Death of Ego R.K.

It is the point where Siddhartha realizes that he does not need to try to rid his ego, and this is the first time he has actually experienced that pleasures and wealth are not valued things. Something within Siddhartha has dies, and it was something that was longing to die for a long time. He is now like a child, so full of joy, confidence and he is fearless. The old Siddhartha has dies and he has been reborn into a new person, a new Siddhartha. He realizes that the fight against his ego has become futile. He had been putting in too much effort, too much striving and too much knowledge. He realizes that his ego had only grown when he was trying to eliminate it. Siddhartha thinks that he has been being too arrogant, and his conscious had been right the entire time. He is just now starting to listen to it. No teacher could ever save Siddhartha. He had to go into the world and abandon himself until the shramana and ascetic within him were gone. The river had told him something, and he still feels as if the river has to tell him something. I think that this is the first step of enlightenment in the book for Siddhartha. He is just now experiencing the real world. I feel like he had been very stereotypical before, this meaning that he had been following the rules of the shramanas and ascetics, trying too hard to be enlightened. Now, he knows how to rid his ego, and the first step in becoming enlightened.