On Siddhartha

I know my current understanding. I know where I am now. It's easy for me to forget that not everybody has seen everything I have and read everything I have and just in general thought enough of the same thoughts as me to know what the heck I'm talking about.

That's why it's easy to stay quiet. I'm not much of a talker, ask anyone. But here, well, here I can lay it all out for ya. Piece by piece, give you the deets on how the system operates. How my brain processes, how it thinks, how it adapts. Maybe if you see how it started and you see where it's gotten, you'll be able to figure out where it's going next.

And so we're starting with the first life-changing book I read. Thanks to my good friend for introducing me: Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse

The story follows the path taken by Siddhartha, during the Gautama Buddha era. I recommend reading it, it's short and I find great meaning in it (obviously). No apologies for spoiling it, it's been out since 1922 and you've been warned!

I saw parallels in my own life to that of Siddhartha's. He was a successful and obedient child growing up but unsure of what was supposed to come after. He knew he had to become separated from his past, but he didn't know where to go. He attempted spirituality and religion, to varying success. He tasted the riches of professional success and he experienced all the feelings of love and family that come with partnership, children. I may not have been the golden child to the same degree, and I haven't quite achieved riches or love (or kids) to the same level, but I've experienced all those feelings in my own rite. I know what it feels like to have enough to spend, I know what it feels like to pursue a partner. I understand that meaning has to be carved out along with those things, that they alone aren't enough for fulfilment (in themselves).

Basically, your perspective is everything. You'll hear bad things on the news, and you won't know how to feel about it. We'll get to that more in Philosophy II.

Siddhartha eventually understands life, next to a river, with the help of an old ferryman's perspective.

out of all secrets of the river, he today only saw one, this one touched his soul. He saw: this water ran and ran, incessantly it ran, and was nevertheless always there, was always at all times the same and yet new in every moment! Great be he who would grasp this, understand this! He understood and grasped it not, only felt some idea of it stirring, a distant memory, divine voices.

Eventually, he tries to explain this wisdom to his friend Govinda.

This here,” he said playing with it, “is a stone, and will, after a certain time, perhaps turn into soil, and will turn from soil into a plant or animal or human being. In the past, I would have said: This stone is just a stone, it is worthless, it belongs to the world of the Maya; but because it might be able to become also a human being and a spirit in the cycle of transformations, therefore I also grant it importance. Thus, I would perhaps have thought in the past. But today I think: this stone is a stone, it is also animal, it is also god, it is also Buddha, I do not venerate and love it because it could turn into this or that, but rather because it is already and always everything—and it is this very fact, that it is a stone, that it appears to me now and today as a stone, this is why I love it and see worth and purpose in each of its veins and cavities, in the yellow, in the gray, in the hardness, in the sound it makes when I knock at it, in the dryness or wetness of its surface. There are stones which feel like oil or soap, and others like leaves, others like sand, and every one is special and prays the Om in its own way, each one is Brahman, but simultaneously and just as much it is a stone, is oily or juicy, and this is the very fact which I like and regard as wonderful and worthy of worship.—But let me speak no more of this. The words are not good for the secret meaning, everything always becomes a bit different, as soon as it is put into words, gets distorted a bit, a bit silly—yes, and this is also very good, and I like it a lot, I also very much agree with this, that this what is one man’s treasure and wisdom always sounds like foolishness to another person.

There's always more to be said for this book, it really helped me forge my perspective over the last few years. It was an important start to my journey, a push in the necessary direction.

My takeaway for you is this: if you find an opportunity to bask in the sun, sit under a big tree, or gaze into a running body of water - I encourage you to do it, if only for a few moments - to help understand life, just a little bit better. Take a walk, feel the cool ocean breeze; the crisp mountain air; the grassy smell of wherever you may call home. Take it in, breathe the nature around you. Feel where you are in the universe.

As a child, I saw life in math. In numbers and shapes, in musical chords. I saw life in colorful little folded pieces of paper, in musical instruments carefully crafted (through years of iteration). I saw life in the people all around me, in the animals and plants that were all around - big and small - if you looked around carefully. In statistics, in probability, in the shuffling decks of cards that (probabilistically) landed in a brand new order every day (52! possible orderings (!!!)). I saw life in the sand and in the snow and in the trees, in the breeze and the cacti and the scorpions that scared me. I saw it in the flowers, and I often stop to smell them still. I saw life in all my hobbies, in every nook and cranny I could observe wherever life takes me.

Remember to notice the little things. Like my hero Aang, try to keep a view of everyone's perspective. Remain cool-headed under immense pressure. Always choose nonviolence, but make sure nobody's being bullied. Maintain balance in all wakes of life, and help others achieve the same. Be a master of all the elements (ie. know nature, and know the tools you can use within nature - first to survive, then to help others).

Another reading I like in this vein is the short story The Egg by Paul Weir (wiki).

I read that one super young and I still like the message it provided me with.

index tags: Philosophy, Siddhartha, Herman Hesse, The Egg, Paul Weir, Religion, Avatar the Last Airbender

category tags: Philosophy