Books in 2022: Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

Book #5

It was some odd day when while scrolling through twitter I found this book highly recommended by a friend. Ever since then I really wanted to read it. Now after I am done, I wouldn't shy away from saying that my friend was right. In fact so right that it is one of those rare books which I have rated 5/5 on goodreads.

Caution, do not judge the book by its cover! It is not at all about Buddha, at least not how I interpret it. It is about life journey of a guy named Siddhartha who pursued wisdom about life and world. Based on his experience he renounced all that was taught to him, abandoned his teachers and took his own journey to learn from the world. Siddhartha, in fact, met Gautam Buddha and had deep discourse about his teachings. He abandoned Buddha himself since he couldn't feel what Buddha felt while he got enlightened. Throughout his life Siddhartha makes lot of choices - good and bad, learns from them, listens to others' wisdom and finally reaches his enlightenment.

Book is heavy on philosophy. But, there are too many takeaway points to keep it aside. In fact, this could be one book that I want to keep by my side all through my life. The last conversation between Siddhartha and Vasudeva was so deep that I would want to read it again and again at every stage of my life, for I know that I will always learn something new out of it every time.

One another point apart from that conversation that touched my heart and mind was about the "time". We have always read how time is important, time is money, losing it cost us .. and what not! However, the book makes us think what if we remove time from our life equation? What if our life is just like a river that continues to flow from one point to another, there is no past and no future, everything is just present. Wouldn't all our problems just vanish?

"Yes, Siddhartha," he spoke. "It is this what you mean, isn't it: that the river is everywhere at once, at the source and at the mouth, at the waterfall, at the ferry, at the rapids, in the sea, in the mountains, everywhere at once, and that there is only the present time for it, not the shadow of the past, not the shadow of the future?" "This it is," said Siddhartha. "And when I had learned it, I looked at my life, and it was also a river, and the boy Siddhartha was only separated from the man Siddhartha and from the old man Siddhartha by a shadow, not by something real. Also, Siddhartha's previous births were no past, and his death and his return to Brahma was no future. Nothing was, nothing will be; everything is, everything has existence and is present."