Only the Blessing of an Ordinary Person
As crowds grew, Rav Eliyahu printed a public notice asking people to stop coming, and the notice only drew more.
It is told that in Greiditz, the more Rav Eliyahu tried to remain hidden, the more the people sought him out. Men and women arrived from near and far, carrying their troubles, their sick, and their hopes for a berachah. He had never wanted the crown of a Rebbe, and the lines at his door weighed on him.
In the end he decided to say it plainly, in public. In the journal HaMaggid he placed a notice, in the year 5634, stating that his berachos were merely the blessing of a plain person, and that nobody, whether a man or a woman, should trouble to come to him any longer. He had no wish for others to place their trust in him as though he were more than he was.
Then he added one more line, and it revealed the secret of his heart. If his prayers were indeed accepted in Heaven, he wrote, it could only be because he never prayed for himself alone. His tefillah was always for all of Klal Yisroel.
It is told that the notice did not turn anyone away. People read it and understood that this was exactly the kind of person whose prayer rises. The crowds grew from day to day, until Rav Eliyahu, reluctantly, accepted that Heaven had given him this task.
Source: HaMaggid, 5634 (1874), gilyon 12 (his own notice).
Most of our prayers begin with what we need. Today, when you daven or say Tehillim, add a second layer. After you ask for your own needs, name two or three people you know who are struggling, and ask Hashem for them by name, slowly. Do it before you ask for yourself, at least once this week. You will find that a heart that opens for others becomes quieter and warmer, and that is where Rav Eliyahu said the power of prayer is found.