Clarity On Fire

Yesterday I was listening to Oprah’s new Super Soul Conversations podcast (it’s basically just edited, audio-only versions of Super Soul Sunday TV episodes), where she was interviewing Paulo Coelho. If you haven’t heard of him, Paulo Coelho is the author of the mega-bestselling allegorical novel The Alchemist, which was published 29 years ago and still hits the New York Times bestseller list regularly. (If you haven’t read it, you really should. It’s one of those rare books that contain within it almost everything you’ll ever need to know about life. Kristen and I did a book club episode about it last year, which I’ll link to!) Anyway, what struck me about Oprah and Paulo’s conversation was what happened to him when he was 17. He said that his parents really wanted him to be an engineer, like his father. His parents had experienced a lot of instability in Brazil, so they wanted something safe, secure, and socially esteemed for their son. But Paulo always wanted to be writer, and he was adamant about it. His p