Four Voices Argue Inside Your Head — Which One Runs You?

Manas is the wanting-and-doubting one. It throws up urges and second-guesses: I want this, no I don't, maybe later, what if. It is the restless child of the inner house — quick, loud, never still. Most of what we call 'my mind' is really just manas tugging at our sleeve.

Buddhi is the grown-up: the part that weighs, discerns and decides. When you pause and say, 'the craving is here, but it isn't worth it,' that calm voice is buddhi. It is the captain — when it is awake.

Chitta is the storeroom. Every impression, memory and old habit is filed here, and it floats things back up uninvited — a face, a regret, a tune. It is why the past keeps colouring the present.

Ahankara is the I-maker, the one that stamps 'me' and 'mine' on everything: my insult, my success, my opinion. The Gita gives the whole ladder in one line — senses below, manas above them, buddhi above manas, and beyond even buddhi, the Self. Notice where you usually live: down among the senses and the wanting, rarely up where the captain sits. And these four are not strangers to each other — they pass the day's work between them constantly, which is exactly why their voices feel like one. A want from manas, a memory from chitta, a verdict from buddhi, a 'mine' from ahankara: it all arrives as a single rush you simply call 'me.'

The first myth: the mind is an enemy to be crushed. But manas isn't bad — its wanting is what makes you reach for anything at all, a job, a person, a path. A house with no restless child is not peaceful; it is empty. The aim was never to kill manas, only to stop letting the child drive the car.

The second myth: my buddhi is always right, so my decisions are sound. The catch is that buddhi can be clouded. Tired, angry or afraid, it bends to whatever manas is screaming for — and we proudly call that a 'decision.' A sharp intellect serving a frightened want is not wisdom; it is a lawyer arguing for a verdict already bought.

The third, and deepest: I am my ego. We assume the 'I' that feels insulted or praised is simply us. But ahankara is only one of the four parts — a function, not your whole being. The very fact that you can watch your ego flare up means there is someone there doing the watching. You are not the part that shouts 'me.' You are the quiet one who notices it shout.

Picture the inner committee in session. Manas tables a want. Chitta pulls up an old memory to back it. Buddhi is supposed to chair the meeting and rule wisely. So why do we so often choose the thing we know is wrong?

Because a fifth move happens, fast and invisible: ahankara hijacks the chair. The ego slips into buddhi's seat and disguises a want as a judgement. 'I'm not being greedy — I deserve this.' 'I'm not being stubborn — I'm just principled.' The most dangerous lies we tell ourselves are the ones where ego wears the robes of reason. That, not raw desire, is what quietly runs most lives.

The old image for the fix is a chariot. The body is the chariot, the horses are the senses, manas is the reins, and buddhi is the charioteer. Let the reins flap loose and the horses bolt wherever they smell food. The whole practice is just this: put the charioteer back in charge. And the rider seated behind — calm, watching the whole ride, touched by none of it — is what they call the Self. You are not the horses, not the reins, not even the driver. You are the one for whom the journey is being made.

So why does this old map matter, beyond being a tidy list of four? Because it buys you a pause. As long as the four voices blur into one 'me,' every urge feels like my command and every dark thought feels like the truth about my life. But the moment you can murmur 'that's just manas wanting' or 'that's chitta replaying an old wound' or 'careful, that's ego dressed as logic,' a small gap opens. And freedom lives in that gap.

This is not about becoming cold or thought-free. It is about no longer being yanked around by whichever voice happens to be loudest. You stop obeying every want as an order, stop trusting every clever justification, stop taking every flare of ego as your final self.

You don't need years in a cave to begin. The next time you feel pulled, try one question before you act: who is talking right now — the child that wants, the memory that haunts, the ego that claims, or the calm one that can actually choose? You won't always get it right. But the asking itself moves you, gently, from being the noise to being the one who hears it. And that, repeated over a life, is the whole quiet work.