Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The Name is right here with you the whole time — but you keep forgetting to actually hold it in your heart.
Instead you've tied your attention to the very things you'll one day have to put down.
The quiet tragedy: what you're desperate for is already present ("the Name is always with you"), while you pour your attention into what you'll inevitably lose ("that which you must eventually abandon"). It's a picture of misplaced attention — the treasure at hand ignored, the perishable clutched. Guru Arjan isn't shaming; he's redirecting. Notice where your attention actually goes all day, and ask whether it's going toward what stays or what leaves.
Where does most of your attention go during a normal day? Is it toward what lasts or what fades?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI