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Disillusionment
Siddhartha could not simply ignore what he had seen. Power, wealth, and position became meaningless to him in the face of illness, old age, and death. His conception of life and what he was were turned upside down and inside out. He saw another possibility, however, in the presence and peace of the religious mendicant.
The first encounter with the mystery of being momentarily shatters the structures of ordinary life. When everything falls away, a moment of opening takes place. In that moment, we are free - free from the fetters of beliefs and ideas about who and what we should be. In other words, in the midst of the destruction of our illusions about life, we experience being what we actually are - free, open awareness. Most of the time, we don't notice that freedom and open awareness. We're too busy putting our view of life back together. Even if we do notice it, we don't stay there for long. But we have, like Siddhartha, encountered the religious mendicant and the possibility of presence.
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