"I keep chasing what has never made anyone happy."
The Arc
Two verses of honest self-observation. The rahaao (P0) admits how easily the dazzling world pulls one in, and asks for footing and the Name. P1 looks squarely at the pattern — chasing what satisfies no one, clinging to what abandons everyone. P2 resolves it not with willpower but with a single restful request: mercy, and the company of the good.
Key Vocabulary
mohay — enchanted, pulled in.
bikh-ee jee-o — a soul easily led off course (here: honest empty-handedness).
laptaa-o — clinging, wrapping around.
karunaapatay — lord of compassion.
saaDhsang samaa-o — merging into the good company.
Themes and Cross-Connections
The rueful honesty — appetite outrunning experience — is a recurring Guru Arjan note. The cure is never self-punishment but a change of company: dissolve the restlessness in the good rather than fight it head-on.
Translation Notes
bikh-ee jee-o (literally a "poisoned/tainted soul") is rendered as a soul easily pulled off course asking for footing, per the project's move from self-condemnation toward honest empty-handedness.
For Raag Soohee
The ache of chasing the wrong beloved and longing for the true one is Soohee's own emotional territory.
"I keep chasing what has never made anyone happy."
The Arc
Two verses of honest self-observation. The rahaao (P0) admits how easily the dazzling world pulls one in, and asks for footing and the Name. P1 looks squarely at the pattern — chasing what satisfies no one, clinging to what abandons everyone. P2 resolves it not with willpower but with a single restful request: mercy, and the company of the good.
Key Vocabulary
Themes and Cross-Connections
The rueful honesty — appetite outrunning experience — is a recurring Guru Arjan note. The cure is never self-punishment but a change of company: dissolve the restlessness in the good rather than fight it head-on.
Translation Notes
bikh-ee jee-o (literally a "poisoned/tainted soul") is rendered as a soul easily pulled off course asking for footing, per the project's move from self-condemnation toward honest empty-handedness.
For Raag Soohee
The ache of chasing the wrong beloved and longing for the true one is Soohee's own emotional territory.