Bhagavad Gita 18.36

sukhaṁ tv idānīṁ tri-vidhaṁ

śṛṇu me bharatarṣabha

abhyāsād ramate yatra

duḥkhāntaṁ ca nigacchati

 

Now, O best of Bharatas, hear,

Of threefold happiness found here;

That which through practice brings delight,

And leads beyond distress’s dark night.

 

My dear Lord, you have made me an innately pleasure-seeking being. And yet, while the whole world is filled with pleasures and my senses clamor for them, those very pleasures entice and entrap me into greater and greater states of suffering. This is the defining dilemma of my existence.

O benevolent Lord, you reveal here the way out of this dilemma: seek the form of happiness that ends all distress—and that extraordinary happiness becomes accessible through practice.

O omnipotent Lord, empower me to dedicate myself to such practice through persistence and abstinence. Help me persist in pursuing that liberating happiness, which comes from remembering you, serving you, and loving you—or more precisely, making you the supreme object of my love. And help me abstain from other forms of happiness that take me away from you.

O Lord of all love, let me practice persistence and abstinence not merely as exercises of my will, but as expressions of my love, or at least of my intention to love you. Please strengthen my devotional intention with these twin conviction: it is the misdirection of my love that drives me toward the happiness that ends in distress; and it is the redirection of my love toward you that will draw me to the happiness that ends all distress.

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18.36 O best of the Bhāratas, now please hear from Me about the three kinds of happiness by which the conditioned soul enjoys, and by which he sometimes comes to the end of all distress.