The Alchemist - A book that can change your life

I am a member of the India Leadership Network on Linkedin, which held an interesting discussion recently about Which Book has changed your life. This discussion saw an enormous amount of participation, and many people mentioned the book The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. This got me interested in the book, so I went through the book and was really moved by it.
It is a simple and interesting story of a boy who goes after his dreams, but it leaves you with very strong lessons, such as the following:

• The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better.
• Everyone on earth has a treasure that awaits him.
• People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams, because they feel that they don't deserve them, or that they'll be unable to achieve them.
• Love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny. If he abandons that pursuit, it's because it wasn't true love .
• Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place.

And finally, the most powerful message in the book that is repeated often is When you really desire something, all the universe conspires to help you to realize your dream, which reminds me of the popular dialog from the Hindi movie "Om Shanti Om":

इतनी शिद्दत से मैंने तुम्हे पाने की कोशिश की है
कि हर ज़र्रे ने मुझे तुमसे मिलाने की साजिश की है

Lessons from Sudoku

Since the time I solved my first Sudoku puzzle two years back, I became a big fan of Sudoku, and regularly spend my leisure time on it. Over time, it gets more and more interesting. Solving a puzzle of this nature also teaches you many lessons of life such as the following:

• If you do not give up, impossible becomes possible
• With regular practice, complex tasks become routine
• Do not get bogged down by the size of the problem; Concentrate on the small steps towards the solution
• Do what you can within your circle of influence, and it will help grow the circle.
• At times, it is best to let the puzzle solve itself and not fight it
• The pace is very slow initially, but picks up 2x, 5x, or even 20x as you pick up momentum