Your Space in my Blog: 12th of February 2009

by Paulo Coelho on February 12, 2009

This space is for you to share your ideas on anything that you consider relevant today.

You can publish here excerpts from your blogs or news and articles in general that you think make a difference to the world today. Try to make a bit of editing on what you post here – try to highlight passages with copy-paste, rather than simply giving links.

Please keep in mind that this blog is currently viewed by 230.000 unique visitors a month, and chances are that many of them are going to read your thoughts.

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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }

Liina L. February 14, 2009 at 10:59 pm

The following is a short story I wrote when I was years younger, around 18-years old I think. At that time I was starting to find myself and starting to believe in the choice of love. It cointains a bit bitterness, but concidering it was an earlier ‘work’, please, don’t criticize it too much. :)

It’s about a youngster who’s a bit shy and unsure about themselves, maybe is a bit afraid of being secluded from other people, but is trying to find the hope of love, and pursue love in forecoming life. Has a bit of symbolics in it aswell…

Here is the story:

Blue Eyes.
(translated from estonian)

Yes. Again I cower on the ground. I feel, that some kind of a fear is covering my soul. Just like on the first schoolday: You feel, that you have to be very quiet and decent. So I am. Just like the last time I look around with my hungry eyes. They feed fastly of the surrounding. What ever would I do, if I was to be blind?
I would immidiately starve and I would fade away quietly. Noone would notice me and they would probably forget me to rotten in the corner, as some old forgotten doll.

I’m sitting on the ground and thinking, why did I come. I don’t have thoughts, neither words, and even if I did, I wouldn’t dare to say them out loud. At least not to You. I am just sitting and waiting the nonexistent, just like an orphan, who is waiting for their parents to rescue them. I am sitting and waiting, and something is bothering me. This bottle, why the heck did I have to buy it? I take a sip, but it doesn’t calm me. I take another more and I look in front of me. I leere and I squint my eyes like a fool. Is it really You? You come quietly, almost like flying towards me. You come and you goggle at me. I shyly turn my glance and I feel it, how I get warm inside.

I boil like lava inside and my hands have no rest, they pick on the dimmed brim of my skirt. You come closer and squat. Yes, You have the same serious look on Your face, just like when You do when You are itending to do something. You reach out Your arm “Let’s go!’ and You pull me up…

The sky is pinky and the sun is drowning itself behind the woods. The trees are silent and the grass is not moving. Only butterflies. There are so many of them and they are striking around with their pretty wings. They are flying high in the evening glimmer, making a circle there and when getting tired, landing themselves on a beautiful blossom, opening their wings. But we don’t notice it at all. We are walking, we are going behind the woods with the sun, where the happines waits for us.

~*~*~*~

Sometimes it amazes me, whatever comes in life, sure, we shift, we grow, we mature… but the main things we have been hoping for while when we were kids, we are still pursuing. Love is always something I’ll pursue. I won’t ever give up on that.

Much love from Estonia,
L.L.

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marie-christine February 13, 2009 at 11:59 am

Tell me a little bit more about your trip Jane
Well, Tarzan, I took a big bird , they call it a plane
Tarzan -Yes?
Jane- It was a long trip and they let us in through the front door,
and we are greeted by people that help you to put your hand-luggage away.
Mine was easy -it consisted of a piece of cloth with a few bits and pieces-
I sat at the front and was told “NO NO NO” I did not understand what was going on, so I went into the next room ,they looked very agitated, arms up in the air, saying “NO NO NO”, and the more I got inside the big bird, the seats got smaller and smaller.
Tarzan – Really?
Jane -The flight was agonizing, it was so cramped, my legs ached and I could not move as I was sitting in the middle between two other people.
Tarzan – you must have had “small space syndrome”, then Jane?.
Jane- Yes, one of the passenger was saying how his cousin had a thrombosis after a long flight.
Tarzan- What is that?
Jane – It is a clot of coagulated blood that stops the blood from flowing .
The cousin tried to get compensation from the airlines and no one wants to hear anything about that.
Tarzan – Why don’t they make the seats bigger?
Jane – I am not sure, they have a class system, the first , business and economy.
Tarzan – what is the difference?
Jane- the first class gets the bigger seats – whether they are big or small – the business smaller one, and the economy big rows of tiny seats they also put a curtain in between rooms. Secret business.
Tarzan- It is so foreign to our way,Jane, here everybody is treated the same.I am so glad we have the forest, the animals , the trees and the plants.
Jane- Not for much longer, Tarzan – I had a big bird’s eyeview from up there – it is disappearing at an alarming rate.

