There are many ways of helping people: by charity, giving food, clothes, alms, serving them personally, looking after them, working in hospitals, nursing them, et cetera. But all this is physical help. It does good to the doer, but at the same time places one under an obligation within the process of evolution. Why?
For instance, I have no food and am starving. I come to you and ask for food; you give some to me, I eat and am satisfied.
This is very subtle. What happens is you save me from starvation, and if you feel you have done a good turn, your ego is fed, and I automatically get the mental impression of being helped, which I must repay to you in some way or the other. [Consequently], sanskaras or impressions are added to you.
Karma yoga of selfless service demands two things which are very difficult to do. Help others, serve others, but in a way in which you are, not even for a moment, conscious of having helped or served them. This is possible only if you forget yourself 100 percent and become lost in the service.
That is why Masters say the only way to help human beings is not just tending to their physical needs, but to give them spiritual upliftment, making them know that the purpose of life is knowing God in perfect honesty, not by hearsay or hearing.
—www.lordmeher.org, p3069
May, 1952;Â Myrtle Beach