Paulo Coelho

Stories & Reflections

Jigsaw puzzle

Author: Paulo Coelho

During a trip I received a fax from my secretary.

“One glass brick was missing for the kitchen’s reform,” she wrote. “I am sending you the original project and what the mason will be doing in order to compensate the fault.”

On one side, there was the project my wife had designed: harmonious rows with an opening for ventilation.

On the other side, the project that solved the lack of the brick: a true jigsaw puzzle, where the glass squares were placed with no aesthetics whatsoever.

“Just buy the missing brick,” wrote my wife.

That was done and the original design was maintained. On that afternoon I kept thinking for a long time about it: how many times, because of a simple missing brick, we completely distort the original project of our lives!

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