The Spy

by Paulo Coelho

At this moment, I look back at my life and realize that memory is a river, one that always runs backward.

Memories are full of caprice, where images of things we’ve experienced are still capable of suffocating us through one small detail or insignificant sound.

Memories bring with them a devil called melancholy—oh, cruel demon that I cannot escape.

The memories always win, and with them comes a demon that is even more terrifying than melancholy: remorse.

“Flowers teach us that nothing is permanent: not their beauty, not even the fact that they will inevitably wilt, because they will still give new seeds. Remember this when you feel joy, pain, or sadness. Everything passes, grows old, dies, and is reborn.”

Everyone flirts with danger, so long as that danger does not really exist.

Never fall in love. Love is a poison. Once you fall in love, you lose control over your life—your heart and mind belong to someone else. Your existence is threatened. You start to do everything to hold on to your loved one and lose all sense of danger. Love, that inexplicable and dangerous thing, sweeps everything you are from the face of the earth and, in its place, leaves only what your beloved wants you to be.”

Love kills suddenly, leaving no evidence of the crime.

“When a woman or a man is abandoned by the person they love, they are focused on their own pain.

When we don’t know where life is taking us, we are never lost.

An artist who desires very little and achieves it has failed in life.”

Tomorrow no longer looked like tomorrow, and the present was no longer the present, just a pit I dug deeper with every step. People walked on either side of me, while children played, seagulls made odd movements in the sky, and the waves rolled in more calmly than I imagined.

I don’t know why life made me go through so much in so little time. To see if I could withstand the hard times. To see what I was made of. To give me experience. But there were other methods, other ways to achieve this. It did not need to drown me in the darkness of my own soul or make me cross through this forest filled with wolves and other wild animals without a single hand to guide me. The only thing I know is that this forest, however frightening it may be, has an end, and I intend to reach its other side. I will be generous in victory and will not accuse those who lied so much about me.

The most beautiful melody in the world will become a monstrosity if the strings are out of tune.

The caged bird may sing of freedom, but it will still live in prison. Thea agreed to live in the cage, then wanted to escape, but no one helped, because no one understood.

I know you are likely in search of adventure, and I hope you’ll forgive my impertinence, but people are usually ungrateful for what they have.”

Are we never to be able to see the true face of love?

Love is an act of faith and its face should always be covered in mystery. Every moment should be lived with feeling and emotion because if we try to decipher it and understand it, the magic disappears.

We follow its winding and luminous paths, we let ourselves go to the highest peak or the deepest seas, but we trust in the hand that leads us. If we do not allow ourselves to be frightened, we will always awaken in a palace; if we fear the steps that will be required by love and want it ...

Love does not obey anyone and will betray those who try to decipher its mystery.