Buddha

Anytime there is a mention of the role of a mentor, my mind goes back to the chapter-long dialogue between Siddhartha and Buddha; where Siddhartha effectively tells Buddha that I don't want to be your disciple - not because you are not the best teacher, but because you can't teach me how to be a "Buddha"! And I don't want to be a "Buddhist", I want to be a "Buddha"!

Fortunately - and mostly from my initial years at work - I may claim to have come across a handful of people - however small - who have this very clear streak of the "Buddha" in them. I have seen them withdraw into their reclusive shell, psychologically shutting off the world around; and then working in that mode for inhuman hours, through inhuman hours; day in, day out - and yet remain utterly untouched by all the seeming toil. They learn intensely in this continuous mode, by doing and by experiencing everything for themselves; not by seeing others do. These are the same people who would assure you that a worthy mentor is just too hard to come by, and that even then your mentor really can't groom you up..

Signing off with these very compelling words from Siddhartha -

"It has come to you in the course of your own search, on your own path, through thoughts, through meditation, through realizations, through enlightenment. It has not come to you by means of teachings!... You will not be able to convey and say to anybody, oh venerable one, in words and through teachings what has happened to you in the hour of enlightenment! The teachings of the enlightened Buddha contain much, it teaches many to live righteously, to avoid evil. But there is one thing which these so clear, these so venerable teachings do not contain: they do not contain the mystery of what the exalted one has experienced for himself, he alone among hundreds of thousands."