यस्मात्क्षरमतीतोऽहमक्षरादपि चोत्तमः।अतोऽस्मि लोके वेदे च प्रथितः पुरुषोत्तमः॥
yasmāt kṣaram atīto ’ham akṣarād api cottamaḥato ’smi loke vede ca prathitaḥ puruṣottamaḥ
Word by word
The verse says
Because I am beyond what perishes, and higher even than what does not, I am known in the world and in the Veda as the highest Person.
In plain words
The name is explained rather than announced.
Beyond the perishing. Higher than the imperishable. Therefore: the highest.
It reads like a conclusion because it is one. He is not claiming the title. He sets out the arithmetic and lets the title follow.
Where you've felt this · in creative work
At a cousin's wedding a quiet man in the third row is pointed out to you as a good singer. Later that night he sings two lines, unaccompanied, and the room stops talking. Nobody announced anything. The description you were given earlier was accurate and useless. You only knew what the word meant once you had heard it.
Going deeper
A title earned in front of you works differently from a title handed over, and this one is being earned.
Puruṣottama is two ordinary words pushed together: person, and highest. The reason comes first - beyond the perishing, higher than the imperishable - and the name comes second. That order is a courtesy to a doubtful reader, who is asked to follow a line of thought rather than swallow a claim.
It is also a strong statement about what all that older scripture was pointing at. Not a force. Not a principle. A person: someone who can be spoken to.
For you that settles what kind of thing devotion is. If the highest reality were an abstraction, affection toward it would be a sweet confusion, a category mistake. This says it is not. There is someone there, and you are allowed to speak.