Once upon a time, there was a young prince who was born into a royal palace of countless riches. He wanted a soulmate, so a woman of his exact specifications was delivered to him. He wanted to be admired, so everyone in the kingdom was ordered to sing songs about him. He wanted to be wise, so he had every book rebranded to show him as the author. The prince got everything he wanted and lived out his days with a high and mighty sense of pride. Everyone showered him with praise and he lived happily ever after. The end. How did the story make you feel? Did you find yourself rooting for the prince? If you are a fan of myths and legends, then this story probably feels incomplete. There's no character development, no plot, no setup and payoff, no lesson is learned, and therefore it's not really a story at all. Because the essence of story lies in transformation. It's not about the destination. It's about the experience of the journey. It's not about getting the reward. It's about becoming the person worthy of receiving the reward. As we transform, the world around us transforms. There is a mysterious order to the universe where every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Everything given must be earned and everything taken has a price to pay. Some call this order karma or fate or divine balance or cosmic justice. No story illustrates this idea better than The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It's one of the most beautiful books ever written and one I find myself returning to often. If you haven't read it and plan on doing so, you may want to skip this section. There will be spoilers.The Alchemist begins with a young shepherd boy wandering the Spanish countryside and living a carefree existence. He sleeps in an abandoned church and watches the stars through a hole in the roof. His days are peaceful and comfortable. His only concerns are food, wine, and his sheep. One night, the boy has a profound dream about finding treasure by the Egyptian pyramids. He tries to dismiss the dream as having no meaning. But the universe has other plans for him. The language of the universe speaks to the boy in the form of signs, symbols, deja vu, and synchronicities, otherwise known as omens. These omens reveal to the boy that the treasure in his dream is indeed real. So the boy sells his sheep and embarks in the long dangerous journey to Egypt. He crosses the ocean to Morocco and is immediately tricked and robbed of what little gold he has. His quest is off to a terrible start, but with no money to return to Spain, he is stranded in a foreign land. He finds refuge in a small crystal shop and offers to clean glasses in exchange for food. The crystal shop is failing to bring in customers and make profit. But the boy's enthusiastic spirit changes things. Over the next year, he learns Arabic and turns the crystal shop into a thriving business. The boy is making good money and gets comfortable. But the omens tell him it's time to move towards the Egyptian pyramids to find his ultimate treasure and fulfill his destiny. So, he says goodbye to the crystal shop and begins the treacherous trek across the Sahara. The heat is blistering. The winds are wicked. And to add further danger, there is a tribal war happening all around him. The boy manages to make it to an oasis, a lush green safe haven, where he receives a warm welcome. But shortly after, he has another prophetic dream about the oasis being attacked. He warns the people of the oasis, and the very next day, the oasis is attacked by a band of dishonorable tribal warriors. Because of the boy's warning, no one in the oasis is harmed, and the attackers are all killed. The people of the oasis celebrate the boy and he is offered a position of power. He also meets a girl, Fatima, and falls deeply in love with her. Once again, the boy gets comfortable. With money, love, and status, he could stay in the oasis and have a great life. But the omens tell him he must carry on to the pyramids to find his treasure. This is when the boy links up with the alchemist, who serves as the boy's guide on the final leg of his journey. The alchemist teaches the boy how to tap into his heart, decipher the omens, and speak to the soul of the world. The alchemist tells him that every search begins with beginner's luck and every search ends with the victors being severely tested. There's only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve. The fear of failure. Eventually, they travel deep into the tribal war zone and find themselves caught in the middle. The alchemist and the boy are captured. Their gold is taken and they are sentenced to death. However, the alchemist tells their captors that the boy possesses special abilities and can transform himself into the wind. He is given three days to perform this miracle. The boy is terrified because he has no idea how he's going to turn himself into the wind. But when the time comes, he is able to speak with the soul of the world and see that everything in the universe is one. A mighty sandstorm blows in, sweeping the boy away and astonishing his captors. So, they release him. Finally, he