I’ve been thinking about an old story from the Mahabharata lately, one that keeps coming back to me. It’s about Karna and Duryodhana, two friends bound by loyalty. Karna, given away as a baby, grew up facing endless whispers about his birth. In Duryodhana, he found more than just protection – he found validation, someone who made him feel seen and worthy when others looked away. This validation created such deep gratitude in Karna that he stayed, even as Duryodhana walked a darker path.
Sitting with this story, I began to see something in myself. We all have our own version of Duryodhana, but it’s not another person – it’s a voice inside us. I’ve come to know this voice well. It validates every hurt, justifies every reaction, makes every emotion feel right and true. Just like Duryodhana did for Karna, this voice makes us feel understood, making it harder to see how it slowly leads us into darkness.
At first, it feels like comfort. Like having a friend who always takes your side, who has an explanation for every emotion, a reason for every reaction. But lately, I’ve noticed something about this inner voice – it never lets me move forward. Instead, it keeps me centered in my own story, making everything about me, my hurts, my reactions. When I listen to it, I sink deeper into darkness, into fear and anger that feel impossible to escape.
The strange thing is, even when I realized this wasn’t helping me grow, I found myself so deeply entangled with this voice that I couldn’t tell where it ended and I began. It had become such a part of my identity that the thought of letting it go felt like losing a piece of myself. I was stuck, not because the voice was helping me, but because I had forgotten how to exist without its constant validation.
But here’s what I’m learning – letting go doesn’t have to be a battle. Just like a plant withers without water, this part of ourselves grows quiet when we stop feeding it our energy. We don’t need to fight it. We just need to gently turn away, to say, “I understand you were trying to protect me, but I don’t need this protection anymore.”
Sometimes I still hear that voice. But now I know I have a choice. I can either get tangled in its story of hurt, or I can simply return to this moment, where life is actually happening. It’s like stepping out of a dark room into sunlight – suddenly everything is clearer, more alive.
In these moments of clarity, I feel closer to something bigger than myself. Not lost in yesterday’s pain or tomorrow’s fears, but here – where peace lives, where love flows, where I can finally be who I’m meant to be.
I’m discovering that true freedom isn’t just about breaking free from that voice – it’s about releasing ourselves from all these stories we’ve wrapped so tightly around ourselves. When we stop making everything about us, stop needing that constant validation, something shifts. We find ourselves able to move more freely, to see beyond our own small world of hurts and reactions.
And when that old familiar voice comes back? I remind myself: I don’t need to push it away. I don’t need to feel stuck in its grip. I just need to let it be, while choosing to stay here, in this moment, where life is actually happening.
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