“As Vasudeva rose from the seat on the river bank, when he looked into Siddhartha's eyes and saw the serenity of knowledge shining in them, he touched his shoulder gently in his kind protective way and said: ‘I have waited for this hour, my friend. Now that it has arrived, let me go’” (Hesse 136-137). At this point and time in the novella, Siddhartha had learned everything he could from the river. An important lesson he learned was listening. The novella states “He felt that he had now completely learned the art of listening” (Hesse). Siddhartha had learned how to go into another being, but he never learned to listen to another being. This lesson is important, because he wanted only to learn from himself, but the river teaches him to listen to everything; to learn from everything. Most importantly, the river helped him reach Atman. Atman is what he was searching for through his entire journey. The most important lesson that he learned was from the