The Zahir by Paolo Coelho
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| Random picture I took in Paris a few years ago. (A lot of the story takes place in Paris. I thought it fitting.) |
My first Paolo Coelho book... I read somewhere that it's pretty autobiographical. Not sure how I feel about this book. Definitely has a lot of Persian mysticism undertones, which I wasn't really expecting. I want to read some of his other works. Anyway... here are some quotes in the order that they appear in the book. Enjoy.
"Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.
. . .
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what Ithacas mean."
-from Contantine Cavafy
"I fought for the socialist ideal, went to prison, came out and went on fighting, feeling like a working-class hero--until, that is, I heard the Beatles and decided that rock music was much more fun than Marx."
"I don't regret the painful times; I bear my scars as if they were medals. I know that freedom has a high price, as high as that of slavery; the only difference is that you pay with pleasure and a smile, even when that smile is dimmed by tears."
"We humans have two great problems: the first is knowing when to begin; the second is knowing when to stop."
"Perhaps it is the name of the city: Vitoria--Victory.... Or perhaps it is the old saying of the conquistadors of the Americas: 'It is not life that matters, but the journey.'"
"And suddenly, in the middle of the central nave, I realized something very important: the cathedral is me, it is all of us. We are all growing and changing shape, we notice certain weaknesses that need to be corrected, we don't always choose the best solution, but we carry on regardless, trying to remain upright and decent, in order to do honor not to the walls or the doors or the windows, but to the empty space inside, the space where we worship and venerate what is dearest and most important to us."
"On the contrary, I am pleased that she exists; she has shown me that I am capable of a love of which I myself knew nothing, and this leaves me in a state of grace."
"When I had nothing more to lose, I was given everything. When I ceased to be who I am, I found myself. When I experienced humiliation and yet kept on walking, I understood that I was free to choose my destiny."
"A fatally wounded soldier never asks the medical team: 'Please save me!' His last words are usually: 'Tell my wife and my son that I love them.' At the last moment, they speak of love."
"As Einstein said, God does not play dice with the universe; everything is interconnected and has a meaning. That meaning may remain hidden nearly all the time, but we always know we are close to our true mission on earth when what we are doing is touched with the energy of enthusiasm."
"...and if I were to die then, despite all that had happened in my life. . . I had remained alive until the last moment, and could, with all certainty, affirm: 'My day was good, let night fall.'"
"Close the door, change the record, clean the house, get rid of the dust. Stop being who you were and become who you are."
"I place one foot on the surface, the whole sheet of ice moves, but does not crack. With one eye on the rising sun, I make a kind of wager with God: if I manage to reach the column and come back without the ice cracking, that will be a sign that I am on the right path, and that his hand is showing me where I should go." (See FOOTNOTE)
"I'm telling you all this because, although in Ecclesiastes it says there is a time to rend and a time to sew, sometimes the time to rend leaves deep scars. Being with someone else and making that person feel as if they were of no importance in our life is far worse than feeling alone and miserable in the streets of Geneva.'
"Stupid people really should be issued their own special identity cards because they are the ones who feed the collective stupidity."
"I was not I, I was nothing--and that seemed to me quite marvelous."
"I had discovered that I was much better and much more capable than I myself had thought; age only slows down those who never had the courage to walk at their own pace."
"In the words of a Persian sage: Love is a disease no one wants to get rid of. Those who catch it never try to get better, and those who suffer do not wish to be cured."
FOOTNOTE:
This part of the book stuck out to me because it's basically what I do at least once a day when I approach a green light that has a red hand flashing for the pedestrians. Seriously. Tell me you've never made a mental bet when approaching a green light.
