Siddhartha Struggles

Siddhartha’s struggle to decide between his spiritual needs and his worldly wants/needs is an important factor in his reaching of nirvana. After Siddhartha falls asleep by the river he has the realization of why he struggled with finding Nirvana. This struggle and this eventual recognition was a key part of Siddhartha's Nirvana. As Siddhartha reflects he “ now realized why he struggled in vain with himself when he was a Brahman and ascetic. Too much knowledge had hindered him” (p. 80, Hesse). Siddhartha’s struggle to achieve his goal with the conventional methods because he had a thirst for knowledge, which was not satisfied by the methods he tried. However this struggle was necessary. Without this struggle he would never have begun his journey that led to his Nirvana.

When Siddhartha was reflecting after his long rest by the river “he [realized that he] could have remained much longer with Kamaswami, made and squandered money, fed his body neglected his soul” (p. 79). Siddhartha struggles between completing his spiritual needs while still fulfilling his earthly wants and needs. It is through this struggle that Siddhartha comes to a key conclusion that, contrary to the beliefs or the former teachings he received, you must have experienced desires to truly rid one of oneself and reach nirvana. Nonetheless the suffering of his soul and the struggle to ease that ache was necessary, as it led to his nirvana, a point he would have reached without it. As Siddhartha lived a lavished life he noticed “slowly the soul sickness of the rich crept over him…...property, possessions and riches had trapped him. They were no longer a game and a toy; they had become a chain and a burden” (p. 63). It is in Siddhartha’s new found lifestyle, of riches and Worldly possessions, that he causes his soul great