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Acharya Ruddrak (the son of sage Uddalak) who was a renowned teacher and scholar. He too could not fulfill the spiritual need of Siddhartha. Siddhartha then undertook a path of intense meditation and self mortification on the banks of the river Niranjana (Falgu). The practice of intense austerities made him frail and weak. At times he would become unconscious due to lack of food. Even with this practice of self mortification Siddhartha felt no closer to realizing the Truth. In this way many years passed during which he was performing arduous
austerities.
After living and practicing in this manner for many years, Siddhartha began to feel disheartened. It is believed that in this state of mind Siddhartha saw Lord Indra (the king of gods) in a dream. Indra was playing a stringed instrument. One string of this instrument was too tight and the sound coming from it was discordant, whil another string was too loose and was equally displeasing. A third string was neither too tight nor too loose and its sound was very pleasant. Siddhartha felt inspired that the lesson from this dream was that the middle way was the superior path. He could see that extreme austerities would not lead to the attainment of enlightenment. He realized that it was only proper to follow the middle path, and to abandon both the hard austerity of asceticism and the life of leisure.
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