"What do you want here today? the desert asked him. "Didn't you spend enough time looking at me yesterday?"
"Somewhere you are holding the person I love, " the boy said. "So, when I look out over your sands, I am also looking at her. I want to return to her, and I need your help so that I can turn myself into the wind."
"What is love?" the desert asked.
"Love is the falcon's flight over your sands. Because for him, you are a green field, from which he always returns with game. He knows your rocks, your dunes, and your mountains, and your generous to him."
~~
"That's what alchemists do. They show that, when we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too."
"Well, why did you say that about love? the sun asked the boy.
"Because it's not love to be static like the desert, nor is it love to roam the world like the wind. And it's not love to see everything from a distance, like you do. Love is the force that transforms and improves the Soul of the World. When I first reached through to it, I thought the Soul of the World was perfect, but later, I could see that it was other aspects of creation, and had its own passions and wars. It is we who nourish the Soul of the World, and the world we live in will either better or worse, depending on whether we become better or worse. And's that's when the power of love comes in. Because when love, we always strive to become better than we are."
-- The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho (p. 144; 150)
