Vairagya

Dispassion, absence of thirst for objects of experience. Together with abhyasa (practice), it forms the fundamental pair of means for achieving mental stillness.

It is not rejection or repression, but the natural loss of compulsive interest when the transitory nature of objects is understood. Patañjali distinguishes levels: from dispassion toward seen objects to supreme dispassion (para-vairagya) arising from knowledge of purusha.

Mature vairagya is a state of inner freedom, not deprivation. The yogi doesn’t renounce out of obligation; things simply cease to exert compulsive attraction.