Ever since we first started reading Siddhartha, one thing that always stuck out to me was our protagonist's disdain for spiritual teachings. He felt that despite his father and the other Brahmins teaching him all they knew from the Hindu scriptures, "the mind wasn't satisfied, the soul wasn't quiet, the heat wasn't stilled."
When he and Govinda go on their pilgrimage to meet the great Gautama, Siddhartha reaffirms what he believes to be true. Although the Buddha is the wisest, most enlightened man he has ever met, Siddhartha refuses to take refuge in his teachings and become a monk, even when his best friend Govinda does.
After we first read this chapter in class, I remember many people at my table commented on the "ego" that Siddhartha displayed.
"He's just a kid, what wisdom can he find that the Buddha himself couldn't?"
And while I do agree that Siddhartha may have initially believed himself to be better than the "child-people" who surrounded him, I also see value in Siddhartha deciding to take his own path towards enlightenment.
What good is knowledge without application? Every Saturday, for more than nine years now, I've been attending Balavihar, a class where I learn about pretty much everything Siddhartha learned about in the beginning of his life as a Brahmin: the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Gunas, Vedanta, and Atman (our true nature). While great Swamis have come and gone, bringing us this knowledge through the metaphors of life they possess, there is no wisdom that can be passed down to me. Swami Tejomayananda may be a wise man who has found Brahman within all of us, until I use all I have learned to take my own path or journey to reach enlightenment, I will never find it.
Wisdom cannot be passed down, and knowledge itself is not wisdom. In fact, who is to say that knowledge itself is objective? My interpretation of the Vedas may differ from yours. My interpretation of religion may differ from yours. My interpretation of life may differ from yours.
An example I can give is with meditation. When we think about meditation, most of us recall a picture of the Buddha sitting under a fig tree, undisturbed by all that's happening around him. In Hinduism, we use meditation to escape the world of Maya, the illusion of the physical world. We are hampered by infinite wants and desires to quell our senses, and meditation is our one chance to remind ourselves of Brahman, or what binds all life together.
Naturally, it's a very difficult task to complete. It seems impossible to clear our mind of any thoughts, especially considering that over one-hundred billion neurons fire in our brain at any given second. Yet, there are people who can do exactly that, and I have received words of wisdom and advice from many of them. They have told me to try counting the seconds between each breath, to feel the blood pulsate through my veins, and to use a japamala to keep track of my prayers, but none of these have ever worked for me. Ultimately, despite all the good advice I have learned, only I have the ability to find what best works for me through experimentation and good practice. I can choose to use the knowledge given to me, or I can discover it for myself. Whatever path I take, it's through my own means that I reach my final destination.
More relevant to all of us is the question of life after graduation. While many of us still wait for the final college decisions to come out, I find it necessary (at least for me) to take some time everyday to tell myself that in the long run, whatever college I end up at will not matter. While we struggle now to try to get into the universities of our dreams, the outcome that we end up with is simply beyond our reach. No matter where we end up, life is ultimately determined by our own choices, not what school we end up going to.
Our loves and passions drive who we become, not the school we end up at. We are all taught the same math, science, English, and history in school, but do all of us end up on the same path?
One may find joy on the stage, while another may find joy in the stars.
It's up to us to paint a new path on the canvas of life.
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