The Archer

by Paulo Coelho

“You have skill, dignity, and posture,” said Tetsuya. “You have a good grasp of technique and you have mastered the bow, but you have not mastered your mind. You know how to shoot when all the circumstances are favorable, but if you are on dangerous ground, you cannot hit the target. The archer cannot always choose the battlefield, so start your training again and be prepared for unfavorable situations. Continue in the way of the bow, for it is a whole life’s journey, but remember that a good, accurate shot is very different from one made with peace in your soul.”

who follows the way does not need a bow or an arrow or a target.”

“Teaching it isn’t hard. I could do that in less than an hour, while we’re walking back to the village. The difficult thing is to practice it every day, until you achieve the necessary precision.”

What is a master? I would say that he is not someone who teaches something, but someone who inspires the student to do his best to discover a knowledge he already has in his soul.”

People always judge others by taking as a model their own limitations, and other people’s opinions are often full of prejudice and fear.

Join with all those who experiment, take risks, fall, get hurt, and then take more risks. Stay away from those who affirm truths, who criticize those who do not think like them, people who have never once taken a step unless they were sure they would be respected for doing so, and who prefer certainties to doubts. Join with those who are open and not afraid to be vulnerable: they understand that people can improve only once they start looking at what their fellows are doing, not in order to judge them, but to admire them for their dedication and courage.

Join with those who are as flexible as the wood of your bow and who understand the signs along the way. They are people who do not hesitate to change direction when they encounter some insuperable barrier, or when they see a better opportunity. They have the qualities of water: flowing around rocks, adapting to the course of the river, sometimes forming into a lake until the hollow fills to overflowing, and they can continue on their way, because water never forgets that the sea is its destiny and that sooner or later it must be reached.

Join with those who have never said: “Right, that’s it, I’m going no further,” because as sure as spring follows winter, nothing ever ends; after achieving your objective, you must start again, always using everything you have learned on the way. Join with those who sing, tell stories, take pleasure in life, and have joy in their eyes, because joy is contagious and can prevent others from becoming paralyzed by depression, loneliness, and difficulties.

Join with those who do their work with enthusiasm, and because you could be as useful to them as they are to you, try to understand their tools too and how their skills could be improved.

The bow is life: the source of all energy. The arrow will leave one day. The target is a long way off. But the bow will stay with you, and you must know how to look after it. It requires periods of inaction— a bow that is always armed and braced loses its strength. Therefore, allow it to rest, to recover its firmness; then, when you draw the bowstring, the bow will be content, with all its strength intact.

A bow is flexible, but it has its limits. Stretching it beyond its capacity will break it or exhaust the hand holding it. Therefore, try to be in harmony with your instrument and never ask more than it can give.

The arrow is the intention. It is what unites the strength of the bow with the center of the target. The intention must be crystal clear, straight and balanced. Once the arrow has gone, it will not come back, so it is better to interrupt a shot, because the movements that led up to it were not sufficiently precise and correct, than to act carelessly, simply because the bow was fully drawn and the target was waiting.

But never hold back from firing the arrow if all that paralyzes you is fear of making a mistake. If you have made the right movements, open your hand and release the string. Even if the arrow fails to hit the target, you will learn how to improve your aim next time. If you never take a risk, you will never know what changes you need to make. Each arrow leaves a memory in your heart, and it is the sum of those memories that will make you shoot better and better.

On a day when you are out of love with life, your aim will be confused, difficult. You will find that you lack the strength to draw the string back fully, that you cannot get the bow to bend as it should. And when you see that your aim is poor that morning, you will try to find out what could have caused such imprecision; this will mean confronting the problem that is troubling you but that, up until then, has remained hidden. The

Use your bad moments to discover what makes you tremble. Use your good moments to find your road to inner peace.

But do not stop either out of fear or out of joy: the way of the bow has no end.

but you need to understand too that nothing in this world stays with us for very long: at a given moment, your hand will have to open and allow your intention to follow its destiny.

Try to develop the gift of kindness: this gift will allow you to be always at peace with your heart.