6 lessons the past 6 months reminded me... (part 3 of 5)

Lesson #4: Success on your own terms

Disclaimer: I highly suggest you start here (part 1 of this article series) or there (part 2). But you can as well finish reading this one first. They are independent but inter-related contents, so reading the whole series will give a better picture. Enjoy!

Ever read ??The Alchemist?? by Paolo Coelho ?

If yes, then you can keep rolling through your feed and move on. You get a picture of what I’m gonna talk about.

?If not, I highly suggest you get a copy of that book asap, and dive into it till the end. Or wait for the movie-to-come (for which Will Smith has recently acquired the rights from Coelho)???

?Anyway, the reason I’m sharing about it is that after almost 2 years where I’ve been coaching entrepreneurs from around the globe, corporate executives from MNCs in Europe or Asia, as well as leaders from IGOs in the US or Africa, I noticed something interesting :

???Any of my coaching clients to whom I recommend to read that book, always end up completely transformed in their own unique way, whether they were reading for the first time or the tenth??

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Just to refresh it in your mind, Here is the plot (Source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Alchemist_(novel))?:

???An?Andalusian?shepherd boy named Santiago consults a?Gypsy?fortune-teller?about the meaning of a?recurring dream. The woman interprets it as a prophetic, telling the boy that he will discover a treasure at the?Egyptian pyramids.

After Santiago sets out, he meets an old king named?Melchizedek, or the king of Salem, who tells him to sell his sheep so as to travel to Egypt and accomplish his 'Personal Legend'. Early on his arrival in Africa, a man who claims to be able to take Santiago to the pyramids robs him instead of the money he had made from his flock. Santiago then has to work for a?crystal?merchant so to earn enough to get to the pyramids.

Along the way, the boy meets an Englishman who has come in search of an alchemist and continues his travels with his new companion. When they reach an oasis, Santiago meets and falls in love with an Arabian girl named Fatima, to whom he proposes marriage. She promises to marry him only after he completes his journey. Frustrated at first, he later learns that true love will not stop nor must one sacrifice one's destiny to it, since to do so robs it of truth.

The boy then encounters a wise alchemist, who teaches him to realize his true self. Together, they risk a journey through the territory of warring tribes, where Santiago is forced to demonstrate his oneness with "the soul of the world" by turning himself into a?dust storm?before he is allowed to proceed. When he begins digging within sight of the pyramids, he is robbed yet again, but accidentally learns from the leader of the thieves that the treasure he sought was all along in the ruined church where he had his original dream.??

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Insights time?: So, what does it have to do with the idea of success on your own terms??

?After another one of my many readings of the book over the past 5 years since I first did, I took note of some keyy bullet points which I always return to when needing clarity in the middle of a bottleneck. Hoping you’ll get (reminded) some 4 insights for yourself (out of tons of others)?:

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1.??No one but yourself can know what success look like for you

You have to find it out for yourself, or even better – you have to create it for yourself. There is no size fits all here. And if you believe so, you might probably end up as 95% of human beings on the planet who never truly live for themselves, and only realize it on their deathbeds (check the book – and articles about ??The top 5 regrets of the dying?? for more details on this).

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2.??Trust the process, and play full out.

One foot in, one foot out won’t make it. Eventually it may even hurt you by keeping your mind – heart – soul teared apart. The idea is to align them and pay full out.

However, truth be told?: it’s a process of discovering what is the next thing calling your soul, and the next sign in your ??desert??, and the next direction from the right person. That requires to decode communications from the ??soul of the world?? as Coelho puts it. The tricky part is to learn to identify what is being pushed on you by the outside world (mostly programming from your culturescape), and what your soul/ higher self/ inner being is truly yearning for.

A good balance of studying great teachers of human past and/or contemporary history, learning some tools and techniques, and most importantly the grace from divine / universal guidance to tune into the signs from higher perceptions.

So, it’s more a dance with?the source of your creation. The complete title of this article would be?: ??success on your own terms, in alignment with the universal timeless unconditional laws of this world, valid accross all space, time, community, creed, religion, beliefs, or other?human-created categorization ?

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3.??All is one, and one is all.

Failure is hidden success. And success is just on the other side of failure. Embrace the pain or disappointments along the way, and learn to turn them into useful assets for future situations.

Someone who seems like an ennemy, might be your best ally/ teacher. And someone who appears like a friend (but reveals not to be one) might be a source of lesson on how to associate with the right people in the future, or show you the value of self-love so you can better enjoy future relationships.

But ultimately. Everything you meet along the way of accomplishing your personal legends, ends up contributing to you achieving it, and really enjoying hthe whole journey in the end

And, what matters in the end is not even the treasure discovered. It’s something else.

4.??At the end of the day, the treasure has always been hidden where you started

Success is never out there. Pursuing it out there the way most of culturescape is programming you to do since childhood to marketplace guru, including school and various social institutions.

The truth is?: whatever success is achieved out there has first to be clear from the beginning. That is why achieving that success is allegorically described as coming back at the beginning of the journey. So, it is more than crucial to start with a clear vision since the beginning, and trut the Universe/ God / Source of Creation that the way will be made for you to get there, no matter how challenging the journey may appear.

Plus, ?at the end of the journey, you have a double treasure?: one is the dream you started with, and the most important is the person you have become, the adventures you’ve lived, the unforgettable memories you’ve created for yourself and all the people you met, in fact those encounters as well, and finally the incredible stories you will tell your kids, grandkids, and eventually the other people who are waiting to see a visible proof of possibility before finally gathering the courage to believe and get on the way towards their own personal legend.

In conclusion

The beauty of all this?? After this first treasure found, You now know the process of manifesting your heart’s desires. Ypu can’t forget it anymore and can from that point go for bigger and bolder dreams. And what is more beautiful than that??

You have a lifetime to fulfill them, and a limitless universe/ God/ Source of creation to support you along that journey.

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All the best. And stay blessed?!

#health #innerpeace #joy #love #compassion #abundance #alchemist #personallegend