Bhagavad Gita 16.16

aneka-citta-vibhrāntā

moha-jāla-samāvṛtāḥ

prasaktāḥ kāma-bhogeṣu

patanti narake ’śucau

With minds confused by countless schemes,

Ensnared within delusion’s dreams;

Attached to pleasures, bound by lust,

They fall to realms of filth and dust.

My dear Lord, desires tend to run wild within my mind and, if uncontrolled, make me run wild, craving and slaving to fulfill them. Those desires have now come to drive, dominate, and even define much of contemporary culture.

O merciful Lord, in this alarming scenario, let me never become hopeless, for you still remain in charge of both the world and my mind. Just as you are forever above illusion, my soul being your part seeks and needs to be above illusion. Let me not lament how much distraction there is in the world or how distracted I am. Instead, let me appreciate and activate that core soul within me.

O infallible Lord, help me move beyond condemning the distractions in the world to appreciating the dissatisfaction I feel with those distractions. Rather than resenting how addicted I am to my devices or condemning myself for that addiction, let me cherish the part of me that longs for something more, even when devices captivate in many ways—from suggestive and seductive to subtle and subversive.

O Lord of all cultures and ages, help me remember you as the ultimate shelter of my attention. Let your shelter energize me to create containers for my attention—such as spaces for meditation, pauses for reflection, practices for digital regulation such as prayer, and techniques. May I thus live for what is meaningful even amid the mind’s mess and the culture’s chaos.

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16.16 Thus perplexed by various anxieties and bound by a network of illusions, they become too strongly attached to sense enjoyment and fall down into hell.