Below is the current recommended reading from Reeves & Associates. Please feel free to submit your recommendations and comments to us so we can see what you are reading.

The Alchemist
by Paulo Coelho, Author;
Reviewed by Bruce Harris, Associate

Every now and then, staff at Reeves and Associates reaches back into the past to reread a book that oozes with adventure and inspiration. This time we turned to Paulo Coelho’s book the The Alchemist. The Alchemist is an old, but beautiful, fable involving an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who abandons all to follow his dream. Ironically, the shepherd boy’s name is only used once in the entire book, lending the mantle of “everyman” to his character. Santiago, although a shepherd boy, represents us all because, like all of us, he has a dream. Unlike many of us, however, he decides to follow his dream and, therein, lies the tale.

Santiago must give up the comfort of all that he knows in order to pursue his dream - something that many are not willing to do. Coelho masterfully draws the reader into Santiago’s courageous choices, leaving each contemplating his or her own decision to follow his or her dreams. Santiago consults with a fortune-telling gypsy and a king, who both advise him to go in pursuit of his dream. The king informed him, “To realize one’s destiny is a person’s only obligation. All things are one. And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

Santiago’s dream of finding a treasure leads him to Egypt. He must travel from Spain through Africa, across the desert to the Pyramids. Coelho seems to tell us that the person who does not follow his dream denies himself the possibility to see God. In fact, Coelho maintains that, “Every happy person carries God within him.” Further, he suggests that those who do not have the courage to follow their “Personal Legend” are doomed to a life of emptiness, misery, and unfulfillment. The great obstacle to happiness is the fear of failure.

The opportunity for personal interpretation and reflection abound in this tale. For example, who is the true Alchemist? Is the symbolism of alchemy and its language a parallel to the search for God while searching for the elixir of life and the philosopher’s stone? Have we not all had comparable challenges, as did Santiago on his search for his treasure? Can we not reflect upon having chance encounters and how we handled them, whether accepting and learning from them, or dismissing them?

Santiago’s journey to fulfillment takes him through encounters with the gypsy, a king, a merchant, a thief, an Englishman, his true love, and an alchemist. Each of us has met similar, if not the same, characters during our life’s search for our personal goal. We have all witnessed the circle of life, have been exposed to the “Soul of the World”, and have also experienced the “Language of the World”. We have each had the opportunity to learn the “language of the desert and the wind” to help us through our most severe challenges and adversity. The sum total of how we have handled these things is, indeed, our personal legend.

This enchanting fable about life’s journey, both physical and spiritual, teaches us to trust our heart, to listen to our dreams, to read the world for signs of God, to take advantage of “coincidence” and luck, and to accept that love changes and improves the Soul of the World.