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                                                  Service Is Its Own Reward

A true World Server strives to have a mind that is balanced at all times. This requires keen enthusiasm for disinterested, selfless service: Be kind to all. Love all. Serve all. Be generous and tolerant towards all.

This is the way to purify both heart and mind, and to help forge the path to world enlightenment.

By performing acts of service, the heart is purified. Egoism, hatred, jealousy, the idea of superiority, and all similar qualities become purged and disappear; humility, pure love, sympathy, tolerance and mercy are

developed in their place. The server comes to feel oneness and unity, in touch with all life.

The person who serves the world also serves the self. Only by first reforming oneself can the whole world

become reformed. The greatest service that can be rendered is to impart knowledge of truth, as the basic

cause of all human suffering is unconsciousness.

True service also purifies the mind, and can be a tool for self knowledge. This practice requires non-attachment to
outcome and that all actions be dedicated to the highest good, with the awareness that all of life is good.

There may be a divine call for a certain kind of work, and if that happens, one can learn to recognize it in the moment. Though people are generally elated by success and depressed by failure, there must not be any

attachment to outcome or even to a particular form of work.

Many people have core pictures giving them polarized attitudes about their work; they are attracted to some

kinds of work, and dislike others. It is not a person’s true calling to seek success or failure, but rather to focus attention on completing the immediate task at hand to the best of one’s ability. Work itself cannot bring misery, but having attachment or identification to work brings in all sorts of worries, troubles, and unhappiness.

If we work for the fulfillment of divine purposes and do not expect any fruit ... if we do everything as

worship of the divine... if we work in unison with Divine Will for the welfare of the world ... then the

moment egoism comes in, the free flow of energy will be noticeably blocked. Being neutral in the way

we approach and do our work, as our work becomes worship, we will become as free as a bird.

When we give up ego and work merely for the sake of humanity, then even eating, walking, talking, sleeping, breathing and answering calls of nature become joyous activities. Great joy exists in approaching work this

way because there is no personal investment in it.

How is this freedom accomplished? When we perform any action, it's important to go inside and become

centered. In this space of equanimity of mind, it is possible to understand the fundamental principles that

govern all we do, and many of the outside forces become clearer and more manageable.

There is certainty in the practice of right work. Even a small amount of service to the community or to the

poor brings forth its own rewards and advantages. Then, we will again be propelled to do some more good

actions by the forces of our impressions of the original action. 

This is a key detail of the way that service evolves.

While the unconscious cannot conceive of doing work without some personal gain, the World Server attains

inner spiritual strength and power by performing selfless motives and practices. Gradually, as we serve society,

the glory and splendor of unselfish work is understood. This practice requires great patience as the old ways of selfishness must be destroyed.

Non-attachment is dispassion or indifference to the sensual enjoyments. This occurs in the mind.

The “I” and “mine” are "poisonous fangs of the mind serpent" which must be removed in order to tame it.

There cannot be bondage to material things like the body or possessions. The binding link ~ the mind ~ can

and must be mastered and controlled.

As we work, the mind will grow to see things in more creative, abstract ways. This nurtures detachment as humanity is lifted by the higher energies, and in the process of doing the work, we will come to no longer pay attention to old worries and difficulties. Self-knowledge evolves as one becomes less self-centered.

When we realize that in our work we do not answer to the boss outside but rather to the God who has

ordained us, there can be no more bondage to office mates and employer. The external work may still appear

to be the same, yet ...

                                                                      We Are Free!

                             Service can be briefly defined as the spontaneous effect of soul contact.

                               This contact is so definite and fixed that the life of the soul can pour

                                     through into the instrument which the soul must perforce use

                                                              upon the physical plane.

                                  It is the manner whereby the nature of that soul can demonstrate

                                                            in the world of human affairs.

                                                  Service is not a quality or a performance;

                                it is not an activity towards which people must strenuously strive,

                                                     nor is it a method of world salvage.

                           This distinction must be clearly grasped, or else our whole attitude to this

                             momentous demonstration of the success of the evolutionary process

                                                           in humanity will be at fault.
                                                        Service is a life demonstration.

                                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Synthesis is from
Science of Yoga, Volume 1: Karma Yoga
by Swami Sivananda, Sivananda Press, Durban, South Africa