By Paulo Coelho
A group of devils were trying to enter the soul of a holy man who lived near Cairo; they had already tempted him with Nubian women, Egyptian food, Libyan treasure, but nothing had worked.
One day, Satan passed and saw his servants’ efforts.
- You’re hopeless - said Satan. - You haven’t used the only technique no one can resist; I’ll teach you.
He went over to the holy man and whispered in his ear:
- Remember the priest who studied under you? He’s just been made Bishop of Alexandria.
Immediately, the holy man was filled with rage, and blasphemed against God’s injustice.
- The next time, use this temptation - said Satan to his subjects. - Men can resist almost everything, but they are always jealous of the victory of a fellow man.
Welcome to Share with Friends - Free Texts for a Free Internet
Why is that?
[Reply]
Dear Paul from Austria,
Thank you for the message and for remembering the …menu and drinks from Cyprus. So you understand. why we…. eat so much and I will be glad to welcome you to Cyprus again after….how many years?
LOVE,
THELMA
p.s. I will try to go to the link above.T.
[Reply]
I haven’t been checking your blog regularly but this is the exact kind of stories I love reading in your blog. So simple and so to the point. :)
Thank you!
[Reply]
My dear Thelma, well my privacy has blown to he wind… I wonder where it will carry me ;) http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2008/09/17/paulo-coelho-and-privacy-zero-60-seconds-for-peace/
I would love to enjoy a Mezzei?/Kebab/Commanderia/StPantelemon/Ouzo in Limmasol and & talk about the evacuation of Famagusta with you (& of course your husband) one day… it’s been a long time… Love, Paul
[Reply]
Dear Hildegarde, it’s important in the first instance to be honest with ourselves. I’m so glad that I waited with a reply… not knowing exactly then for whom your post was meant… I feel your anger, your pain… next time I walk… I’ll walk for you… Love, Paul
[Reply]
It also can be result of not following your own path and not taking responsability for yourself, but waiting that somebody else does it.
Anyway it is monster. I was enied and suffered much because of undeserved jealousy. My life was put in jeopardy because of it, and profesionaly I was almost distroyed.
Envy and jealousy is not part of my character, thankks Lord, and therefore my life is still on the bright side and will remain like that.
Love
Luce
I feel sorry for person who can not fight monsters within as it eats worse than any acid both sides.
[Reply]
I think that envy and jealousy have origin in posesivness
and egocentism in extreem.
[Reply]
You know, I really find jealous people irritating and this coming from someone who is nowhere near perfect. It makes people quite ugly.
I don’t really desire material things, and I’m very happy for people when they succeed in life. I cannot understand anyone who would begrudge that.
BUT…. I realised that I DO have a jealous side when it comes to my beloved nephew. I have helped to bring him up and I have to admit the green eyed monster comes out when his stepfather gets attention I don’t believe he deserves lol. I’m evil, evil I tell you.
Kathleen xxoo
[Reply]
Read Eckhart Tolles book “A new earth” for a while today and find some interesting on page 35 - 48 about the ego.
He has the same thinking as me in many ways :-)
We live in a world which mostly measures happiness with how much things you have.
How can you ever be happy if you always want more
then your neigbour?
Shouldn´t we be happy and grateful for the things we have instead for the moment?
Like a home with roof to live in, food for the day, a hug from your children etc.
I think that things can´t really belong to us, we just lend them for a moment in time.
We can´t compare us self with others, that will not lead
to any good.
Instead work hard towards your life purpose, and enjoy each day for what it has to give. Try to stay in the presence about tomorrow we don´t now nothing :-)
Love Jessica
[Reply]
Instead of trying to be holy,…live your life with your heart and fulfill your dreams by transforming to dust…
When I wrote this I was feeling angry…why I asked myself in the evening?
I found my answer and saw that what I wrote was a message for myself.
If you place yourself or any other on a pedestal, you will definitely fall because of the dedication that you give to your goal is not done out of love…otherwhise there wouldn’t be a pedestal…
it’s done with a force that is trying to destroy the other and so yourself too.
I fought a lot of times against forces who tried to destroy my way and mostly they won because I used a pedestal. Now I realise that any ego can destroy love…so I am the courage now to believe in my way without judgement although I still have to release some old patterns otherwhise I wouldn’t got angry after reading this story …and search the reason outside of me by judgement.
