Quotes from book
The Witch of Portobello

Name: The Witch of Portobello
Author: Paulo Coelho

Paulo CoelhoOriginal title A Bruxa de Portobello (Portuguese, 2006)

The Witch of Portobello is a fiction work by Brazilian writer Paulo Coelho published in 2006, about a woman born in Transylvania to a Romani mother in a gypsy tribe without wedlock. The central character is abandoned by her birth mother because the father was a foreigner and later adopted by a wealthy Lebanese couple.

“You are what you believe yourself to be.”

Paulo Coelho book The Witch of Portobello

Source: The Witch of Portobello (2007), p. 152.
Context: You are what you believe yourself to be.
Don't be like those people who believe in "positive thinking" and tell themselves that they're loved and strong and capable. You don't need to do that because you know it already. And when you doubt it — which happens, I think, quite often at this stage of evolution — do as I suggested. Instead of trying to prove that you're better than you think, just laugh. Laugh at your worries and insecurities. View your anxieties with humor. It will be difficult at first, but you'll gradually get used to it. Now go back and meet all those people who think you know everything. Convince yourself that they're right, because we all know everything, it's merely a question of believing.
Believe.

“Our body remains alive, yet sooner or later our soul will receive a mortal blow. The perfect crime--for we don't know who murdered our joy, what their motives were, or where the guilty parties are to be found.”

Paulo Coelho book The Witch of Portobello

Source: The Witch of Portobello

“In order for us to liberate the energy of our strength, our weakness must first have a chance to reveal itself.”

Paulo Coelho book The Witch of Portobello

Source: The Witch of Portobello

“Athena's great problem was that she was a woman of the twenty-second century living in the twenty-first, and making no secret of the fact, either. Did she pay a price? She certainly did. But she would have paid a still higher price if she had repressed her natural exuberance. She would have been bitter, frustrated, always concerned about "what other people might think," always saying, "I'll just sort these things out, then I'll devote myself to my dream," always complaining "that the conditions are never quite right."”

Paulo Coelho book The Witch of Portobello

Deidre O'Neill, known as Edda, p. 11.
The Witch of Portobello (2007)

“Laugh at your worries and insecurities. View your anxieties with humor. It will be difficult at first, but you'll gradually get used to it.”

Paulo Coelho book The Witch of Portobello

“Love simply is. That is the testament of Athena or Sherine or Hagia Sofia — love is. No definitions. Love and don't ask too many questions. Just love.”