While praying how can we cultivate emotions without becoming sahajiyaic?

Transcript

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not become sahajiyai while expressing our emotions? And at the same time, how do we express our emotions? Yes. Sahajiyaism essentially means that it comes from the word sahaj.
Sahaj means to take it easy. So where people do not follow a process of purification, but just assume that they are purified. So Bhaktivinoda Thakur used the example of a woman who is not pregnant, but acts as if she is having labor pains.
Even if no matter how much labor pains she has, she is not going to deliver a child. So like that, there has to be a conception, gestation, and then we deliver. So like that, there is a systematic practice of bhakti, which is when we connect with the spiritual master, when we get the Bhakti Vrata Beach, then that Bhakti Vrata Beach gestates in our heart and it grows and then spiritual emotions manifest.
So if one diverses the practice of bhakti and imagines that the fruit of bhakti is there in terms of emotions, then that essentially is sahajiyaism. So as far as sadhakas are practicing bhakti seriously, they are following the process and if we experience emotions in the process of bhakti, during the practice of bhakti, then that is very good. We should see those emotions as gifts of Krishna, as special blessings which Krishna has bestowed and we cherish those blessings.
Cherish those blessings gratefully, cherish them in our heart and whenever we later on feel dry, we feel as if no bhakti in my heart, we can remember, yes, I did experience those emotions. That means these emotions are real and if I keep practicing, these emotions will recur in future. But for serious sadhakas, the problem may come in two folds.
One is that we consider only those emotions as a sign of devotion. That means when we realize there is no emotion, that means there is no devotion. No, devotion is a steady process, just like our worldly desires are there.
Now, if you keep practicing bhakti, the inborn desires will slowly go down, the graph will keep going down. But even by going down, sometimes there will be certain spikes. Suddenly we may feel lust coming up, suddenly greed coming up, suddenly anger coming up.
So those spikes, it is called rittam, spiritual survival. So like that, even our attraction towards Krishna, by the steady practice of bhakti, the graph will be going up. While the graph is gradually going up, sometimes there will be positive spikes also.
Sometimes we will experience intense emotions in bhakti and if we experience that, we see that as a precursor of what is awaiting us in future. But when we don’t experience those spikes, we start thinking, oh, this process of bhakti is not working only. And what is the use of practicing? So if the absence of emotion becomes our justification for giving up devotion, then that is surging.
That is the first thing. Second thing is that if we experience some emotions and then we start bragging about it to everyone else. You know, when I went into Darshan, I got tears in my eyes and this and that.
We can talk about this with our intimate friends, but there is no need for us to display that in public to everyone else. Because then it becomes not so much a matter of inner attraction towards Krishna, it becomes more a matter of outer ostentation. And that is not what we desire.
So if we are not doing that, like sometimes one person came to Prabhupada and he said, Krishna came in my dream yesterday night. Prabhupada said, serve him today. Okay, good that Krishna came in the dream.
But Krishna coming in the dream is not going to make us liberated. What we do after waking up is going to make us liberated. It is for us to practice bhakti.
So if we get these extraordinary experiences, which may be if we talk of a dream or if it comes out of spiritual experience or mystical experience, that is very good. If it comes well, then good. But the important thing is what is the result on us? What is the transformation that happens to us by that? So if the experiences are what is expected in the path of bhakti, there is a book called Madhuri Kadambiri, which describes the advances of bhakti and you can read that.
And if we are getting advanced glimpses of those emotions, that is wonderful. So rather than rejecting or suppressing those emotions in the fear of being Sahajiyai, we focus on seeing those emotions as gifts given by Krishna to increase our inspiration for pursuing more diligently the path of bhakti.