In plain words
We must take part in the service of society. What does it mean to take part in this service of society? “I am educated, I wear a safari suit, I wear white clothes: and I am to sweep the bazaars? This is not service”: you must not think so and grow irritated. Sweeping the bazaars is not service. You are doing a job. Do that job properly, to the satisfaction of your own Ātma: that itself is service. You are doing business. You must do your business properly, not by the path of injustice and wrongdoing. Not only this. The root cause of Bhārata coming to this sorry state today is just this. No one does his duty properly. If such people have Bhakti, what use is it? Doctors and nurses must carry out their own duties well. While a patient there is in pain, running off because the ārati is going on: this is not Bhakti, it is madness! Look after that patient well. See that no suffering comes to that patient. That itself is your service. Your duty. If you leave him there and come running because they are offering ārati, does that become Bhakti? This is not Bhakti. It is foolishness. For such people, however much they hear, Bhakti will not take root. If you pour pāyasam into a vessel with ten holes, it all keeps leaking out. It is always empty. They are the holes in your heart. The holes called selfishness and self-interest. However much Bhakti you pour in, what is the use? Each must do his own duty properly.
There is one more thing that is very important: however much salary we take, we must do work worth that salary. Only then do we become people who have served the country. Taking a high salary and doing little work: that amounts to cheating the country. Are you doing work worth the salary you are given, or not? That itself is great service. We must serve with good qualities such as these. Truly, if one takes a high salary and does … work, why would our Bhārata come to this state? To pay salaries … they go to every country and ask for loans. For whom do they take the loans? For you alone. If one does work worth the salary, there will be no losses at all, will there? Taking thousands of rupees in salary and doing a few paise of work: is that just? This is not justice at all. It is no Dharma at all, is it? It is no sacrifice. We must do work worth what we have received. That itself is sacrifice. It must satisfy the Ātma. That itself is the Śānti that befits us. Otherwise where will Śānti come from: we say Śānti, Śānti, Śānti.