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The most essential quality necessary for achieving spiritual perfection is humility. Without humility, no matter how much else one may accomplish in the service of the Lord, one will be blocked by his false pride from spiritual perfection. The living being will not be released from his entanglement within the three modes of material nature and will thus remain in the cycle of birth and death.  Therefore we must learn from the spiritual master what is the real meaning of humility.

Srila Prabhupada describes humility in his purport to the Bhagavad-gita 13.8-12 as follows:

"Humility means that one should not be anxious to have the satisfaction of being honored by others. The material conception of life makes us very eager to receive honor from others, but from the point of view of a man in perfect knowledge -- who knows that he is not this body -- anything, honor or dishonor, pertaining to this body is useless. One should not be hankering after this material deception. People are very anxious to be famous for their religion, and consequently sometimes it is found that without understanding the principles of religion one enters into some group which is not actually following religious principles and then wants to advertise himself as a religious mentor." 

In the same purport Srila Prabhupada further explains:

"One should approach the spiritual master with all humility and offer him all services so that he will be pleased to bestow his blessings upon the disciple. Because a bona fide spiritual master is a representative of Krishna, if he bestows any blessings upon his disciple, that will make the disciple immediately advanced without the disciple's following the regulative principles. Or, the regulative principles will be easier for one who has served the spiritual master without reservation."

One time a disciple thought he would show Srila Prabhupada how humble he was so that Srila Prabhupada would recognize him for his humility. He wrote Srila Prabhupada a letter and presented himself as "the most fallen". In order to teach him genuine humility Srila Prabhupada wrote him back that he was not the "most" anything, that he was simply insignificant.

So, if we can develop the mood of genuine humility and fully surrender ourselves at the lotus feet of the bona fide spiritual master, we will advance very nicely along the pathway of spiritual perfection. And at the time of death we will enter into that all blissful spiritual sky, never to take birth again in this miserable material world.  What could be a better, more meaningful way to spend our life?