makes it to the pyramids and sees an omen, the scarab beetle, which shows him where the treasure is buried. He begins to dig, but some Arabs see what he's doing and start beating him, demanding to know why he's there. With some of his last breaths, he confesses that he had a dream that there was treasure buried by the pyramids. The leader of the Arabs laughs at the boy for being so stupid as to cross the world because of a silly dream. The leader tells the men to stop beating the boy and move on. But just before he leaves, he turns to the boy and says that he once had a dream about treasure being buried in Spain at an abandoned church with a hole in the ceiling. But this was only a silly dream. Lying in a puddle of his own blood, the boy is filled with contempt and laughs at the irony of it all. The universe truly does speak in mysterious ways. He had to go on this massive adventure, crossing the Sahara and nearly dying on several occasions just to learn that the treasure was right under his feet from where he began. And that's pretty much the end. So why did the story have to unfold like this? Why couldn't the Omens just tell the boy that the treasure was there from the start? Why did he have to travel great distances and fight for his life just to return to where he began? Well, this is simply because the journey was never about the treasure. The journey was about becoming who he was meant to be. As Paulo Coelho writes, "The reward for our work is not what we get, but who we become." The boy left home as a sheeplike wanderer and returned a wise man. Each time he got comfortable along his journey, the universe invited him to step into the unknown. And each time he did, he was rewarded with something greater. His ultimate reward was the person he became. A man who knew himself on the deepest level with unshakable faith and the ability to communicate with the soul of the world. He gained a sense of inner peace, which is something no amount of money can buy. It is the privilege of a lifetime to become who you really are. In the end, the boy returned to Spain and found a chest of gold buried under the church. But the treasure would have had an entirely different meaning if he discovered it without the journey. We must be careful of anything that is given to us for free. Everything that we get comes with a price. You can pay before or after. Any profound insights or wealth gained without the requisite personal development will be destabilizing or harmful. As Carl Young famously said, "Beware of unearned wisdom, which is knowledge that arrives without the inner work, discipline, or maturity needed to hold it."
In this context, Carl Young was warning about psychedelics and the potential for people to use them as a shortcut to enlightenment. Psychedelics are a wonderful tool for exploration, but doing psychedelics does not make one enlightened or truly wise. Without proper grounding, it can lead to mental illness or an inflated ego. Unearned wisdom is like reading the last page of a book without having lived the chapters. You might see the answer, but you won't understand what it really means. The journey forged the boy into someone who was capable of possessing the treasure. Without the journey, he would not be fit to hold it. The alchemist is akin to the story of the prodigal son in the Bible. Jesus tells the story of a man who had two sons. The younger son said to his father, "Father, give me my share of the estate." So, he divided his property between them. The younger son then runs off to a distant country to frolic with prostitutes and indulge in hedonistic behaviors. When the money runs out, the youngest son finds himself desperate and alone. He winds up taking the only job he can get, throwing food to pigs. He can't even eat the food that he gives to the pigs. He's lost everything, his money, status, and pride. So, he decides to return to his father with his tail between his legs and offer himself as a lowly servant. But when his father sees him, he rejoices and calls to kill the fattened calf in celebration. The eldest son is hurt by this and says, "I've stayed by your side and always obeyed you, but you never even gave me a young goat to celebrate with my friends. What gives?" My son, the father says, "You are always with me and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found." The lesson here is simple and profound. Taking a treasure that one is not ready for will lead to chaos and destruction. The youngest son left home a selfish, wasteful sinner. But through hitting rock bottom, he learned the errors of his ways and returned home with humility and maturity. There are two types of people in this world. Those who are humble and those who are about to be humbled. The process of being humbled will destroy parts of oneself that need to die in order for the true self to be born. Alchemy is an ancient tradition of transforming base materials into noble materials, like changing lead into gold. The alchemist combined elements of chemistry, metallurgy, physics, medicine, astrology, art, and mysticism to bend materials to meet their desires. But on a deeper