“And what went wrong when other alchemists tried to make gold and were unable to do so?”
“They were only looking for gold,” his companion answered. “They were seeking the treasure of their Personal Legend, without wanting actually to live out the Personal Legend.”
Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist is a tale of a journey. It is one of those philosophical novels that skips along lightly through the philosophy as we watch Our Hero discover the Meaning of Life. Minor characters come and go, each leaving their footprints in the sand, pointing the way to Discovery. Books like this are legion; there are enough of them that they probably even have a genre name, but (alas) I have no idea what it is. It’s not exactly a bildungsroman, but it is like a cousin of that genre.
Within this Yet-To-Be-Named Genre, The Alchemist is pretty good. The story is charming. Santiago, the hero, is a Spanish shepherd, who has a dream and embarks on a journey to find his treasure at the Great Pyramids. He is a persistent lad, overcoming obstacles and finding friends with his winning manner. It is, in other words, a perfect graduation gift.
But, it isn’t the book itself that intrigues me right now. It is the story of how I came to be reading this book right now.
The Great Coronavirus Semester just ended. Before the college shutdown, I had a class in which we just read books and got together to talk about them. When everyone went home, I told the students to just read a book and send me their thoughts about it. Seemed like a good way to finish off a class which was really never anything more than that in the first place.
There was a student in the class whom I had never met before the start of the semester. Great student who obviously loved reading books and talking about them. Exactly the sort of student with whom I always enjoy conversations. She’ll do well in life. A few weeks after the shutdown, she sent me her reflections on the book she read, which was (surprise plot twist) The Alchemist.
Now this novel has been on my “I should probably get around to reading it” list forever (well, technically not “forever” since the book was only published in the early 90s). So when I saw my student had just written a long reflection on it, I figured this was as good a time as any to read it.
The student’s reflections were fascinating. The story of the novel wove right into the story of her life and it all ended on a remarkably hopeful note looking at the future with determination. This student just graduated and is off on her journey to fulfill her Personal Legend. I have high hopes for her.
But, reading the novel and thinking about what my former student wrote about the novel led, naturally enough to thinking about my own Personal Legend.
The boy didn’t know what a person’s “Personal Legend” was.
“It’s what you have always wanted to accomplish. Everyone, when they are young, knows what their Personal Legend is.
“At that point in their lives, everything is clear and everything is possible. They are not afraid to dream, and to yearn for everything they would like to see happen to them in their lives. But, as time passes, a mysterious force begins to convince them that it will be impossible for them to realize their Personal Legend.”
So, what is mine? What is it I wanted to accomplish in life? Well, first, and presumably most obviously, build a life with the Long Suffering Wife of Your Humble Narrator and raise kids of whom we could both be proud. Check!
But then there is also this: to learn and to know and to pass on that learning and knowing to others.
My Personal Legend is to lead a life in books. But that life in books comes from interactions with my students. They inspire me to read more books and then I do everything I can to pass the inspiration back to other students.
The Alchemist turned into the metaphor of my Personal Legend. I taught a seminar that inspired a student to realize that reading books and thinking about her life was a marvelous way to live. She read this book, and wrote about how the book had become part of the warp and woof of her life. That inspired me to read the book and I realized how much the book was showing that my Personal Legend made me one of the minor characters in the lives of my students, helping them to set out on the journey of their Personal Legends. And, it is not the goal that is important, it is the journey. You can’t reach the goal of your Personal Legend without the journey of your Personal Legend.
And so, I read books. And I talk with my students about those books. And now I talk with you, Dear Reader, about these books.
At this time of Graduations, The Alchemist teaches this message: Don’t just think about the goals of your life. Don’t just want to have the gold you made. Remember that your Personal Legend is not the goal, it is the journey to the goal. That journey is happening even today. Today, you can take one step in the journey of your Personal Legend. Just one step. Not a big step. Not the overwhelming leap over the chasm that is in the way. Just one small step. The journey matters. The journey, after all, is your life.