Servanthood is the state of being a servant. A servant is a person who is employed by another person in order to perform certain duties or is a person who is in some way serving the needs of others.

Service can be either freely-given or compulsory. Services may be sold or exchanged for something. Professional services are awarded some form of compensation.

Servanthood is not the same as servitude, which is a form of bondage or slavery in which service is compulsory and in which there is no form of compensation.

Servitude is a state of being forced to serve other persons. A serf, a bond-servant, or a slave is a person forced into servitude.

A serf is a person who is forced to live or work on the land or property of a landowner and who is treated as if he or she were the property of that landowner.

A bond-servant is a person who is bound to service without any form of compensation.

An indentured servant is a person who has indebted himself or herself, or exchanged his or her liberty, for some privilege or form of compensation, and is therefore bound by contract to serve another person.

A slave is a person who is forced to serve other persons against his or her own will and who is treated as if he or she were the property of another person. A slave is also forced to serve other persons without any form of compensation.

Servanthood is not servitude. To be forced into servitude is to be a victim of injustice. To force a person into servitude is unjust.

Servanthood may be freely-chosen or may be compulsory. Servanthood may be voluntary or involuntary. A person who does not think of himself or herself as a servant may still attain a state of servanthood.

True servanthood comes from being free to choose to serve others.

Servanthood that is freely-chosen is not a form of bondage or slavery. When we choose to become servants we affirm our own freedom of will.

A true servant is a person who serves freely of his or her own will. If service is compulsory, then it does not adequately express the free will of the true servant.

To serve is to help, to fulfill the needs of, to obey, to follow the instructions of, to assist, or to be useful to others. Perfect freedom can be found in serving freely.

To freely serve means that we have the choice not to serve. But when we freely serve others we affirm our own sense of identity.

The true servant helps other persons to fulfill themselves as human beings. The true servant is not a lackey, a vassal, or a slave. The true servant serves freely, because he or she wants to serve. The true servant does not expect to be rewarded for serving, because being able to serve is its own reward.

True servanthood is an affirmation of freedom and not of bondage or slavery. The true servant acts to promote the happiness, fulfillment, and well-being of others, and acts to promote peace and justice in society.

It may be argued that when we serve others we allow others to become our masters. But it may also be argued that we become our own masters when we freely serve others.

To freely serve is to put the needs of others before our own. But we must be able to serve the needs of others in order to fulfill our own needs. To serve the needs of others is not to deny our own needs.

Freely serving others is not the same as serving our own ends. When we freely serve others, it is not because we expect to be rewarded, but because we fulfill our own need to serve. The need to serve may or may not seek to be rewarded, and it may seek its fulfillment both internally and externally.

When we freely serve others we have the opportunity to be unselfish. When we are unselfish we can free ourselves from selfish desires and internal conflicts. When we are unselfish we can also achieve inner peace, harmony, and understanding.

By freely serving others we can fulfill ourselves. When we freely serve others we can become ourselves and can realize our ideals. When we freely serve others we know that we are changed in our sense of being.

To feel no need to serve others is to be without the true freedom that can be found in servanthood. To choose freely to serve others is not to deny oneself, but to affirm oneself.

When we freely serve others we transcend our own limitations, because we are concerned with something beyond our own needs, something that causes us to put the needs of others before our own. When we serve each other we affirm each other.

In order to truly serve others we must have humility. We cannot serve others if we always put our own needs before the needs of others. Humility enables us to know when our own needs are less important than the needs of others.

Humility enables us to respond to the needs of others before we respond to our own needs. When we know the importance of humility we can serve others without using others to serve our own needs.

The true leader is also a servant. The true leader serves those whom he or she leads. True leadership is servanthood.

When we freely choose to serve all humankind and the living world we also serve a higher principle of reality. This is how true servanthood becomes freedom. The freedom of true servanthood is also the freedom of a higher principle of reality.

When we can freely choose to serve others we are not constrained by our own selfish needs, and we can choose the freedom of a higher principle of reality. When we are helping others we can know that a higher principle of reality is working through us. When we truly care about others we can be servants to a perfect will that gives direction to our own will.

When we freely serve others we show our concern and caring for others. If we love others, then we truly care about them. If we love others, then we also feel the need to serve them.

When we freely serve others we put their needs before our own. We try to satisfy their needs before we satisfy our own. We are more concerned with their needs than with our own needs. Our own needs are fulfilled by fulfilling their needs.

But we fulfill our own need to serve when we freely serve others. Thus, we affirm, rather than deny, ourselves when we freely serve others.