Diletta

I'd like to meet:

Paulo Coelho
We can see our life as if it were a bicycle race.At the start, when we are still young, we all set off together, sharing friendship and enthusiasm. But as the race progresses, that initial happiness gives way to the real challenges – tiredness, boredom, doubts about our own abilities. We notice that a few friends have, in their hearts, already given up – they are still cycling, but only because they cannot stop in the middle of the road. There are more and more of them, pedalling along beside the support vehicle – also known as routine – talking among themselves, fulfilling their obligations, but oblivious to the beauties and challenges of the road. We eventually leave them behind us, and then we come face to face loneliness, with unfamiliar bends in the road and mechanical problems with our bicycle. We pass through dark forests and, there, anything can happen because they are peopled by the ghosts of our imagination. At a certain stage, after suffering a few falls with no one near at hand to help, we begin to ask our- selves if it is really worth all the effort. Yes, it is. It is just a question of not giving up. In order to overcome these obstacles and contribute to improving the state of the world, we need four invisible forces – love, saviours of the fatherland death, power and time. We must love because we ourselves are loved – even though our loneliness often makes us believe the opposite. We must have an awareness of death in order to understand life fully. We must struggle in order to grow, but without allowing ourselves to be deceived by the power that is gained through that struggle because we know that such power is worthless. Finally, we must accept that our life – regardless of whether or not we believe in the paradise that follows – is at this moment caught in the web of time, with all its opportunities and limitations. Therefore, in our solitary bicycle race, we must behave as if time existed and do everything we can to value each second, to rest when necessary, but to keep going in the direction we have chosen. These four forces cannot be treated as problems to be solved, because they are beyond our control. We must accept them and let them teach us what we need to learn. We live in a universe that is at once vast enough to frighten us and small enough for us to believe that we have everything under control. As we pedal towards our goal, we must make a point of asking ourselves, “What is different about today?” The sun might be shining but, if it happens to be raining, always remember that all this means is that the dark clouds will soon have disappeared. The clouds disappear, the sun remains the same and never goes away. In moments of loneliness it is important to remember that. As we return to the simple truths that exist in us, we distance ourselves from the collective hysteria and can intervene realistically in the worlds around us. At some point tragedy crosses the path of every human being – it might be the destruction of a city, the death of a child, a baseless accusation or an illness that appears without warning and brings with it permanent disability. Sometimes we inherit tragedies that belonged to previous generations. Meanwhile we have love, death, power and time, which will help us to maintain our serenity the next time a man walks along the road through our village, be he crying or laughing. If we are confronted by a genuine problem, the newspapers will not be able to convince us otherwise. If it is just another case of someone peeling onions, the saviours of the fatherland and civilization will not be able to go off and commit crimes in our name. For it is always good to remember how we learned to ride a bicycle. It was not by calculating vectors, critical mass, G-forces or the ideal speed. It was not by sitting down in front of a teacher and having him explain to us how that two-wheeled vehicle manages to keep moving. It was not because someone said our bicycle was better and safer than someone else’s bicycle, and so we could cycle forth with confidence. It was not because we listened to this or that opinion, or because we saw endless TV coverage of the Tour de France or the Olympic Games. It was because we dared to make that first pedal stroke. We tried, we fell off and tried again, until one day, almost miraculously, we achieved perfect balance. And we never ever forget, even if 10 or 20 years pass without our even getting on a bicycle. Can it be explained? No, it cannot. But we know how to ride a bicycle, and that is the important thing, because then we can visit another village, create a road, lose our fear and discover how much we have in common. Andy Garcia