of physical or spiritual effort, which degenerates the soul and leads to sadness and depression.

An old fable passed on orally: As soon as he died, Juan found himself in a very beautiful place, surrounded by the comfort and beauty that he had dreamt of. A person dressed in white came up: ‘you have the right to whatever you want: any food, pleasure, fun”, he said.
Delighted, Juan did everything he had dreamt of during life. After many years of pleasures, he looked for the person in white:
“I’ve already done everything I wanted to”, he said. “Now I need some work, to feel useful”.
“I’m very sorry”, said the person in white, “but this is the only thing that I cannot get for you. Here there is no work”.
“To spend eternity dying of tedium? I would prefer a thousand times to be in hell!”
The person in white came up, and said in a low voice:
“Where do you think you are?”

According to Winnie Albert: How can a society survive if it is increasingly more focused on frozen foods, instant photographs, mashed potatoes, speed reading and electronic calculators?

Sociology of sloth: Both he who overworks, and those that refuse to work, are reacting in the same way – trying to get away from the natural problems of any human being, avoiding thinking about the close reality and about the responsibilities inherent to a normal life (Source: The compulsive worker, Oxford, 2001)

According to Buddhism: Traditionally, sloth is one of the principal obstacles to awakening the soul. It is manifested in three ways: the sloth of comfort, which makes us stay always in the same place. Sloth of the heart, when we feel discouraged and unstimulated. Finally, the sloth of bitterness, when nothing matters more to us, and we are already not part of this world (Source: Pema Shodron in Shambala Sun, November 1998)

Comment from the Tao Te King: A man on the path adapts to the Path. An upright man adapts to Virtue. A man who loses something resigns himself to the Loss. He who adapts to the Path is happily accepted by it. He that is upright is accepted by Virtue. He that resigns himself to the loss is accepted by the Loss.

Therefore, already almost in mid-2007: We are accustomed to asking ourselves: Where does inspiration come from? Where is the joy of living? Is all this effort worth while, because during all the year gone by I tried to go beyond my limits, I sustained my family, I behaved as well as possible, and even so I did not arrive where I wanted to?
A warrior of the light understands that awakening is a long process, and that it is necessary to balance contemplation and work to get where one wants. It is not reflecting on what one did not get that he will change; quite the contrary, in these questions is the germ of inaction, of lack of incentive. Yes, perhaps we have done everything right and the results are not visible, but I am certain: there are results. They will surely be revealed as we go along– if we do not give up now.
Happy work to everyone.

Copyright @ 2007 by Paulo Coelho
Warrior of the Light, a www.paulocoelho.com.br publication

Selected Warrior of the Light issues are available as free e-books (PDF format) from the Smink Works Books site