Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Illusions


Encouraged by the feedback about the insights taken from the book “The Alchemist”, I am now sharing a few thoughts on the book “Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah” by Richard Bach.  He is more popular for the book “Jonathan Livingston Seagull.

Again, it is not the story but the insights from the story that inspires me more. Just read for yourself.

  • Teaching is reminding others that they know just as well as you. You are all learners, doers, teachers.
  • Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself.  Being true to anyone else or anything else is impossible. 
  • The simplest questions are the most profound. Where were you born? Where is your home? Where are you going? What are you doing? - Think about these once in a while, and watch your answers Change.
  • You teach best what you most need to learn.
  • Your friends will know you better in the first minute you meet than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years.
  • The best way to avoid responsibility is to say, “I’ve got responsibilities.
  • You are led through your lifetime by the inner learning creature, the playful spiritual being that is your real self.
  • Don’t turn away from possible futures before you’re certain you don’t have anything to learn from them.
  • You’re always free to change your mind and choose a different future, or a different past.
  • There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts.
  • The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other’s life.
  • Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof.
  • Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they’re yours.  
  • A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed. It feels an impulsion... this is the place to go now. But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons.
  • You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it true.  You may have to work for it, however.
  • The world is your exercise-book, the pages on which you do your sums.  It is not reality, although you can express reality there if you wish. You are also free to write nonsense, or lies, or to tear the pages.
  • If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional characters are sometimes more real than people with bodies and heartbeats.
  • Your conscience is the measure of the honesty of your selfishness. Listen to it carefully.
  • Every person, all the events of your life are there because you have drawn them there.  What you choose to do with them is up to you.
  • The truth you speak has no past and no future. It is, and that’s all it needs to be.
  • Here is a test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: If you’re alive, it isn’t.
  • In order to live free and happily, you must sacrifice boredom. It is not always an easy sacrifice.
  • Don’t be dismayed at good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again. And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.
  • The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy.
  • What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.