Vidya and Avidya: Knowledge and the Veil

In Hindu philosophy, vidya is true knowledge and avidya is ignorance or illusion—the veil that obscures reality. Your former identity may have been largely constructed from avidya: inherited beliefs, unquestioned assumptions, the stories you were told about who you should be. Losing that identity means avidya is lifting, and vidya—true knowing—is emerging, though it may feel disorienting. Mirabai's journey involved rejecting the avidya of her royal identity and prescribed role, moving toward the vidya of her direct experience with the divine. Your grief for who you were is partly grief for the loss of comfortable illusion. But as vidya grows, you understand that maintaining that former self required constant effort to sustain the lie. Losing it is exhausting, but it's also clarifying. The person you were depended on not seeing certain truths. The person you're becoming is one who sees more clearly, even when that clarity is painful.