Paulo Coelho: Doing (page 3)

“Solitude is not the absence of company, but the moment when our soul is free to speak to us and help us decide what to do with our life.”

“Work is a blessing when it helps us to think about what were doing; but it become a curse when its sole use is to stop us thinking about the meaning of our life.”

“They think they're normal, because they all do the same thing. Well, I'm going to pretend that I have drunk from the same well as them.”

“There is one great truth on this planet: whoever you are, or whatever it is that you do, when you really want something, it's because that desire originated in the soul of the universe…. The soul of the world is nourished by people's happiness.”

“Things do not always happen the way I would have wanted, and it's best that I get used to that.”

“She was doing it because she had nothing to lose, because her life was one of constant, day to day frustration.”

“I'm not doing anything, and yet I'm also doing the most important thing a man can do: I'm listening to what I needed to hear from myself.”

“True wisdom consists in respecting the simple things we do”

“Just as your hand has the power to hide the sun, mediocrity has the power to hide your inner light. Do not blame others for your own incompetence.”

“When we can do nothing else, we can still love, without expecting any reward or change or gratitude.”

“Even If you're doing the same thing over & over, U need to discover something new, fantastic & unbelievable that went unnoticed the time before.”

“Why are we smiling when we loathe each other?’ ‘Why do we sell happiness to the readers of this magazine when we are profoundly unhappy ourselves, the slaves of fame?”

“Our life is a constant journey, from birth to death. The landscape changes, the people change, our needs change, but the train keeps moving. Life is the train, not the station. And what you’re doing now isn’t traveling, it’s just changing countries, which is completely different”

“We learn in the past, but we are not the result of that. We suffered in the past, loved in the past, cried and laughed in the past, but that’s of no use to the present. The present has its challenges, its good and bad side. We can neither blame nor be grateful to the past for what is happening now. Each new experience of love has nothing whatsoever to do with past experiences. It’s always new.”

“In magic—and in life—there is only the present moment, the now. You can’t measure time the way you measure the distance between two points. “Time” doesn’t pass. We human beings have enormous difficulty in focusing on the present; we’re always thinking about what we did, about how we could have done it better, about the consequences of our actions, and about why we didn’t act as we should have. Or else we think about the future, about what we’re going to do tomorrow, what precautions we should take, what dangers await us around the next corner, how to avoid what we don’t want and how to get what we have always dreamed of.”

“That’s the problem, we do get used to things.”

“What did I do to deserve this?”

“What we aim to do is calm the spirit and get in touch with the source from which everything comes, removing any trace of malice or egotism. If you spend too much time trying to find out what is good or bad about someone else, you’ll forget your own soul and end up exhausted and defeated by the energy you have wasted in judging others.”

“Stay close to those who are by your side in happy times, because they do not harbour jealousy or envy in their hearts, only joy to see you happy.”