Question: I was reading the Nectar of Instruction that the guru sows the seed of bhakti within the heart. But it confuses me as I think there is dormant love of Krsna already within the heart, then how can it be planted?

Jayapataka Swami: In the Caitanya Caritamrita there is a verse that brahmanda brahmite kono bhagyavan jiva, guru Krsna prasade paye bhakti lata bija. That even when one wanders from universe to universe, in the brahmanda, one brahmanda you have to stay for the whole life of Brahma, which is 100 years, 365 days and each day is a thousand yugas. So you are staying billions of millions of millions of years. You wander from brahmanda to brahmanda means one life of Brahma you go to another brahmanda, so brahmanada brahmite kono bhagyavan jiva, some conditioned soul is blessed to have the seed of devotion planted in the heart. So whether the seed is dormant in the heart and awakened by the guru or whether it is planted, it is the same thing. The point is that we are awakening it, we call awakening, planting, still I am in material conditioning. So you can say planting or awakening, it is much the same thing.
02-DECEMBER-2019 ALACHUA, FLORIDA, USA