Jnana Yoga: Asking Who We Really Are
When I first heard about yoga, I thought it was just stretching and breathing, but the more I read, the more I realized yoga is about way more than fitness – it’s about finding out who we really are. Out of all the paths of yoga, the one that hits me the hardest is Jnana Yoga, the path of knowledge. It’s not about memorizing facts or acing tests; it’s about wisdom, self-inquiry, and asking questions that go deeper than what we usually bother with.
The main question of Jnana Yoga is super simple to ask, but not simple to answer: “Who am I?” At first, I’d probably respond with things like: I’m a student, a daughter, a friend, but when I think about it, those are just labels. They change. I won’t be a high school student forever. Even my personality changes – I’m not the same person I was when I was thirteen, and I won’t be the same at twenty-five. So if all those things shift, then who’s the me that doesn’t change?
Jnana Yoga teaches that our true self isn’t the body, which gets older, or the mind, which is constantly spinning with thoughts and feelings. The real self is awareness – the part of us that watches everything else happen. It’s like the sky behind the clouds: always there, even if we forget to notice it. That idea is kind of comforting, especially as someone who’s seventeen and always being told to “figure out who I am.” Maybe the answer isn’t about picking the right career or fitting into the right group, but about realizing that my deepest identity is already whole.
I think what makes Jnana Yoga powerful is that it challenges us not to settle for surface answers. It’s scary to question yourself like that, but also freeing. For me, it’s a reminder that I’m more than my grade point average, more than my insecurities, and more than what other people think. Jnana Yoga doesn’t mean I have everything figured out – it just gives me a different way to look at life, one that feels honest and a little more real.
