Manuscripts
7. The Copt believes only in the present moment and what he calls Moira—the unknown god, the Divine Energy, responsible for a single law, which, if ever broken, will bring about the end of the world.
8. “They can destroy the city, but they cannot destroy everything the city has taught us, which is why it is vital that this knowledge does not suffer the same fate as our walls, houses, and streets. But what is knowledge?”
When no one replied, he went on.
“It isn’t the absolute truth about life and death, but the things that helps us to live and confront the challenges of day-to-day life. IT isn’t what we learn from books, which serves only to fuel futile arguments about what happened or will happen; it is the knowledge that lives in the hearts of men and women of good will.”
9. “None of us know what tomorrow will hold, because each day has its good and its bad moments. So, when you ask your questions, forget about the troops outside and the fear inside. Our task is not to leave a record of what happened on this date for those who will inherit the Earth; history will take care of that. Therefore, we will speak about our daily lives, about the difficulties we have to face. That is all the future will be interested in, because I do not believe very much will change in the next thousand years.”
15. Does a lead, when it falls from the tree in winter, feel defeated by the cold?
16. In the cycle of nature there is no such thing as victory or defeat; there is only movement.
16. And within that cycle there are neither winners nor losers; there are only stages that must be gone through. When the human heart understands this, it is free and able to accept difficult times without being deceived by moments of glory.
17. And he will blame no one for what is happening to him. Ever since he fell in love for the first time and was rejected, he has known that this did not put an end to his ability to love. What is true in love is also true in war.
Losing a battle or losing everything we thought we possessed will bring us moments of sadness. But when those moments pass, we will discover the hidden strength that exists in each of us, a strength that will surprise us and increase our self-respect.
We will look around and say to ourselves: “I survived.” And we will be cheered by our words.
Only those who fail to recognize that inner strength will say, “I lost,” and be sad.
18. They try to work out what they did wrong and what they did right. They take advantage of this moment of defeat to rest, heal their wounds, devise new strategies and equip themselves better.
18. Their previous defeat means that this time they must win, because they don’t want to suffer the same pain again.
But if victory is not theirs this time, it will be the next time. And if not the next time, then the time after that. The important thing is to get back on your feet.
Only he who gives up is defeated. Everyone else is victorious.
And the day will come when those difficult moments are merely stories to be told proudly to those who will listen. And they will listen respectfully and learn three important things:
Wait patiently for the right moment to act.
Do not let the next opportunity slip by you.
Take pride in your scars.
…Scars speak more loudly than the sword that caused them.
23. Defeat comes when we fail to get something we very much want. Failure does not allow us to dream. Its motto is: “Expect nothing and you won’t be disappointed.”
Defeat ends when we launch into another battle. Failure has no end; it is a lifetime choice.
23. Only the defeated know Love. Because it is in the realm of Love that we fight our first battles—and generally lose.
25. And they promise themselves: “Tomorrow will be different.”
But tomorrow comes and the paralyzing question surfaces in their mind: “What if it doesn’t work out?”
And so they do nothing.
Woe to those who were never beaten! They will never be winners in this life.
29. Without solitude, Love will not stay long by your side.
29. Solitude is not the absence of Love, but its complement.
Solitude is not the absence of company, but the moment when our soul is free to speak to us and help us decide to do with our life.
Therefore, blessed are those who do not fear solitude, who are not afraid of their own company, who are not always desperately looking for something to do, something to amuse themselves with, something to judge.
If you are never alone, you cannot know yourself.
And if you do not know yourself, you will begin to fear the void.
But the void does not exist. A vast world lies hidden in our soul, waiting to be discovered. There it is, with all its strength intact, but it is so new and so powerful that we are afraid to acknowledge its existence.
The act of discovering who we are will force us to accept that we can go further than we think. And that frightens us.
30. Woe to those who prefer to spend their lives saying: “I never had any opportunities!”
Because with each day that passes, they will sink deeper into the well of their own limitations, and the time will come when they will lack the strength to climb out and rediscover the bright light shining through the opening above their head.
And blessed be those who say: “I’m not brave enough.”
Because they know that it is not someone else’s fault. And sooner or later, they will find the necessary faith to confront solitude and its mysteries.
31. For those who are not frightened by the solitude that reveals all mysteries, everything will have a different taste.
In solitude, they will discover the love that might otherwise have arrived unnoticed. In solitude, they will understand and respect the love that left them.
31. And those who are alone in this moment need never be frightened by the words of the devil: “You’re wasting your time.”
Or by the chief demon’s even more potent words: “No one cares about you.”
The Divine Energy is listening to us when we speak to other people, but also when we are still and silent and able to accept solitude as a blessing.
And in that moment, Its light illuminates everything around us and helps us to see that we are necessary, that our presence on Earth makes an immense difference to Its work.
And when we achieve that harmony, we receive more than we asked for.
33. Just as Love is the divine condition, so solitude is the human condition. And for those who understand the miracle of life, those who states peacefully coexist.
67. Like the sun, life spreads its light in all directions.
When we are born, we want everything at once and cannot control the energy we have been given.
But, if we want to make a fire, we have to focus all the sun’s rays on one spot.
…And there comes a moment when we need to focus that inner fire so that our life will have some meaning.
