Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The True One has soaked all the way into the mind and lives there. He is forever steady and unchanging — He never comes and goes the way everything else does. Whoever holds close to that True One becomes spotlessly clean inside, and through the Guru's teaching, they merge into the True One completely.
This verse says the unchanging One lives inside us, and holding close to Him makes the mind clean.
It comes back to the shabad's first contrast: what changes and what never changes. Now it looks from the inside. Sach man andar rahi-aa samaa-ay — the True One has soaked into the mind and lives there. The first verse spoke of forms that come and go, and a One who is nihchal, unmoving. Now that unmoving One has made a home inside us. Sadaa sach nihchal aavai na jaa-ay — forever true and steady, He does not come and go.
Think how rare that is. Everything else comes and goes. Moods rise and fade. Friends move away. Toys break. Our bodies change. Even feelings we were sure would last forever quietly slip away. Building our peace on any of these is like building a sandcastle at the edge of the waves. They move, and our peace moves with them. The One within is the only thing that aavai na jaa-ay, never arrives and never leaves, because He was always there. Resting our heart on that is like finally standing on solid rock. The burning, restless mind of the earlier verse came from clutching things that will not hold still. The cure is to hold the One thing that never moves.
What happens to someone who holds close? Sachay laagai so man nirmal — their mind becomes nirmal, spotless. We do not scrub ourselves clean by force. We hold close to what is spotless, and the stains slip away, as an earlier shabad taught. Hold on to changing things and we pick up their dust. Hold on to the pure One, and His purity becomes ours. Then gurmatee sach samaavani-aa — through the Guru's teaching, we merge into the True One, like a clean drop joining a clean ocean. We become what we hold on to. So the whole secret is what we choose to hold.
What have you built happiness on that later "came and went" and let you down — and what in life feels like it never moves?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI