Human effort has human limits. Spiritual efforts have no such limits. Humans receiving spiritual gifts that call for spiritual effort are overwhelmed. Such occasions arise in the lives of rare souls. Spirit knows no failures. Human beings are daunted when faced with an occasion that needs spiritual efforts. Most give up. Some try. Success is rare in great projects. When great efforts of great souls in great projects are rewarded with great success, life will permit one flaw there. For that to be flawless one needs to be a realised soul. Effort that ends in success yields relief. That is normal, human. Relief felt will lead to the repetition of the same problem. Effort that ends in success generates gratitude in devout souls. Gratitude felt is capable of converting the problem into an opportunity, effort into enjoyment.
A devotee's experience is as follows.
Faced with the intensities of human smallness a devotee took another man's point of view and rose to the divine occasion. The other man was pleased. One may take great efforts prompted by a mental ideal. This man did so. But his nerves were raw, the body was soul. What he did – to please the other man – was revolted against by his swabhava. It was on fire, revolted all the time violently. It was an imperfect consecration. Still, Life rewarded him in an unheard of fashion. As he acted to please the other man, his rival, Life acted to over-please him. Life gave an abundant opulent response. There was a flaw in it. It was an essential flaw.
He had no heart to go back to his original consecration to neutralize this important defect. After a little while, he again tried through consecration to fully neutralize this flaw. What he could have done originally in a few days, now months of effort are not enough to set it right. To his consecration of several months, he added a TOKEN ACT of high discipline. If the earlier original effort was burning his whole being, the present one was nerve racking. After 51 days strenuous practical consecration the resistance broke. Life began to reward copiously. What he should have got through responsibility he now got without responsibility fixed on him. It came 7 fold. A more than human effort receive a more than divine recognition.