Paulo Coelho Quotes

Since we cannot change reality, let us change the eyes which see reality," says one of my favorite Byzantine mystics. I did this when a child; I do it now as well in the most creative moments of my life.

...belief has a second edge. If there are ten thousand medieval peasants who create vampires by believing them real, there may be one - probably a child - who will imagine the stake necessary to kill it. But a stake is only stupid wood; the mind is the mallet which drives it home.

The child in us is always there, you know, and it's the best part of us, the winged part that travels farthest.

I've never outgrown my childhood.

I think that all of us either lose touch with the child inside us or try and hold onto it because it so precious to us and it's such an extraordinary part of our lives.

I want my work to help people rediscover the child that's hiding in them.

In every real man a child is hidden that wants to play.

There is a child inside me that wants to come out and do something to surprise all the adults.

If it seems a childish thing to do, do it in remembrance that you are a child.

I think that the greatest gift God ever gave man is not the gift of sight but the gift of vision. Sight is a function of the eyes, but vision is a function of the heart.

When you're around kids you can be a little kid yourself and pretend that life is magic and you don't have to be one of those sweaty people going to work every day.

There is a child in all of us.

I adore kids. I enjoy everything that they bring to the party. They just say what they think.

Poetry and imagination begin life. A child will fall on its knees on the gravel walk at the sight of a pink hawthorn in full flower, when it is by itself, to praise God for it.

The most sophisticated people I've ever known had just one thing in common: they were all in touch with their inner children.

It was almost like being a child again because you felt like you were in your bedroom and it almost felt like no one was really watching you. So, you were just kind of having a bit of fun on your own doing silly voices in the bedroom.

I enjoyed being in movies when I was a boy. As a child you're not acting - you believe. Ah, if an adult could only act as a child does with that insane, playing-at-toy- soldiers concentration!

Having children has helped me become a better actor because they remind you to play make believe. It's the ease and naturalness of their beings. They just play and it's completely real for them at the time. As an actor, if we do it well, we make you believe.

I never presumed to tell anyone who could make a rainbow what color to make children.

I had a teacher in Paris, who said that if an actor forgot what it's like to play as a child he shouldn't be an actor. I've always loved being with children. It's marvellous to see the fresh ways they see the world. Watching them look at a tree or a river helps you to understand something that's very important.

For me, difference is beautiful, there is not only one beauty, and in a collection I always like to show mixed directions. When you look at people or things, there are all these codes and standards that come into play around what is considered ugly or beautiful, and I've always questioned that. When you're a kid, you're not conditioned, you don't see perversity, there's a state of innocence where everything is beautiful, you see differently....I am lucky because I am doing now what I dreamt of doing as a child, and I like to think that I've retained a childlike state of mind.

Do not erase the designs the child makes in the soft wax of his inner life.

In art we are once again able to do all the things we have forgotten; we are able to walk on water; we speak to the angels who call us; we move, unfettered, among the stars.

Faith isn't an act of intelligence, it's an act of imagination.

I am often accused of being childish. I prefer to interpret that as child-like. I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things. I tend to exaggerate and fantasize and embellish. I still listen to instinctual urges. I play with leaves. I skip down the street and run against the wind. I never water my garden without soaking myself. It has been after such times of joy that I have achieved my greatest creativity and produced my best work.