Patanjali identifies five fundamental afflictions (kleshas) that generate suffering; addiction emerges from and perpetuates these psychological wounds.
The kleshas—avidya (ignorance), asmita (ego), raga (attachment), dvesha (aversion), and abhinivesha (fear of death)—form Patanjali's map of human psychological affliction. Addiction intimately involves all five: ignorance about addiction's nature and consequences, ego investment in the addict identity, attachment to the substance or behavior's promised relief, aversion to uncomfortable emotions, and denial of mortality's reality. Rather than viewing addiction as a single disease, the kleshas framework reveals it as a complex psychological knot where multiple afflictions reinforce each other. This multi-layered understanding transforms treatment: addressing addiction requires not just behavior change but healing of the underlying afflictions through yoga practice, ethical development, and meditation. Modern trauma-informed addiction treatment implicitly recognizes this: recovery requires processing emotional wounds, recalibrating identity, and developing distress tolerance—precisely the psychological work the kleshas framework illuminates.
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