nuggets from Paulo Coelho

When we sense that the time has come for a change, we begin -- unconsciously -- to run the tape again, to view every defeat we have experienced until then.        "And, of course, as we grow older, our number of difficult moments grows larger.  But, at the same time, experience provides us with better means of overcoming those defeats, and of finding the path that allows us to go forward.  We have to play that second tape on our mental VCR, too. "If we only watch the tape of our defeats, we become paralyzed.  If we only watch the tape of our successes, we wind up thinking we are wiser than we really are. "We need both of those tapes."