68. Finally, there are those who saw at once that the question (of meaning) was a trap; there is no answer.
Instead of wasting time grappling with that trap, they decide to act. They go back to their childhood and look for what filled them with enthusiasm then and—disregarding the advice of their elders—devote their life to it.
Because Enthusiasm is the Sacred Fire.
They slowly discover that their actions are linked to a mysterious impulse behind human knowledge. And they bow their heads as a sign of respect for that mystery and pray that they will not be diverted from a path they do not know, a path which they have chosen to travel because of the flame burning in their hearts.
They use their intuition when they can and resort to discipline when intuition fails them.
They seem quite mad. And sometimes they behave like mad people, but they are not mad. They have discovered true Love and Will.
And those two things reveal the goal and the direction that they should follow.
69. That is the beauty of the person who continues onward with enthusiasm and respect for the mystery of life as his only guide; his road is beautiful and his burden light.
70. He focuses not just on the goal to be reached, but on everything happening around him. He often has to stop because his strength fails him.
At such moments, Love appears and says: “You think you’re headed toward a specific point, but the whole justification for the goal’s existence lies in your love for it. Rest a little, but as soon as you can, get up and carry on. Because ever since your goal found out that you were traveling toward it, it has been running to meet you.”
76. We are used to thinking that what we give is the same as what we receive, but people who love expecting to be loved in return are wasting their time.
Love is an act of faith, not an exchange.
Contradictions are what make love grow. Conflicts are what allow love to remain by our side.
Life is too short for us to keep important words like “I love you” locked in our hearts.
But do not always expect to hear the same words back. We love because we need to love. Otherwise, love loses all meaning and the sun ceases to shine.
A rose dreams of enjoying the company of bees, but none appears. The sun asks:
“Aren’t you tired of waiting?”
“Yes,” answered the rose, “but if I close my petals, I will wither and die.”
And yet, even when Love does not appear, we remain open to its presence. Sometimes, when loneliness seems about to crush everything, the only way to resist is to keep on loving.
77. Tears speak for themselves. And when we feel that we have cried all we needed to cry, they still continue to flow. And just when we believe that our life is destined to be a long walk through the Vale of Sorrows, the tears suddenly vanish.
Because we managed to keep our heart open, despite the pain.
Because we realized that the person who left us did not take the sun with them or leave darkness in their place. They simply left, and with every farewell comes a hidden hope.
It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.
77. Out one true choice is to plunge into the mystery of that uncontrollable force. (love)
79. Because love is like the water that is transformed into a cloud; it’s lifted up into the heavens, where it can see everything from a distance, aware that one day it will have to return to Earth.
Because love is like a cloud that is transformed into rain; it is drawn down to the Earth, where it waters the fields.
Love is only a word, until we decide to let it possess us with all its force.
Love is only a word, until someone arrives to give it meaning.
Don’t give up. Remember, it’s always the last key on the key ring that opens the door.
83. No one can go back, but everyone can go forward.
And tomorrow, when the sun rises, all you have to say to yourselves is:
I am going to think of this day as the first day of my life.
84. I will look at everything and everyone as if for the first time, especially the small things that I have grown used to, quite forgetting the magic surrounding them. The desert sands, for example, which are moved by an energy I cannot understand—because I cannot see the wind. #beginnersmind
86. Since I am heading off into the future, I will be helped by the scuff marks left on my sandals from when I stumbled in the past.
86. Above my head exists a sky about which all humanity, over thousands of years, has woven a series of reasonable explanations.
Well, I will forget everything I learned about the stars, and they will be transformed once more into angels or children or whatever I feel like believing at that moment.
Time and life have given me plenty of logical explanations for everything, but my soul feeds on mysteries. I need mystery.
…I want to fill my life with fantasy again…
87. I will not complain about life, saying, “Everything’s always the same and I can do nothing to change it.” Because I am living this day as if it were my first and, while it lasts, I will discover things that I did not even know were there.
89. And if I’m alone in bed, I will go over to the window, look up at the sky, and feel certain that loneliness is a lie, because the Universe is there to keep me company.
And then I will have lived each hour of my day as if it were a constant surprise to me, to this “I” who was not created by my father or my mother or my school, but by everything I have experienced up until now, and which I suddenly forgot in order to discover it all anew.
And even if this is to be my last day on Earth, I will enjoy it to the fullest, because I will live it with the innocence of a child, as if I were doing everything for the first time.
94. It isn’t enough to imagine everything that might happen if we allowed ourselves to join not just our bodies, but our souls as well.
Let us plunge together, then, down the dangerous path of surrender. It may be dangerous, but it is the only path worth following.
94. Let us forget all that we are taught about how it is noble to give and humiliating to receive. For most people, generosity consists only in giving, and yet receiving is also an act of love. Allowing someone else to make us happy will make them happy, too.
95. Everything is permitted, if everything is accepted.
Sometimes love grows tires of speaking softly. Therefore, let it reveal itself in all its splendor, burning like the sun and destroying whole forests with its winds.
If one of the lovers surrenders completely, then the other will do the same, because embarrassment will have become curiosity, and curiosity leads us to explore all the things we did not know about ourselves.
96. Fearlessly open the secret box of your fantasies. One person’s courage will help the other person to be equally brave.
True lovers will be able to enter the garden of beauty without fear of being judged. They will no longer be two bodies and two souls meeting, but a single fountain out of which pours the true water of life.
96. And time will cease to exist, because in the land of pleasure born of true love, everything is infinite.