A few months ago, my friend suggested we go on a retreat together. My first instinct was to decline. I told myself I didn’t have the time. I have a lot going on, and too much to catch up on. But something in me pushed back against that excuse, and I decided to go anyway.
We talked the whole drive there, the kind of conversation that starts light and slowly turns into something else. At some point, without much warm-up, she asked me: “Are you already in your purpose, or do you still need to find it?”
I opened my mouth to answer, and nothing came out. I had a job. I had things I was good at. I would have said, a month earlier, that I was doing fine. But sitting in that car, I couldn’t say yes with any confidence, and I couldn’t say no either. I just sat with it, watching the road, aware that something in me had gone quiet.
The retreat came and went. I journaled a little, listened more than I spoke, and came home telling myself I’d think about it properly “when things settled down.” Except the question didn’t wait for things to settle down. It kept surfacing — in my quiet time, while driving, in the pause before I fell asleep.
Weeks later, my friend called. “Have you read The Alchemist yet?” she asked, like she already knew the answer. I hadn’t. “You need to,” she said. “Just read it, and tell me what you think.”
I ordered a copy that same day.
This is exactly why I keep a shelf of books like this one and keep coming back to write about them here. Not because I’ve read a lot of books, but because these are the ones that actually stopped me in my tracks. The ones that hand you a question at the exact moment you’re finally ready to sit with it.
Why I Reached for This One
The Alchemist follows Santiago, a young shepherd who keeps having the same dream about a treasure waiting for him near the pyramids. Instead of shrugging it off, he sells his sheep and goes looking for it. Along the way, he meets a merchant who once dreamed of visiting Mecca, built his whole life around “someday,” and let years pass without ever going. I won’t walk you through the rest; that part is worth discovering on your own.
One thing I know is that I recognized myself in that merchant. How easily we dress up giving up as being “realistic.” How gently we talk ourselves out of what we actually want, and then call it maturity. Coelho has a name for the thing you’re meant to do with your life — your “Personal Legend.” Put simply, it’s the thing you keep circling back to, the thing you’d still want even if no one clapped for it.
The book doesn’t say the tragedy is failing to reach that thing. It says the tragedy is giving up on it quietly, and calling that peace.
By the time I finished it, my friend’s question from the car had turned into a different one, one I could finally sit with instead of dodge: what have I quietly stopped pursuing, and when did I start calling that okay? I still don’t have it fully figured out. But I’ve stopped pretending the question isn’t there. And I called her back to tell her so.
Why I Keep Recommending Books Like This
I don’t think every book needs to change your life to be worth your time. But sometimes, the right book finds you exactly when you need it, not because it’s the most brilliant thing ever written, but because it meets you gently, right where you are.
That’s really the heart of why this Book Recommendation category exists. It isn’t a list of the “best books everyone should read.” It’s me sharing the ones from my own shelf that quietly moved something in me. I am hoping one of them does the same for you, in whatever season you’re in right now — whether you’re still figuring out who you are beneath the roles you play, or simply looking for your next good read like Fearless and Free.
If The Alchemist is new to you, I hope you find a quiet afternoon for it soon. And if you’ve already read it, I’d love to hear what it stirred in you.
Either way, keep reading. Keep picking up the books that ask you honest questions. You never know which one is waiting to meet you exactly where you are.
Have a book from your own shelf that found you at the right time? I’d love to hear about it in the comments. Stick around, because I’ll be sharing more from my library soon.
With love,
Cheta Otiji