Chapter 6Verse 17 of 47

Bhagavad Gita 6.17

युक्ताहारविहारस्य युक्तचेष्टस्य कर्मसु | युक्तस्वप्नावबोधस्य योगो भवति दुःखहा ||

yuktāhāra-vihārasya yukta-ceṣṭasya karmasu | yukta-svapnāvabodhasya yogo bhavati duḥkha-hā ||

Translation

The devotion which destroys all misery is his, who takes due food and exercise, whose actions are properly regulated, and whose sleep and vigils are duly proportioned.

The same teaching said the other way around, as a reward. Eat the right amount. Move the right amount. Work the right amount. Sleep and wake the right amount. To the man who lives like this, the practice itself becomes the thing that ends suffering. The phrase at the end is not small. Yoga becomes the killer of grief. Not a help against it, not a comfort while it lasts, but the thing that puts it down. And it does so almost as a consequence of the steady, unflashy ordering of meals and hours. The romance is removed from the picture on purpose.

Reflection

What ordinary rhythm of meals and hours have you been treating as unimportant that this verse calls the floor?

Read this verse in its chapter: Chapter Six

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