Why We Keep Ourselves From Hard Work

1:29·1080p·Part 5 of 5·Hindi audio, English subtitles

“And so, whenever we try to keep our children away from labor and sorrow, do we not in truth close off the very path to their happiness?”

Krishna, in this teaching

About this teaching

Drawn from the teaching's own words — auto-transcribed and translated. The full transcript is further down.

Chapter 2 — Parents

Chapter 2 of 35 — 5 parts, 10 min in total.

Parents, and the long shadow their wishes cast over their children.

Almost every catastrophe in the Mahabharata can be traced to a parent. Dhritarashtra cannot refuse his son. Gandhari blindfolds herself rather than see. Kunti abandons a child and keeps the secret for a lifetime. Shantanu's desire costs Bhishma everything.

The epic is unusually clear-eyed here: it does not present parents as villains, but as people whose love, unexamined, becomes the instrument of harm. What a parent wants for a child and what the child owes the world are not the same thing, and the gap between them drives much of the plot.

Terms you'll hear

Pitr-rina: The debt owed to one's forebears — a real obligation in dharmic thought, and one the epic keeps testing.

Background on the theme of this chapter, not a summary of this particular clip. Watch it for what Krishna actually says.

Transcript

English translation

It is human nature to desire the greatest possible happiness for oneself, for one's family, for one's children. For this very reason we keep ourselves forever apart from labor and hardship, and strive to increase our rest and our comforts. Reflect upon your own life — is it not true that we are forever arranging rest and comfort for our children? But have we ever thought what benefit rest alone can bring? What is the life of those who receive only ease and comfort? When the body labors, it grows more healthy; when the intellect (buddhi) faces hard challenges, it grows more brilliant. This is the experience of us all. Yet perhaps we forget that when the mind and the soul (Atman) meet with difficulties, they too grow stronger. And so, whenever we try to keep our children away from labor and sorrow, do we not in truth close off the very path to their happiness? Reflect on it yourself.

हिन्दी — as spoken

मनुश्य का स्वभाव है कि वो स्वयम को, अपने परिवार को, अपनी संतानों को अधिक्तम सुख प्राप्त हो ऐसी इच्छा रखता है इसी कारण से हम सदा श्रम और कश्ट से अंतर रखते हैं विश्राम और सुविधाओं को बढ़ाने का प्रयास करते हैं स्वयम अपने जीवन का विचार कीजे क्या ये सत्य नहीं? कि हम अपनी संतानों के लिए सदा ही विश्राम और सुविधा का आयोजन करते हैं पर क्या कभी सोचा है? केवल विश्राम से क्या लाप प्राप्त होता है? केवल सुख और सुविधा जिने प्राप्थ हो उनका जीवन कैसा होता है शरीर जब श्रम करता है तो अधिक स्वस्थ बनता है बुद्धी भी जब कठिन चुनोतियों का सामना करती है तो अधिक तेजस्वी बनती है ये हम सबका अनुभव है पर हम शायद ये भूल जाते हैं कि मन और आत्मा को जब कठिनाईया प्राप्थ होती है तब वे भी अधिक बलवान होती है अर्थाद जब भी हम अपनी संतानों को श्रम और दुख से दूर रखने का प्रयास करते हैं क्या वास्तव में उनके सुख का मार्ग बंद नहीं कर देते हैं स्वेम विचार कीजिए

Auto-transcribed from the audio; lightly imperfect on Sanskrit names and terms.