Although The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho is a work of fiction, it is beloved by entrepreneurs because it is about following your dreams. Here are my twelve favorite passages from the book.
- “If I became a monster today, and decided to kill them, one by one, they would become aware only after most of the flock had been slaughtered, thought the boy. They trust me, and they’ve forgotten how to rely on their own instincts, because I lead them to nourishment.”
- “they don’t even realize that they’re walking a new road every day. They don’t see that the fields are new and the seasons change. All they think about is food and water.”
- “It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting”
- “at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie.”
- “The boy didn’t know what a person’s ‘Personal Legend’ was. ‘It’s what you have always wanted to accomplish. Everyone, when they are young, knows what their Personal Legend is.'”
- “people are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dream of.”
- “If you start out by promising what you don’t even have yet, you’ll lose your desire to work toward getting it.”
- “when each day is the same as the next, it’s because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises.”
- “When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that will carry him to places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision.”
- “You must love the desert, but never trust it completely. Because the desert tests all men: it challenges every step, and kills those who become distracted.”
- “There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”
- “people need not fear the unknown if they are capable of achieving what they need and want.”
Disclosure: Links to Amazon.com are affiliate links. That means I get a few pennies if you choose to buy the book using my links.