Viveka Khyati and the Final Discrimination
The final, irreversible discrimination (Viveka Khyati) is the fruit of sustained non-attachment and practice: consciousness permanently recognizing the difference between itself (Purusha) and everything else (Prakriti), ending the confusion that is the cause of all suffering.
Sutra 2.28 states that from consistent practice of the eight limbs, impurities diminish and the lamp of knowledge burns until Viveka Khyati (discriminative wisdom, the perception of distinction) is reached. This is not a momentary experience of clarity but a permanent, unbroken recognition: consciousness is seen clearly, once and for all, as different in kind from everything it has ever experienced or will experience. The meditator who achieves Viveka Khyati cannot thereafter believe themselves to be their thoughts, emotions, body, or any constructed identity — just as a person who has woken up cannot again believe they are their dream character. This irreversibility is the criterion by which genuine liberation is distinguished from temporary mystical experience.
From consistent practice of the eight limbs, discrimination illuminates the way to liberation.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj's I Am That documents the phenomenology of irreversible Viveka Khyati in modern terms: 'When I look inside and see that I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I look outside and see that I am everything, that is love. Between these two my life turns.'
Yoga Sutras of Patanjali