Tarzan -Come on Jane, let’s go and have a swim while we can ‘EEEEE IIIII OOOO ” ‘

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Clara Z February 13, 2009 at 11:42 am

Do yu believe in coincidence, sign or unexpected things that happen maybe for you to open up a little more?
Yestarday I wanted to post something that I wanted to do for long time but, due to my lack of confidence, I always postpone it.Is something close to my heart, so I found the courage and I did it, unfortunatly for some reason I could not write it in this one so I did it in the 9 february space blog.
In the evening, while I was browsing in the internet I saw the news about the subject I wrote about,so I read it all. This morning, not sure if I’ve posted the correct link or if you could log in, I went in the Nas site and found by coincidence the trail of an Australian movie about the story of the subject I wrote about, the movie is called “The Black Balloon” Was it meant to be for me to post it yestarday? I would like to post it here but I don’t know how to copy-paste. I would be grateful if you could read it.
One more coincidence,the movie won many awards, and, one in 2008 in Berlin Festival…
Thank you

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Amitabh February 13, 2009 at 4:10 am

First I would like to thank you for this opportunity.
Here is my contribution for this free for all …

This is from my blog hopefully you will enjoy it.
*******

I am context man! I find solace in setting up events in their context. And though The Black Swan has done its best to destroy my confidence in context (“narrative fallacies”), I still find taking decisions easier when context is clearer.

Let me try to explain what I mean by context. This is my favourite.

Suppose you have just arrived at a village and you hear that a boy has been killed by a wild animal. The most horrific thing is that none of the villagers rushed to rescue of the boy. What would be your reaction? Outrage? Small boy done to death because of apathy on part of the villagers. But then you rationalize. Perhaps the animal was big, leopard or tiger. It wouldn’t have helped even if the villagers had tried. But then you hear it was just a wolf. Now you are angry. This is not on. You curse the villagers silently.

But being a “contextual person” you dig deeper. You find that the boy was naughty and like to play pranks. Just to entertain himself, he used to cry out wolf. The villagers would rush to his rescue every time just to see him laughing his head off and their consternation when they would find there was no wolf. He had done so twice before and this time the villagers thought he was pulling a fast one once again.

Yes, dear readers, this is the old “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” story. Twisted around. You begin to understand more when the context is clear.

The problem with our education is that we are presented with narration that flow naturally – from the beginning to the end. As a result we are not trained to see beyond. What is presented is fact. And that’s that. It is a helpful device to teach morals to a child, but awful device to teach us to think.

Unfortunately life is much more complicated and in many cases the reverse trace leads to a beginning that suits the narrator the most. In fact, you could end up with more than one narration depending on who is telling you the story.

Decisions based on context could be wrong or right. But decisions based on snapshots can never be right (Now don’t quote me Blink!)

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Gary Severance February 13, 2009 at 1:33 am

I believe the talent of a novelist to provide insight and opportunities for catharsis for readers is an amazing gift. It is offered with no clear expectation of emotional return for the writer.

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Nancy February 12, 2009 at 10:13 pm

A lot of people want change in the world. But I think most people around the world, most likely not readers from this blog, are not reaching for the Change that will bring about true peace. The change that will bring true peace will occur when people are looking to become a better human being – working on oneself so that one can help another. Right now I think when people say they want a better life they do not mean changing themselves. What most people are saying is they wish people around them to change, so that their life becomes better while they remain the same.

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Leaf February 12, 2009 at 8:10 pm

Artist

The artist sat alone, knowing full well that no-one is really alone.
Rain drizzled cold and grey. The garden, where the artist sat, becoming more and more soaked. A bedraggled blackbird sat on the fence and shook now and again to get rid of the wet.
The artist adjusted the peaked cap on his head and turned up his collar.
‘You don’t have to sit out here getting wet, looking like a lunatic’ his inner voice chided.
‘I know I don’t. And anyone who thinks I look like a lunatic can go find his own business to worry about.’

The artist lit a cigarette and looked around, as if surveying the work which needed doing in the garden, though not; he was just looking.
Always looking for something, he thought.
Sometimes finding something, sometimes losing something, always looking for something, sometimes not finding anything.
Searching.

Blades of grass and wild leaves became heavily laden with water droplets.
Catch the light just right and it would look like an huge, diamond encrusted palace. All the little elves and goblins would come out with their picks to raid the place and run away with the jewels…..probably go to Los Angeles and sell them as teeth to the celebrities.

Cynicism.

The artist rose from the bench, picked up a sturdy stick, took three or four paces and stuck the stick in the ground. Then found another stick and placed it some distance in line with the first.
A new studio.
The builders would be coming tomorrow to lay the foundations.
If the rain stops.