level, alchemy is about spiritual purification. Many alchemists saw the process of refining metals as a metaphor for refining the soul, transforming the base self into something noble. This idea of transformation is at the heart of every great story. It's not about finishing the story or getting to the end goal. The treasure lies in the journey itself. Through experience, we grow. Wisdom is knowledge plus experience. One cannot be wise without experience. Every struggle we've endured has molded our character. The more we experience, the more humble, aware, capable, and wise we become. Anything taken must be earned. If it is not earned, the reward becomes a punishment. Just take for example all the people who win the lottery. They are not prepared for that level of wealth and it often ends up bankrupting them and destroying their lives. Today we live in a world of quick and easy rewards which seem to be offered to us freely. Take for instance pornography. Unlimited access to sexual gratification is only a click away. A teenager now has access to more graphic imagery than any king in history. Seeing these images comes with a heavy price, though. The more one gets sucked down this rabbit hole, the more difficult it will be to form deep, intimate relationships with a partner in real life. Similarly, students who use AI to do their homework, maybe using chat GBT to write their papers will improve their grades, but upon graduation, what did they actually learn? Did they really get ahead? And now it is being shown that there is a direct correlation between the use of AI and cognitive decline. So, it is time to be very careful when we are offered cheap, easy access to something that feels good. Understand that there is always a price to pay. This is the cosmic balance. But on the bright side, there is always a reward for sacrificing comfort in the pursuit of your destiny. The rewards are usually not immediate, but the work you put in and the suffering you endure will always pay off. The reward may not come in the form of money, but what price would you be willing to pay to become who you want to be? What good is treasure if you are weak and ignorant? No amount of money can buy wisdom and integrity. A story that illustrates the bright side of this cosmic balance comes from Anna Lembke's book, Dopamine Nation, in her chapter on the power of radical honesty. A young man named Drake struggled with alcohol and addiction, something that ran in his family. Drake had a habit of partying and driving home drunk. One night, he's pulled over by the police and given a DUI. Luckily for Drake, he had enough money to afford the best lawyer who could get him off and clear his record. All he had to do is lie and plead not guilty, and the lawyer would handle the rest. But something strange happened when Drake stood in front of the judge. His conscious jolted him into confessing that he was indeed driving drunk. He was then severely punished, losing his driver's license for a year, sentenced to mandatory DUI classes and having to pay a hefty fine. The consequences of telling the truth were initially harsh. But the ordeal caused Drake to stop drinking and get his life together. 10 years later, now a successful doctor, he looks back on that moment of telling the truth in court as the most important positive experience of his life. He could have taken the quick and easy route and avoided the consequences. But where would he have ended up if he lied? Most likely still an addict, selfish and impulsive. Telling the truth was a painful price, but he paid it voluntarily. And for this, fine. The consequences of telling the truth were initially harsh. But the ordeal caused Drake to stop drinking and get his life together. 10 years later, now a successful doctor, he looks back on that moment of telling the truth in court as the most important positive experience of his life. He could have taken the quick and easy route and avoided the consequences. But where would he have ended up if he lied? Most likely still an addict, selfish and impulsive. Telling the truth was a painful price, but he paid it voluntarily. And for this, he was rewarded by becoming the person he was meant to be. There's a saying that hell is the place where the person you are meets the person you could have been. So perhaps heaven is the place where you become who you are truly meant to be. To be the wisest, most competent, noblelest, most courageous individual possible. To have a deep sense of your soul and inner peace. To live in complete harmony with nature and your loved ones. To lay on your deathbed with no regrets. This is what is within your grasp. Remember, the reward for our work is not what we get, but who we become. It is the privilege of a lifetime to become who you were meant to be. [Music] Another great quote from Paulo Coelho is, "Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should be their lives, but none about his or her own." In today's internet age, we're constantly bombarded with unsolicited voices telling us what to think, what to believe, who to hate, and so on.
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