If you haven’t read The Alchemist, one of the best-selling books of all time, then you’ll be in a minority. Written in 1988 in Portuguese, it has since been translated into 67 languages and will forever be on the reading list for those with a wanderlust heart. It also has some great quotes for solo travel. Below are a collection of my favourite quotes from The Alchemist.
“The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better.”
“Love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny.”
“The fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself, no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams.”
“To die tomorrow was no worse than dying on any other day. Every day was there to be lived or to mark one’s departure from this world.”
“Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place.”
“People are capable at any time in their lives, of doing what they dream of.”
“Never stop dreaming.”
“When a person really desires something, all the universe conspires to help that person to realize his dream.”
“The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight.”
“You must understand that love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny. If he abandons that pursuit, it’s because it wasn’t true love… the love that speaks the Language of the World.”
“Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.”
“Possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting”
“Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.”
“Every search begins with beginners luck. And every search ends with the victor being severely tested. The boy remembered an old proverb from his country. It said that the darkest hour of the night came just before the dawn.”
“When I have been truly searching for my treasure, I’ve discovered things along the way that I would have never seen had I not had the courage to try new things.”
“People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams because they feel that they don’t deserve them, or that they’ll be unable to achieve them.”
“At a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie.”
What’s your favourite quote from The Alchemist? Let us know below…
Amar was born and raised in England and embarked on an 11-country round-the-world gap year after graduation and then became well and truly hooked. The first gap year inspired a second, which ended up being a 23-country down-the-world trip from Canada to Antarctica. Since then, Amar has spent the last 14 years traveling the 7 continents.