Critical Thinking Journal #2

            Paulo Coelho is famously known for his top selling book, The Alchemist. The Alchemist sold a whopping one hundred million copies worldwide. Those who read The Alchemist may say that the book is life changing and has greatly inspired them; this is exactly what Coelho wanted readers to experience when they read his book. Coelho says that “the world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.” With this in mind, Coelho explains that a person can say all they want, but nothing will change around them unless they lead the way and do something in order to change something.

            Early on in his life, Coelho knew he wanted to be a writer. However, his parents discouraged him from becoming a writer because they believed Coelho wasn’t going to receive anything worthwild out of becoming one. Disobeying and not listening to Coelho, Coelho’s parents sent him to an asylum three times hoping that Coelho would change his mindset. It wasn’t till his late thirties that Coelho took the five hundred mile walk on the Road of Santiago de Compostela and began writing (Biography). Even though Coelho’s first book wasn’t a big success, his second book, The Alchemist, is what brought him to fame. While Coelho was in prison for composing lyrics that the government associated as being “dangerous," Coelho started to write his second book. Coelho wanted to prove to the world that he wasn’t the bad guy that everyone made him out to be. Following his quote, Coelho wrote about how he woke up and how he changed the world around him.

            Relating to Paulo Coelho’s quote, I experienced a situation that reflects his quote. Since I was a little girl, my mother used to tell me a similar quote. She said, “It’s better to show your friends the right way rather than telling them what’s wrong.” My freshman year of high school, I tried out for the softball team and made it. When games started, my coach would always yell at us for not doing the play correctly. As captain of the team, I stepped onto the field and showed the team the proper way of executing the play. It was in this instance that I changed the way the team played the rest of the season. From that point on, we rarely lost a game because the girls on the team saw that it was possible to execute the play correctly.

 

 

 

 

                                              Works Cited

Biography.com Editors. "Paulo Coelho Biography." Biography.com. A&E Television Networks, Web. 28 July 2016.

“Paulo Coelho." 2012. FamousAuthors.org 29 June, <http://www.famousauthors.org/paulo-coelho>