Recently I finished reading Paulo Coelho’s book The Alchemist. The story follows Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy on his journey across North Africa pursuing his “Personal Legend” after he dreams of finding treasure at the Egyptian Pyramids. The book is superbly written (and translated; originally written in Portuguese), not too long and packed full of insightful and thought provoking character interactions.

The main themes explored in the novel are the concepts of omens, listening to your heart and following the path carved out for you by the universe. To many the idea of destiny is a tough sell and discussion on whether fate is legitimate or not has been long disputed. Personally, I love to humour the idea of its legitimacy and found the way it was framed within the book really engaging.

Maktub

“It is written” is the provided translation for the Arabic word Maktub in the book, implying that all happenings in life are dictated by the same hand; the same essential force responsible for all of existence. Whether or not you believe in a deity of some variety, it’s hard to argue against the idea that all things are intrinsically linked and part of the same overarching system. The phenomenon of existence blows my mind on a regular basis because so many variables have to come together in some sort of harmonic unison for any of it to be possible. I could go on a tangent about my thoughts on relativity, but I’ll try to save it for another post.

Because of the insane complexity of this phenomenal existence machine, I can’t help but feel like there has to be some sort of artistic rhythm and natural ebb & flow of each component within it. Without each part of a system working in the way they are supposed to, the system at large could not sustain itself, it wouldn’t exist. Like any machine, intended behaviour of the whole requires intended behaviour of its parts. If each part has an intended behaviour, does that imply the existence of fate?

Language of the World

Early in the book, omens are established as a pivotal mechanism that drive Santiago’s progress on discovering his Personal Legend. Throughout his journey, the universe is in constant communication with him through subtle hints and markers that he is on the right path. As the story progresses Santiago meets The Alchemist, who ends up teaching him the “Language of the World”, a universal form of communication shared by all things — humans, animals, the desert, the wind and the sun. Through interpretation of this language, Santiago is able to eventually find his treasure and realise his initial dream.

I can’t help but subscribe to the power of listening to omens, sometimes it’s unbelievably uncanny how acting on a omen ended up panning out for my life and my own journey towards my Personal Legend. Learning the language of the world is described in the book as listening to your heart, or in other words, your intuition, your gut feel.

On my own path there have been many crossroads, in my career, relationships and hobbies, where I was faced with a decision and some unspeakable force felt like it was giving me a nudge to a certain direction and all I had to do was say fuck it, and send it into the direction that was calling. So far, all of these decisions have coalesced into something that I would consider a beautiful life. Some of these decisions were difficult, many of them in fact, but thats the thing; following your Personal Legend often leads you to be tested.

I’ll wrap up with an example of a recent omen I followed. I was gifted a nice enthusiast coffee grinder for my birthday only a month ago, and the other week after waking up in a real stinky mood I went to make myself a coffee. I switch on the grinder and immediately it internally short-circuited and fried it’s control board. After work that day, still not doing well, I went on a stroll to smoke a joint and relax. After making it a whole 100m up the street, my joint fissled out and when trying to re-light, my lighters flint ran out as well. I took this as a double whammy omen that led me to create the Dopamine Detox pact with my partner, just to take a breather and reset. I don’t know what fruit this path will bear, but so far it’s turned out this pretty neat blog that you’re reading!

So yeah, listen to the universe, it’s quite chatty when you tune in and it seems to know a thing or two.

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