Baba says, ‘One is to be a maharathi on the basis of the efforts you make to attain blessings or the inheritance. The other is to become a maharathi on the basis of one specialty or other that you have in doing service‘.

Too often I try to get my worth out of what I do, how well I perform – am I good enough, strong enough, talented enough, successful enough? I think that if I just work harder, out-perform my co-worker or service companions, then I will feel good about myself. I am constantly living in this proving mode with a need to impress. The problem is that I am getting my value from the wrong place. If I don’t know who I am- a pure soul, a child of God- then, I will work to get others to validate me. I become heavy with thoughts of: ‘Do they accept me? do they compliment me? if not, let me work harder, prove to them that I am good enough’. But when I am secure in who I am, then I won’t compete with others or feel the need to prove myself. I already know I am unique with my own unique role in the drama.

My job is not to convince people that I am good enough, it is to fulfill my purpose. Sometimes, I want that class I am teaching to go well or for many people to attend a program. But when I check my motives, I realize it’s not so much about serving as it is to feel good about myself. I deceive myself into thinking I am serving when all I am doing is being subservient to the ego, to my own insecurity and using service as a means to feed it. Baba reminds me daily of who I am and Whom I belong to. My self worth should come solely from the fact that I am a soul and a child of God. My identity should be based on who I am, not on what I do or whom I know or what I own. If I am basing my identity on limited things, then I am competing in a race that isn’t mine. I impress one person today and another tomorrow, prove one thing today and another tomorrow. I am on a treadmill – running a lot, but going nowhere.

Baba says: check, where are you getting your identity, your value from? Is it from your inheritance or from service?

Let me get off that treadmill. I am already a child of God, I already belong in the drama, I already have a unique part in it. I have nothing to prove to anyone. I can feel good about who I am right now. When I suffer from this ‘proving’ sanskar, I even try to prove myself to Baba. I think He will be pleased with me, that He will bless me and favor me when I do lots of big service projects- when I give lots of lectures, when I have lots of people that say my name and look up to me etc. God doesn’t base my value on how well-known I become or not, He loves me because I am His child. He says I am the jewel of His eye, that I am the one seated on His heart-throne. He has already approved me, He has already blessed me. Let me stop trying to win His approval and simply step into His blessing, into my destiny. It doesn’t make Him happy to see me constantly striving, living pressured hoping I will measure up, trying to earn His blessings. In fact, He feels compassion when He sees me struggle for something I already have. Looking to achievements and accomplishments, titles and approvals for my value is a dead-end street, let me get back on the highway.

Sometimes, I even try to enlist God to help me: ‘Baba, help me give a good lecture’, ‘Baba, let there be many people that attend my workshop’. Baba is here not to help me prove to this old world that I am talented, or that I am smart or anything else. He is here to transform the world and establish His kingdom- the kingdom of heaven. He has given me the awesome privilege to help Him in this task, not the other way around. I help Him by becoming pure. That is the war I am fighting- the war of purity vs. impurity. Let me not get distracted into thinking that I need to outdo, outperform or outsmart anyone, I don’t. The sign of a great warrior in Baba’s army is one who is pure. That starts with having a pure awareness or the true awareness of who I am- I am a soul, not the body. That’s step 1 which then enables purity in thoughts, words, actions, attitude and vision. As long as I remain body conscious, that is, as long as my awareness is wrong, as it has been for half a cycle, I will struggle as I have for half a cycle in finding identity in bodily relationships, possessions and accomplishments. I will continue to live selfishly, going against the core of my being. I will consequently live uneasy, receive and give sorrow as I have for half a cycle. If even after being a Brahmin, you remain subservient to limited desires, then what is the difference?, asks Baba.

This is the most elevated life where you find your true identity and purpose. This is the life where you receive direct sustenance from God, so, why do you continue to struggle, He asks. When your awareness is pure, that is, when it is true, then there is automatically truth and cleanliness in everything else. Then, you will not struggle but rather always swing in the swing of supersensuous joy in your minds, you will swing in the swing of contentment and the swing of being embodiments of love received from the Father’s heart and from the hearts of souls. Everyone likes truth and cleanliness. People like to be around others who are secure in who they are, who are contented people.

Let me not get baited into trying to impress, into proving my value to people when I don’t need to. Instead, let me spend the time I would have wasted on the hustle, on being focused on my purpose. Then, because my awareness is pure, my motives for doing anything will be pure too and when the motive is pure, Baba will bless it and success is guaranteed.