Quit Pit
Paulo Coelho’s parents forbade him from writing still he refused to conform and wrote in secret.
When he was 17, his parents committed him to a mental asylum. he escaped three times. Don’t quit in the pit. Paulo Coelho spent his 20s and 30s living life like a hippie and wandering the world aimlessly.
At nearly 40 years old, he wrote his first book. A year later, he wrote the Alchemist in only two weeks, an inspirational story. The book flopped. Even it seems that he had no success and he was crushed but still not ready to give up. Paulo started knocking on doors begging for people to read his book.
And then…
It happened, just like in the book.
He found a publisher ready to take a chance on him. The publisher couldn’t explain why he said yes…
It was just an intuition. Today, 65 million copies of “The Alchemist” have been sold worldwide. Paulo holds the Guinness World Record for having the most translated books.
He’s impacted over 150 million people and publishes at least one novel every 2 years. Whenever Paulo travels, he continues to find beauty in the world and the people within it and has even reconciled with his parents.
Paulo Coelho connected the dots of his struggle to create his own meaning.