Optimistic.
A whole kettle of potential, boiling and bubbling away. Enough for seventeen cups of wild imagination and inspiration.
A new studio.
The artist had been sharing a studio in town, but it hadn’t been working out too well recently with the other artists and also, the artist felt he hadn’t been able to work as much as he’d like. Not being a nine-to-five kind of person, he found the arrangement awkward at times.

Sunshine.
The artist smiled at the clearing sky.
The blackbird gave one more shuffle of the feathers, warbled and flew off.
Sunshine. The rain had stopped.
The artist turned and went to the back door, wiped his boots on the mat and went inside.
Contrary – artists.
He boiled the kettle to make a cup of inspiration and lit another cigarette.
The phone rang.
Never really alone, thought the artist.

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thewolffather February 12, 2009 at 7:29 pm

I found an article today…

MOSCOW (AP) — The collision between U.S. and Russian communication satellites this week — the first such crash in space — has created speeding clouds of debris that threaten other unmanned spacecraft in nearby orbits, Russian officials and experts said Thursday.

I was thinking thank God it did not hit the Iranian satellite!

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Almost Insightful February 12, 2009 at 3:56 pm

THE DRIVING FORCES OF MY BASIC INSTINCTS

“[T]he consciousness of the manual workers is founded on their awareness of limited work opportunities which pushes them to strengthen their unions to gain control and ownership over existing and potential economic opportunities.”

When I read this, I thought of pragmatism and then an influx of noisy thoughts polluted my head. I am a believer of pragmatism (moral pragmatism? if there’s such) and when I read this sentence, I suddenly question the underlying driving force of my belief and how do I allow myself be driven by it.

If pragmatism is based on this kind of awareness which is of limited opportunities and that this is principally what pushes people, which includes me, to do the things that we are doing–studying, getting a stable job, if not the better job above the rest, expanding contacts, expanding knowledge, and feeding our basic instincts–then our tendency is to direct the motion of our lives almost solely to achieving economic stability. My questions revolve around how much such has become my driving force. Then I asked myself how much of my planning my life integrate my search for democratic participation in aggressively articulating and pursuing issues that are democratic and political in nature.

Then of course, the usual epiphany that comes to Filipinos–that the government is deliberately making people hungry and poor because only through that will they make the economic forces so strong that the people would not have much time to think of their power and potential to participate in issues.

By making economic stability the immediate, if not sole, need for survival, the government is diminishing the chances that people will think and act on national issues.

But the government is so wise that it will not let people go too hungry because when people are pushed to the walls, to their limits, that’s the only time they react. Very “The Day the Earth Stood Still”.

Make them hungry but not too much to make them fight YOU for food. Let them fight each other.

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Mary Schneider February 12, 2009 at 3:19 pm

(please fix my post? I “came” not “can” (more coffee Mary!)

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Mary Schneider February 12, 2009 at 3:18 pm

I came across an excerpt from “If Life is a Game, These are the Rules” that spoke to me today. Thank you for allowing me to share it with you…from Chapter 4 –

“Lessons will be repeated to you in various forms until you have learned them. When you have learned them, you can then go on to the next lesson.”

Wow. Today I “get it” and realize I should be grateful for every lesson I’m taught.

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Molly February 12, 2009 at 2:10 pm

The following isn’t anything we don’t already know. But I got it on a much deeper level recently.

I was able to observe my energy and how it reaches out and tries to wrap itself around another’s “dysfunction”, for lack of a better word, and fix it, change it. Or it could be something someone is talking about which is absolutely false. Or it could be someone excruciatingly overanalyzing a situation. I tend(ed) to take it on as my own burden to try and correct, fix. And it takes an immense amount of energy to do so. And usually it doesn’t feel good to me. Upon really close observation I see that it is my ego’s way of trying to correct things to fit my world view. To make it right. But we don’t all wear rose-colored glasses. In fact, I would venture to say that all of our glasses are slightly different shades of many different colors.

When appropriate, it is far simpler just to observe whatever reaction I might be having to what someone is saying or doing, than to step in and try and alter things in any way. It feels better. There is almost a sense of relief that comes with not needing to defend anything. Even though I still have the urge to do so. In silence there is immense freedom.

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Alexandra February 12, 2009 at 1:32 pm

I want to remember a romanian sports man,killed several days before,named Marian Cozma,may he rest in peace.He tried to deffend a girl attacked by some criminals .He was in an hungarian team,and now two nations are crying the lost of the good hearted brave giant.

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