Pañca kleśa

Avidya represents a fundamental spiritual forgetfulness, positing ignorance as the root from which other kleshas spring. It embodies the misapprehension or absence of knowledge regarding our true nature. Avidya is the veil that obscures truth and casts the projection of illusion, mistaking the ephemeral for the permanent, superficial for the profound, pain for the pleasure (Tomar, 2024). Avidyā is the root of all mental afflictions, recognizing it is the first step in transformation. Avidyā manifests through habitual identification with transient emotions, desires, and social roles, which fosters ego-centric behaviour and obstructs growth. While such self-knowledge may provide confidence, it can hinder intellectual, personal, and spiritual development unless recognized as provisional and transcendable. The yoga path addresses this through disciplined cultivation of detachment (vairāgya), meditation, and moral foundations (yama and niyama), which include virtues like non-violence, truthfulness, contentment, and devotion (Jakubczak, 2004).

Emerging from avidya, when we forget our true nature, we assume a different false nature, it is called Asmita. Everything we write on our resume is Asmita. This misidentification complicates the distinction between the atman and its external environment, making us believe that our superficial identities define us (Tomar, 2024). Asmita is identified as the second klesha, egoism or misidentifying with the “I” sense. Alongside the other roles of kleshas, this review emphasizes how introspective self-awareness through yoga dismantles such false identifications, aiding self-regulation across body, mind, and environment (Roche, 2018).

It is an obsession to reexperience pleasure again and again or repeatedly, absence of which creates misery. We feel attached to everything which endorses our ego or limited identity-Asmita (Tomar, 2024). Rāga is an attachment born from past pleasures, which binds the mind and sustains craving. This links it to Western ideas like conditioned preference and reinforcement learning but, unlike the generally neutral Western view, the Yoga tradition sees all attachment as a cause of disturbance (Jakubczak, 2004).

It is an obsession to avoid the possibility of re-experiencing the pain, failing which creates misery. We are averse to anything which threatens our false identity-Asmita (Tomar, 2024). Dveṣa is an aversion or repulsion that stems from past unpleasant experiences. In the Yoga view, it’s the mirror image of rāga, just as attachment binds us to pleasure, aversion binds us to pain by keeping negative memories and resistance alive. This relates it to Western concepts like avoidance learning and negative reinforcement but points out that Western psychology often treats aversion as adaptive for survival, whereas the Indian perspective sees it as another mental affliction that disturbs inner balance and perpetuates suffering (Jakubczak, 2004).

Characterised by an existential dread of death and a tenacious cling to life, abhinivesha haunts individuals, obscuring the understanding that death is a natural culmination of life, a mystery to be embraced rather than feared. Recognising the non-separation between life and death dispels this fear, revealing the path to wisdom (Tomar, 2024). Abhiniveśa is the deep-rooted clinging to life and fear of death, seen in Yoga philosophy as a universal instinct, even in the wise. It’s tied to the ego’s survival drive and is considered one of the most persistent kleshas. This compares it to Western views on the survival instinct, death anxiety, and theories like Terror Management Theory. The key difference is that while Western psychology often frames this fear as natural or even motivating, the Indian perspective treats it as a subtle bondage that must be transcended to achieve liberation (Jakubczak, 2004).

Kāma is the force of sensory and mental longing for pleasure, ranging from sexual attraction to any aesthetic or material enjoyment. In classical Hindu thought it is one of the four legitimate aims of life (puruṣārthas) when pursued in harmony with dharma, artha, and mokṣa, yet it becomes an “enemy” when it overrides moral restraint and clarity of mind (Yogapedia, n.d.).

Krodha is an agitated mental state that erupts when desire is obstructed, escalating ordinary displeasure (pratigha) into a readiness to harm. Listed among the twenty secondary unwholesome mental factors in Buddhist Abhidharma and among the six ripus in Hindu texts, it clouds judgment and propels violent or harsh action (Yogapedia, n.d.).

Lobha denotes grasping attachment to objects, status, or experience, an insatiable urge to acquire and hoard beyond need. Both Hindu Dharmaśāstra and Buddhist psychology class it as a root defilement that fetters the mind and fuels unethical speech and conduct (Yogapedia, n.d.).

Moha is the dull ignorance that veils the true nature of self and reality. Identified as one of the three poisons in Buddhism and a ripus in Hinduism, it fosters misperception, wrong decisions, and the cycle by which unmet desire leads from anger to further bewilderment (Bhagavad Gītā 2.62-63) (Yogapedia, n.d.).

Mada is intoxicating self-inflation, excessive pride in youth, wealth, learning, caste, or any worldly advantage. Texts describe it as a tamasic mental state that breeds complacency, disdain for others, and ultimately spiritual downfall; Buddhists classify it as “mental inflation,” a basis for other defilements (Yogapedia, n.d.).

Matsarya is the inability to rejoice in another’s success or to share one’s own possessions, clinging so tightly that one begrudges others’ happiness. Hindu Purāṇas treat it as a form of mental pain, while Buddhist Abhidharma defines it as stinginess rooted in passionate attachment (Yogapedia, n.d.).