Spiritual words

Have a Conversation with Your Soul Every Morning and Evening

    • Foto: Magda Buftea

      Foto: Magda Buftea

Although virtues are considered qualities of the soul, they are also a means for the strengthening of our body. However, passions are of a different nature: some are of the soul, because they are only loved by the soul and others are of the body, because they are the delight of the body. In other words, both in the first and second category the soul and the body are not aware of the other’s presence.

Every evening we must wonder how we spent the day and every morning we should wonder how we spent the night. And we should think not only sometimes but always, about passions and virtues, consider the stage of our life – the beginning, the middle or the end. Do we deserve a payment for the acts that we did or do we work without reward? When we commit a sin we should complete the shortcomings of our sins through teas and weeping.

What prevents us from perfecting ourselves is the fact that we do not know what the beginning, the middle and the perfection of our virtues is, what the reasons that drain our virtues are and the fact that to any virtue there is added the sin of vanity. Without being aware of all this we are struggling for nothing.

Although virtues are considered qualities of the soul, they are also a means for the strengthening of our body. However, passions are of a different nature: some are of the soul, because they are only loved by the soul and others are of the body, because they are the delight of the body. In other words, both in the first and second category the soul and the bogy are not aware of the other’s presence.

(Translation from Sfântul Cuvios Paisie Velicikovski de la NeamţCrinii țarinei sau Flori preafrumoase adunate pe scurt din Dumnezeiasca Scriptură, Editura Bisericii Ortodoxe din Moldova, Orhei, 1995, p. 20)