JONATHAN LIVINGSTON SEAGUL by RICHARD BACH
Published in 2004 by Harper Collins Publishers India
Review by Usha Kumaraswamy. 25th August 2006
It is an inspiring story of a seagull who is not convinced about
flying for just finding food and to survive.He wants to find meaning to his life and
fly not just to
live but to live to fly.He has a dying thirst to attain
higher levels of perfection in flying.
The book first published in Great Britain in the year 1972 is a book which has inspired people for decades. The author is a writer and pilot,author of three books on mystique flying.Photographs of Russel Munson are live and rare making us feel seeing the velocity of the flight of the seagull.
Jonathan who has the hunger for learning and Sullivan the
passionate teacher who says "Our purpose of living is to find perfection and we take hunded lives to realise that .Learn nothing and the next world is the same as this one,all the same limitations and lead weights to overcome." strike the right balance.
Sullivan teaches to look not with mere eyes which show limitation but with understanding. To attain freedom rituals,superstition or any limitation that come hindering should be set aside is what he advocates.
The greatest lesson of forgiving with love the
flock which outcasted him who dared to be different to fly higher and higher is learnt by Jonathan which makes him a passionate teacher. He strives to uplift his flock realising that the joy of learning is complete only when it is shared with those who need support.
This is a book which I enjoyed for the absolute freedom it talks about twenty years back and now again when I read it I see deeper meanings.It is not only about chasing dreams to soar,but about making your heaven through reaching higher states of consciousness.
It is truly a book of all times.
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