श्रीभगवानुवाच
असंशयं महाबाहो मनो दुर्निग्रहं चलम्
अभ्यासेन तु कौन्तेय वैराग्येण च गृह्यते
śrī-bhagavān uvāca
asaṃśayaṃ mahā-bāho
mano durnigrahaṃ calam
abhyāsena tu kaunteya
vairāgyeṇa ca gṛhyate
SYNONYMS
TRANSLATION
The Lord said:
The mind is hard to subdue and fickle, no doubt, O mighty-armed one, but, O son of Kunti, by practice and by the exercise of dispassion it can be brought under control.
PURPORT
No doubt, the mind is hard to subdue on account of its fickle nature. However, it can be subdued with difficulty by cultivating favourable attitude in the direction of the self by repeated contemplation of Its being a mine of auspicious attributes (these being eternality, self-luminosity, bliss, freedom from Karma, purity etc.), and by the absence of hankering produced by seeing the host of evil qualities in objects other than the self hankered for.