The principle of unreality in the Advaita has not been propounded for the external world but for getting rid of emotional attachment, desires worries etc i.e the qualities of ‘Jiva’. The essence of Advaita and the unreality of the world is that the essential duties must be performed sincerely as essential tasks and only when they have been completed should the thoughts etc about them be given up. One should never consider abandoning them altogether in the first place.
A person, who has his thinking power and the worldly tasks perfectly under control, even while the work is being done, has the experience of feeling the ultimate peace of his own real being as a subtle basic experience in the form of ground. He has abandoned the harmful part of the tasks like the desire for the fruits, selfishness, etc and is carrying out the tasks that destiny allots to him while he is experiencing the paramanand deep within himself.
A True Sadhaka:
We come across four types of persons (1) A person fully engaged in worldly life and has no time to even to think of spirituality is ‘Baddha’ (2) A person who is eager and has keen interest in spirituality, is “Mumukshu” (3) A person who has taken initiation from Sadguru and follow his instruction and carry out the Sadhana presented by Sadguru is Sadhaka (4) A person who has achieved salvation and spends most of his time in spirituality including its propagation is Siddha. A Sadhaka should carry out Sadhana as advised by his Sadguru to achieve salvation. Sadhaka should understand the meaning of the discourses in exactly the same manner as the speaker intends it to be understand. Sadhaka should carry out “Sadhana” wholeheartedly put everything he has viz. physical work, with full attention and money.
He should take all the notes for one’s own personal use. And note down those words which touch his heart and highly instructive sentences in verbatim. When you are carrying out one type of Sadhana don’t mix it up with another type of ‘Sadhana’
Testing Time for Sadhaka:
A real worth of a person comes out when he finds himself in a testing situation. When some one tells him of his woes, he advises ‘ you are the ‘Atman’ who is unaffected by the conditions of the body and talks like a Jnanai.
But when he himself suffers a minor setback he indulges in breast beating, imagining all kinds of things ‘A thing like this should not have happened to a sincere Sadhaka like me and so on and gets more and more agitated.
So every Sadhaka should examine whether his Jnana is useful only for advising others i.e as show or whether he has made progress and become more unattached and less egoistic.
The real test is possible only when Sadhaka actually faces an adverse situations in life such as sorrow and dishonour.
The effect of your practice should remain permanently in your blood an integral part of you.