The mind is certainly the cause of both bondage and liberation for embodied beings.Attached to objects, it enslaves;free of objects, free.

This verse, almost identical to statements in the Amṛtabindu Upaniṣad, presents the central teaching on the role of the mind.Mano hetuḥ — the mind is the cause — of both bandha (bondage) and mokṣa (liberation).There is no external agent;the mind itself produces both states.

Viṣayāsaktam — attached to sense objects — the mind creates bondage.Every attachment is a chain, every desire a bondage.The problem is not the objects but the compulsive relationship with them.

Nirviṣayam — free from objects, without objects — the same mind liberates.It is not a different mind nor a destroyed mind;It is the original mind recognized in its free nature.The Bihar School emphasizes that yoga does not fight the mind but rather purifies and redirects it.Haṭha yoga, working with prāṇa, offers an indirect but effective path: by calming prāṇa, the mind naturally becomes detached from its compulsive objects.