What is Sāṃkhya? Samkhya is one of the oldest schools of Indian philosophy. It’s dualistic, meaning it says reality has two fundamentally different ingredients:

1. Purusha (pure consciousness), the silent witness, that is passive, unchanging, aware. It is not the body, not the mind, just the observer

2. Prakriti (nature / matter), everything that is subject to change, everything that is material, including our body, mind, emotions, and thoughts. Samkhya list 25 attributes through which Prakriti, or mother nature operates. This whole structure explains how the intellect (buddhi) and ego (ahamkara) arise, what the world is made of (elements), and how experience happens (senses + mind).

In Samkhya, even your mind emanates from Prakriti. First, your Buddhi (intellect), your ability to understand, judge, decide, (“this is good,” “this is true”), and from that develops Ahaṃkāra (ego), the feeling of “I am this” (“I am tired” “I am smart”)

Sāṃkhya says suffering is caused by a mistaken identity, by believing for instance that “I am tired” (Ahamkara, Ego, Prakriti) instead of “I am that” (Purusha, Pure Consciousness), in other terms, mistaking the observer (Purusha) for the mind-body system (Prakriti).

According to Sāṃkhya, Liberation happens when you realise that you are not your body nor your mind, but you are the pure observer, separate from everything else. In Samkhya, you are like a person watching a movie, while your thoughts, emotions, and life events are the film on the screen. Suffering happens when you forget you’re the viewer and start believing you are the character, getting completely caught in the drama…