Love
Hildegarde
[Reply]
Many of us fail to notice what we do have… focusing rather on what we do not have hence, fostering a poverty mentality that keeps us enslaved to the world so many of us reject.
He/she might have power and prestige…. but we might have the freedom they crave to live our lives as dictated by our soul… and yet many of us fail to see that perhaps behind the power and prestige, or the money, or the looks… all things of this world… may be a man or a woman longing to be free to experience him or herself without the strings required to stay in or obtain power, or prestige, or the money or the looks….
When we start our day with gratitude….. gratitude for all we ‘possess’, for all we have… we see how abundant and rich our lives are and that we lack nothing.
We may not have what we want but we have what we need….
…..Peace of mind, serenity, a sense of belonging to something or someone greater than ourselves and our little world…. giving us the thrill to enjoy with the innocence of a child, a ray of sunshine kissing our cheek even if it is a cloudy day…. we keep the focus on ourselves… avoiding the trap of finding our worth by comparing ourselves to others or their achievements…or their possessions.
Love brings out the best in us. Love can be with us always and in ALL ways… if we choose to live in love, with love and within it.
[Reply]
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=pR240P9z5Zw
The aeroplane.
Have a nice day.
LOVE,
THELMA
[Reply]
My dearest Paul from Austria, thank you for ..’ breaking’ your ‘privacy codes’ just for me. I appreciate that, is means that you cosider me, Paulo Coelho and all of us here, your frieds. Imagine we are sitting in a …Bar near the sea in Limassol talking and Paulo Coelho is with us too.. [The drinks on me, this time, my dearest Annie. I hope you are better]
I was ‘teasing’ you above, so that I would make you come out of your shell and ..start talking!! I do it all the time and it ..works… My husband and daughters tease me that I can learn the story of the life of someone in … five minutes! I say, yes because I am honest, I feel love and people trust me.
I send my best wishes for your daughter for a ‘cloudless’ life and since her father is a ..’cloud dweller’ he will manage to drive …storms away! Or else, you may take an ..aeroplane [the Pilot] and show her the World from up there.. There is a song the ‘Aeroplane’ by Costas Xatzis, a gypsi, Greel singer, saying that all that give you pain and sorrow looking them from the heights, they are but just doll’s houses and the people ants..
LOVE,
THELMA
p.s. You have mentioned many time that you work hard and are tired. Take care of yourself too,
T.
[Reply]
I think that jealousy hangs out with fear -envy, greed .I think at some point in all our lives we have felt jealousy ..I understand that for most people they have what they have as they have worked hard and thats what God wants them to experience /for some it is their lesson ,and reward -we should be happy for people ,not judge .But !! in love this one gets alot of people when the heart is involved .Like Paul said -I do understand that about daughters ..its just being protective as a parent and wanting the best for your children - we must learn to trust them too and let them go a bit ..depending on age of course ..But in relationships it does not serve anybody ,just love -trust and be honest it clears things up straight away and then the person does not have to wonder or think all sorts of things -which is what happens in jealousy it grows and turns into a mountain out of a mole hill …Just remove it from the vocabulary like Paul said ..it is its own worst enemy …Love and Light Tania
[Reply]
So how is that for privacy zero dear Paulo…? ;) I will however not divulge anymore secrets about my daughter, for her own protection…
Love & privacy almost zero ;), good night xxx, Paul
[Reply]
Dearest Thelma, my tongue was in my cheek when I said that (of course you couldn’t see it ;) When my daughter falls in love, I will be both exuberantly happy for her & her Beau, but at the same time will have to cope with playing second fiddle thereafter…;) She’s just entered that wonderful age where both sides are tested to the maximum, but given her musical genius, she is so busy that we are all somehow protected from the standard avenges of puberty. She has received something from her upbringing which I could only have dreamed of as a boy… trust… and self sufficiency. I live for her… and would die for her if necessary… my greatest love of all… It’s a paradox I know, but somehow I find myself wishing her a life without the pain & the downfalls that I have endured, even though I know that these were vital for my, and just as important for her development. I cannot and dare not protect her from the lessons (no matter how cruel they may be) she has before her. I can only pray that God & the Universe is gentle with her…
I’m so tired today, must get some sleep, good night all,
Love, Paul
[Reply]
Maybe this holy man was being tested of his faith…As there is asaying here, He arrived to the fountain, but he didnt drink…
Love and Graditude
Annie
[Reply]
Dear Paul from Austria, I am asking you the question right now! Why do you think that ‘when a man expresses his love for your beloved daughter for the first time’, you may feel jealous?
