Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
People live out the patterns they've built up over time — the seeds they planted come up as the life they harvest. But serving the True Teacher brings a steady, lasting peace. You don't stumble onto the Guru by accident: it takes a kind of grace, a good fortune — and then, through the **shabad**, you're united with the One.
This verse says our past shapes us, but the Guru can open a new way, and even finding the Guru is a gift.
The first line is poorab likhi-aa so karam kamaa-i-aa: "what was written before, they live out." It touches on karam, the long chain of cause and effect. We live out the patterns we have laid down. Kindness tends to grow more kindness. Grabbing tends to grow more grabbing. You can feel this with any habit. Practice something every day and it gets stronger. Who you have been shapes who you are now. That isn't a cruel fate stamped on you. It is just the natural way actions grow into character.
Then Guru Amar Das makes an important turn. The chain is not the final word. Satgur sayv sadaa sukh paa-i-aa means "serving the True Guru, lasting peace is found." The Guru can break the old pattern and open a door the chain alone would never reach. Think of a river cutting the same path year after year. Karma is the current. The Guru is how you find a new channel. That is very hopeful. You are never simply trapped in your past.
So how do you reach the Guru who can free you? Bin bhaagaa gur paa-ee-ai naahee means "without good fortune, the Guru is not found." Bhaag is good fortune, grace, a gift. This keeps us from getting proud. Meeting the Guru isn't something you cleverly earned. It is a present that arrives. Even the freedom from old patterns is received, not grabbed.
And how does the joining happen? Sabdai mayl milaavani-aa means "through the Word, they are joined in union." The shabad, the Guru's Word, reaches deep and joins the soul to the One. Grace brings you to the Guru. The Guru's Word carries you home.
What's one habit you've "planted" that's now growing on its own — and is it one you'd want to keep harvesting?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI