Lauren Jauregui

The source of the river was compared to the past and its mouth to the future; since the source and mouth of a river coexist, therefore past and future could also exist simultaneously. • Everything from his childhood to his old age, and indeed all his previous lives, were contained in his present self.

Om

The concept of Om, which signifies the oneness and unity of all things, marks key moments of awakening for Siddhartha. Siddhartha’s ability to finally comprehend Om is his entrance into enlightenment, but along the way he encounters the idea a number of times, each time sparking a change within him. He first encounters Om in his training as a Brahmin. He realizes that though he has been taught what Om should mean, none of those around him have fully achieved an understanding of it in their own lives. People who chant the word and understand the concept intellectually surround him, but their lives do not reflect the enlightenment that comes from fully embracing the energy of Om. He hears Om again when he stands near the river contemplating suicide. Realizing that life itself is indestructible, he must learn to just “be,” not try to force his life along specific paths. Essentially, he is trying to merge with Om, which he recognizes as being all around him, rather than continuously search for a philosophy that accesses it on an intellectual basis. At the end of the novel, the more he listens to the river, the more aware he becomes of the complexity of Om and how it involves not only the physical and spiritual world but also time itself. When he finally comprehends the word in its entirety and understands that all things exist at the same moment, all possibilities are real and valid, and time itself is meaningless, he finally achieves enlightenment.

Siddhartha battles with other polar opposites as well, such as time/timelessness and attachment/detachment, but in these, too, he finds that embracing one and rejecting the other does not