Well, I may think differently, because fathers have a special bond with their daughters. When this happened with my children, I felt happy and relieved, because I know we have played our roles as parents doing our best and then, it is the time to let them free to try their wings and fly..
When my father died, I felt helpless and devastated, although I was married and had an eight -years -old daughter. I could not imagine myself living without him. So, I decided as a mother not to be very ‘protective’ and teach them to be able to stand on their own feet, to let them believe in themselves and find their Path. To have love around them is happiness and LOVE is freedom.
LOVE,
THELMA
p.s. How old is your daughter? Because I remember myself from the Kindergarten having boys expressing their love!!!
[Reply]
Instead of trying to be holy,…live your life with your heart and fulfill your dreams by transforming to dust…
Love
Hildegarde
[Reply]
I have experienced jealousy from both sides… I purport to have excluded the word from my vocabulary and practically from my heart… however ask me the question again when a man expresses his love for my beloved daughter for the first time… ;)
We all have the right to breath, to drink, to eat, to sleep… and last but certainly not least… to Love!
Love & be grateful for what “you” have, Paul
[Reply]
It was envy,and the man was wrong because not God did the wrong thing,but other men.Why he blasphemed God?And how did he know that for him was not awaiting a better chance? Sometimes the thing that we envy is one bad luck for the others and we see only the surface,not whats beyond.God knows alone whats the best thing for us,so we must trust him and have faith and patience.If one things not happens,there must be a good reason.
[Reply]
“always jealous of the victory of a fellow man”?
Devil likes a lot to use the world “always”. Maybe a comfort, for Its own ego.
Many times in my past I could be jealous about another’s overhang. And I did not. For the simple reason, that in that case I spend my time to ask why I did not succeed, rather than envying the other.
So I disagree; just for the “always”. Because I guess it happens sometimes, but surely not always.
[Reply]
Or..as seen with my own eyes.. all it takes to temp many holy men…is a pint of beer.
Yesterday, a Catholic priest was arrested for dealing cocaine in America. WHY…would he do that?
Isn’t i a contradiction to say ‘The temptation of what is just’? God is just, and wouldn’t tempt us, but call us?
[Reply]
I also agree, jealoussy is on of the hardest fealings to come
to grip with.
But I try to think that we ar all uninqe and have our own life purpose. The world wouldn´t be the same without just you.
You are important to the people around you, and you can contribute with your own special gift.
I think that we decide our life purpose before even coming
down to earth.
And I also believe that the people that sucess with their goal have practice, and hard work behind the success.
They don´t give up no matter what. So why be jealous?
That doesn´t lead to anything good.
Instead concentrate on your own life purpose or goal and
NEVER GIVE UP :-)
Love Jessica
[Reply]
Jealousy and envy, words with a similar meaning.
The monster with the Green eyes. Green is the colour of jealousy.
For me to be jealous shows an inferiority complex. It shows also that man wants to possess whatever his ‘brother’ has, something that for my opinion is impossible. In life always there will be others more beautiful, more talented, more…and more. So it is necessary to feel self-satisfied and walk our Path without .. comparisons.
Love and jealousy. I think that when you are in love, passion may blind you. I believe that this comes not from insecurity, but in that ‘magical state’, spell, we lose our obectivity. We then may be find ourselves trapped in jealousy. Passion [pathos] carries the meaning of pain. So Eros is involved with the fear of losing our beloved, inevitably. The ‘cure’ is to think logically, but eros and logic, do not coexist.
We all know the story of Othellos.
LOVE,
THELMA
[Reply]
Totally agree. Mastering our own ego is certainly the more difficult and interesting quest.
This is a degenerated version of love. As we are all desperate for love, we often confuse it with recognition. The ego devil loves it!
[Reply]