Resumo de Jonathan Livingston Seagull

I read Jonathan Livingston Seagull when I was 14 years old and have read it often since then.

I discover new meanings in the book whenever I turn to it because of my perspective of life at that moment in time.

I have had a troubled childhood and the only thing that kept me going on were my mentors, the first of which was Jonathan. Thank you, Mr. Bach.

Jonathan is about how a perspective has the power to change your life. We all live our ordinary lives and continue supporting a beaten path because the unknown path is dangerous. And we are creatures of habit. Everything we do in our lives, we mold towards this phenomenon.

Survival is important and not excellence. It is easier to walk towards established paths rather than into uncertain, unknown territories. It is easier to walk than fly. It is easier to accept limitations than overcome them. It is easier to accept failure than try to succeed.

Jonathan was a Seagull. And Seagulls have limitations. Most Seagulls accepted the limitations. Jonathan did not. He loved to fly and wanted to learn to fly better and faster than any Seagull had flown before and Seagulls cannot do that - should not do that! They are not meant to fly high or fast or they would have been made that way.

If Seagulls are not made to fly high or fast, what makes them imagine that they can break the chains of their nature? Is rebellion based on self-belief acceptable?

We are bound by our limitations to fail, there is nothing much we can do to change what and who we are ? this is the credo of the common mindset.

To be a hero is a tough job, it requires responsibility. Failure is an option and you need courage to fail. To fail in our society is taboo.

Heroes are rebels that herald change. Our society enforces rigid thoughts and rules on rebellion because rebels are dangerous. You cannot predict what they will do. They may just change what you most endear ? your life and who really wants that? It really doesn?t matter whether you are happy or not, life goes on - doesn?t it? So why take the pressure? Just live with it.

So Jonathan was given the ultimate punishment and was BANISHED from his flock for not being like the other seagulls. His only crime was that he wanted to learn to fly. He did not accept limitations.

Jonathan was a Hero.

And he never gave up. All that mattered to Jonathan was to fly. He flew low and he flew high, he flew - slow and he flew fast. He tried and he failed. He tried again, failed and tried again, till he succeeded.

Jonathan was no ordinary seagull. All he wanted to do was to learn everything he could about flying and learn he did! Heroes do these kinds of things!

He learnt and he practiced.

He practiced till he realized?impossible is nothing.

He could fly better and faster than any Seagull before him.

To Jonathan happiness came with learning.

All that mattered to Jonathan was to better himself every moment, day after day. All that mattered was to touch perfection. He realized perfection was a journey and not the destination.

And Jonathan did just that. He went on his way to find perfection and to live it.

On his journey he met with his mentors who thought the way he did and had spent several lives practicing and learning.

Now, he learnt from them!

Soon it was time for Jonathan to pass on his learning to Seagulls who thought and lived the way he did when he had just started his quest for learning.

Now Jonathan is here within us pushing us to reach perfection. I can hear him speak to me everyday ?Raj, limitations are only?.

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