Forgiving Your Stories

The abbot asked his favorite pupil how his spiritual progress was coming along. The pupil answered that he was managing to dedicate to God each and every moment of the day.

“Then all that's left now is to forgive your enemies.”

The young man was shocked:

“But I'm not angry at my enemies!”

“Do you think God is angry at you?”

“Of course not!”

“And even so you ask Him to forgive you, don't you? Do the same with your enemies, even though you don't feel hatred for them. Those who practice forgiveness wash and perfume their own hearts.”

Paulo Coelho is a Brazilian author who has sold more than 100 million books, which include 14 short story collections and the novel “The Alchemist.” He has been a fan of the Internet since the early 1990s. He spends at least three hours a day online, writing e-mails back and forth with his readers and posting photos on Flickr, MySpace and a blog.

Coelho's online activities also include promoting pirated copies of his own books. Since 2005 he's been directing his readers to an online site where they can download his books, in languages from German to Japanese, for free. “I always thought that when, at the beginning of your career, you strive to be read, you can't change your mind later and become greedy about it.”