Common misconception

It is not a trance or withdrawal; the jivanmukta lives ordinarily, but without the knot of ego and craving.

The question it leaves you holding

If someone were already free, how would their everyday actions look any different from yours?

Schools that center this concept

• Advaita Vedanta — Shankara's non-dualism: only Brahman is real; the individual self is that one Self, mistaking itself as many.
• Yoga — Patanjali's discipline: still the mind's movements and the Self rests in its own nature, free of nature's play.

Questions to explore

• How can someone be liberated and still have a body and a life?
• Which schools accept jivanmukti, and which deny it?