Yoga Vasiṣṭha approaches suffering by locating its root in ignorance of one’s true nature as pure consciousness. What is ordinarily taken to be the solid world of objects, bodies, and events is repeatedly described as a kind of dream or mental projection, appearing within consciousness but lacking independent reality. When consciousness identifies with the body–mind complex and the egoic “I,” there arises a sense of separation from the whole, and with that separation come desire, fear, attachment, and aversion. These movements of the mind generate the experience of bondage and the cycle of birth and death, so that pleasure and pain seem to be imposed from outside, even though they are actually arising within awareness itself. Suffering, then, is not an inherent property of the world, but a mode of the mind conditioned by ignorance.

The cessation of suffering is presented as the fruit of self-knowledge, the direct recognition that one’s essential nature is the unchanging witness-consciousness, not the shifting play of thoughts, sensations, and roles. When it is clearly seen that all phenomena—body, world, and even the sense of bondage—are appearances in the Self, their power to wound or bind falls away. This is not merely an intellectual conviction but a stable insight in which it is evident that nothing truly happens to the pure awareness that one is. From this standpoint, even the notions of bondage and liberation are understood as conceptual waves within consciousness, without ultimate solidity. Yet as long as the sense of suffering persists, the text speaks meaningfully of a path and a goal.

That path is described primarily in terms of transformation and quieting of the mind. Discriminative inquiry (viveka or vicāra) is urged: examining who the sufferer is, what the “I” really denotes, and what status the world actually has. Alongside this inquiry, the cultivation of detachment from transient objects and results, equanimity amid pleasure and pain, and a steady, tranquil mind is emphasized. Through sustained practice of such inquiry and non-attachment, the deep-seated tendencies that perpetuate ignorance and agitation are gradually dissolved, leading to what is called the extinction of the mind—not physical death, but the ending of ignorance, craving, and restless conceptualization. In this clarity, liberation while living becomes possible: life continues in appearance, but inwardly there is freedom from disturbance, and with that freedom, the effective end of suffering.