• mantrayantam — consulting, deliberating
  Present participle of √mantr (to take counsel). The root of mantra and mantrin (minister). Kṛṣṇa as deliberator with ministers like Uddhava — Bhagavān is the source of all wise counsel, yet conducts cabinet meetings as if the counsel emerged in dialogue.
• jala-krīḍā — watery sports
  Compound: jala (water) + krīḍā (play). A standard Kṛṣṇa-līlā motif — water-sports recall the Yamunā līlās of Vraja. Gauḍīyas read the jala-krīḍā in Dvārakā as a faint echo of Vraja's Yamunā-vihāra, transposed into the aiśvarya key.
• vāra-mukhyā — royal dancing girls
  Compound: vāra (best, chosen) + mukhyā (chief). The chief court entertainers. Their presence does not stain the līlā; in the Bhāgavata frame, all who serve Bhagavān are uplifted by the contact — the same principle that lifts the women of Mathurā in earlier chapters.
• uddhava-ādibhiḥ — with Uddhava and others
  Compound + plural: Uddhava heads the list of councilors. Gauḍīyas treat Uddhava as one of the most intimate bhaktas in Dvārakā-līlā — his presence in the council scenes anchors the chapter's sakhya-overtone even at the height of aiśvarya.

• Where do I treat my recreation as guilty rather than as part of a whole life?
• What balance of consultation and refreshment is right for me?

In one palace the chief minister and the Lord are bent over maps; in another the Lord laughs in the river with His queens. The chapter refuses the divorce we keep proposing — between counsel and play, gravitas and lightness. In Bhagavān both are unwaveringly Himself.