The Shala Daily

Here’s a paradox that would have made Patanjali smile: the smarter you are, the more confident you are in your own objectivity—and the more wrong you’re likely to be about it. Research on what psychologists call the “bias blind spot” reveals something the yogis named millennia ago: we see clearly the biases in others while remaining remarkably blind to our own.

In Sanskrit, this fundamental blindness has a name: avidya. Usually translated as “ignorance” or “spiritual blindness,” avidya is identified in the Yoga Sutras as the root klesha—the foundational obstacle from which all other suffering flows. It’s not ignorance of facts, but something more subtle: a distorted perception that mistakes the impermanent for permanent, the impure for pure, the painful for pleasurable, and the not-self for self.

Recent cognitive science research maps this territory with striking precision. A landmark study by West, Meserve, and Stanovich found that when participants were shown descriptions of various cognitive biases and asked to rate their own susceptibility versus that of others, a consistent pattern emerged: people saw themselves as significantly less biased than average. Even more telling, this blind spot was observed across all bias types and was positively correlated with cognitive sophistication. The experts weren’t exempt—they were often the most blind to their own blindness.

👁️ The Architecture of Not-Seeing

The research identifies several mechanisms behind the bias blind spot that echo yogic teachings on the kleshas. Confirmation bias—our tendency to seek information that supports existing beliefs—mirrors how avidya perpetuates itself. We don’t see what we’re not looking for. The affect heuristic, where emotions drive decisions we then rationalize as logical, recalls the teaching that avidya operates beneath conscious awareness, coloring perception before we’re even aware we’re perceiving.

What’s particularly striking is how the blind spot persists even when we’re told about it. Research shows that even people who acknowledge cognitive bias as a general phenomenon tend to exempt themselves from its effects. This is avidya’s signature move: it creates the very conditions that make it invisible to itself. As Swami Satyananda Saraswati noted, avidya “distorts our understanding of reality, fostering a sense of separation and confusion.”

The research also confirms what yogis have long taught: expertise doesn’t protect us. In crisis decision-making studies, even crisis experts—while less susceptible than laypeople—remained significantly affected by framing bias, anchoring bias, and the bias blind spot itself. Knowledge alone cannot dissolve avidya. Something else is required.

🔥 The Practice of Seeing Clearly

This is where svadhyaya—self-study—becomes essential. The Yoga Sutras don’t prescribe simply reading about bias or understanding it intellectually. They prescribe practice: the sustained, disciplined attention to our own mental processes that reveals how we construct reality moment by moment. Tapas, the fire of discipline, burns through the comfortable fog of self-deception.

The cognitive research offers a parallel insight: to mitigate bias, we need external checks. We need systems, processes, and other people who can see what we cannot. This is sangha—spiritual community—in action. It’s why the tradition emphasizes the importance of teachers, why peer review exists in science, why accountability partners matter in any transformative work. We cannot see our own blind spots alone.

There’s also the practice of pratipaksha bhavana—cultivating the opposite thought. When we notice ourselves dismissing evidence that challenges our position, we can deliberately consider the strongest case for the opposing view. When we catch ourselves assuming our perception is objective, we can ask: What am I not seeing? What would change if I were wrong?

🌅 From Blindness to Vidya

The opposite of avidya is vidya—true knowledge, clear seeing. The path from one to the other isn’t about accumulating more information but about developing what the yogis call viveka—discrimination, discernment, the capacity to distinguish between what’s real and what our conditioning projects onto reality.

This is humbling work. The research suggests that simply knowing about the bias blind spot doesn’t eliminate it. Similarly, simply knowing about avidya doesn’t dissolve it. What changes us is practice—the daily, unglamorous work of watching the mind, questioning our certainties, and remaining curious about what we might be missing.

Perhaps the most practical teaching is this: when we’re most certain, that’s often when we need to be most careful. The feeling of objectivity is itself a red flag. As one researcher noted, people who were told to introspect about their own potential biases were often more confident in their objectivity—because they’d looked inward and, predictably, found nothing suspicious. The search itself became the proof. Avidya is clever that way.

The yogic response isn’t despair but practice. We can’t think our way out of avidya, but we can practice our way through it—one moment of honest seeing at a time.