The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho

youth, and we seek personal and profes- sional achievement. We are
     surprised when people our age say that they still want this or that out of life. But
     really, deep in our hearts, we know that what has hap- pened is that we have renounced the
     battle for our dreams we have refused to fight the good fight.
    The tower of the church kept changing; now it appeared to be an angel with its wings
     spread. The more I blinked, the longer the figure remained. I wanted to speak to Petrus
     but I sensed that he hadnt finished.
    When we renounce our dreams and find peace, he said after a while, we go through a short
     period of
    tranquillity. But the dead dreams begin to rot within us and to infect our entire being.
     We become cruel to those around us, and then we begin to direct this cruelty against
     ourselves. Thats when illnesses and psychoses arise. What we sought to avoid in combat
     disappoint- ment and defeat come upon us because of our cow- ardice. And one day, the
     dead, spoiled dreams make it difficult to breathe, and we actually seek death. Its death
     that frees us from our certainties, from our work, and from that terrible peace of our
     Sunday afternoons.
    Now I was sure that I was really seeing an angel, and I couldnt pay attention to what
     Petrus was saying. He must have sensed this, because he removed his finger from my neck
     and stopped talking. The image of the angel remained for a few moments and then disap-
     peared. In its place, the tower of the church returned.
    We were silent for a few minutes. Petrus rolled him- self a cigarette and began to smoke.
     I took the bottle of wine from my knapsack and had a swallow. It was warm, but it was
     still delicious.
    What did you see? he asked me.
    I told him about the angel. I said that at the begin- ning, the image would disappear when
     I blinked.
    You, too, have to learn how to fight the good fight. You have already learned to accept
     the adventures and challenges that life provides, but you still want to deny anything that
     is extraordinary.
    Petrus took a small object from his knapsack and handed it to me. It was a golden pin.
    This was a present from my grandmother. In the Order of the RAM, all of the ancients have
     an object such as this. Its called the Point of Cruelty. When you saw the angel appear on
     the church tower, you wanted to deny it, because it wasnt something that you are used to.
     In your view of the world, churches are churches, and visions occur only during the
     ecstasy cre- ated by the rituals of the Tradition.
    I said that my vision must have been caused by the pressure he was applying to my neck.
    Thats right, but that doesnt change anything. The fact is that you rejected the vision.
     Felicia of Aquitaine must have seen something similar, and she bet her entire life on what
     she saw. And the result of her having done that transformed her work into a work of love.
     The same thing probably happened to her brother. And the same thing happens to everyone
     every day: we always know which is the best road to follow, but we follow only the road
     that we have become accustomed to.
    Petrus began to walk again, and I followed along. The rays of the sun made the pin in my
     hand glisten.
    The only way we can rescue our dreams is by being generous with ourselves. Any attempt to
     inflict self- punishment no matter how subtle it may be should be dealt with rigorously.
     In order to know when we are being cruel to ourselves, we have to transform any attempt at
     causing spiritual pain such as guilt, remorse, indecision, and cowardice into physical
     pain.
    By transforming a spiritual pain into a physical one, we can learn what harm it can cause
     us.
    And then Petrus taught me the Cruelty Exercise.
    In ancient times, they used a golden pin for this, he said. Nowadays, things have changed,
     just as the sights along the Road to Santiago change.
    Petrus was right. Seen from down at this level, the plain