A leelā (Divine pastime) is any action of God. Our actions are called karm (material action), and God’s actions are called leelā. And the difference is not in the physical action.
A leelā may be exactly the same on the outside, in terms of what it appears to be, as a karm. In other words, Krishna may have done many of the things that we do in our everyday life. He ate, He slept, He played with His friends. He did all of these things, yet when He does them, they are leelā, and when we do them, they are karm.
So, what’s the difference? What’s inside? What do we have inside? Māyā (material energy). What does Krishna have inside? Yogamāyā (God’s Divine internal power). That’s the difference.
I spoke to you about Yogamāyā. That is Krishna’s most personal power. And it is through that Yogamāyā-śhakti (Divine power of Yogamāyā) that He performs all of the amazing actions that He does. Whether they are Almighty actions like creating the universe, or loving actions like the leelās we’ve been hearing about in the Bhagwatam.
All of these leelās are made possible and performed through Yogamāyā. And all of our actions are because of māyā. We are under māyā. Our mind is under māyā. In fact, our mind is made of māyā, so all of our thoughts are māyic (from māyā). All of our emotions are māyic.
Add to this that Krishna has no desires. That’s another internal difference. Our desires are what impel us to perform any action. Because we have a desire to attain something, we decide to do any particular action. That’s why it is called karm. Karm are those actions performed by souls like us who are under māyā. And here we have all our own personal desires, and depending on what those desires are, then we perform our actions.
