Bhagavad Gita 15.1

ūrdhva-mūlam adhaḥ-śākham

aśvatthaṁ prāhur avyayam

chandāṁsi yasya parṇāni

yas taṁ veda sa veda-vit

 

A tree with roots above, branches below,

Eternal it is, the sages declare so;

Its leaves the Vedic hymns unfold,

Who knows this tree knows truth untold.

 

My dear Lord, many and mighty are the illusions of this world. Indeed, this world is a realm of illusion, and yet it is through this very world that I must journey toward the world of reality.

O omnipresent Lord, I need the realization to understand what really exists and what truly matters. Through the metaphor of the upside-down tree, you convey how this world is like a reflection and that there is another world which is the real one. Help me both intellectually understand and emotionally accept that much of what the world glamorizes—beauty, fame, power, wealth—is superficial. They do not really matter in the long run. What truly matters is love—especially lasting love, the love experienced in the relationship between me as the everlasting soul and you as the everlasting Lord.

O omnipotent Lord, lead me beyond realization to purification, where what I accept through perception also manifests in my preference. May my desires change so that the driving desire is not for the superficial or the illusory, but for the real and the substantial. Please work your magic in my heart so that desires for the superficial decline and disappear, and desires for the real are developed and become my driving desires. Thus whatever I desire, may I use it in the mood of service to you, the supreme desirable.

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15.01 The Supreme Personality of Godhead said: It is said that there is an imperishable banyan tree that has its roots upward and its branches down and whose leaves are the Vedic hymns. One who knows this tree is the knower of the Vedas.