That fateful Tuesday morning was two years ago. Todd is now 24 years old and
halfway through his teaching degree and has “never had this much fun in my life.”
He has been accepted into the honors Education program for next year. As he puts
it:
“I have found my purpose ... this is in fact exactly what I was supposed to be doing all along.”As for his parents, yes they were disappointed when he initially told them that
he didn’t want to be a lawyer, but they were way more disappointed by the fact that
Todd had been scared (to tell them) and unhappy for so long.
Have Faith
I believe you can make anything happen as long as you listen to your heart, do
the work, and give up your timeline. One of my favorite books is the international
best-seller The Alchemist. It’s one of the best-selling books of all time and has been
translated into 80 languages. I’ve recommended it for more than a decade, and as I
was writing this book, I bought myself a new copy to keep me inspired and
reminded that the “Whole universe conspires to help you when you follow your heart.”
When I cracked open the twenty-fifth anniversary edition, I was blown away by
a story in the forward of the book. I had no idea that when The Alchemist was first
published in Brazil, it failed. Miserably.
“When The Alchemist was first published twenty-five years ago in my native Brazil, no one noticed. A bookseller in the
northeast corner of the country told me that only one person purchased a copy the first week of its release. It took another
six months for the bookseller to unload a second copy—and that was to the same person who bought the first! And who
knows how long it took to sell the third.
By the end of the year, it was clear to everyone that The Alchemist wasn’t working. My original publisher decided
to cut me loose and cancelled our contract. They wiped their hands of the project and let me take the book with me. I was
forty-one and desperate.
But I never lost faith in the book or ever wavered in my vision. Why? Because it was me in there, all of me, heart
and soul. I was living my own metaphor. A man sets out on a journey, dreaming of a beautiful or magical place, in