The Treatment – Page 10 – The Tao of Holy Orthodoxy

November 27, 2017August 27, 2018

41. Give Thanks. Beware of Despair.

despair alone

When you are attacked by bad thoughts, remember that you cannot control whether a thought enters your rational mind. If someone says to you, “Please, do not think of a yellow car,” your mind might immediately form an image of a yellow car. You are not responsible for being attacked by a bad thought, but you are responsible for whether you accept or reject the bad thought. If you reject it, there is no sin.

If you have a bad thought, you may be tempted to become despondent (depressed) and to fall into the deep pit of despair (hopelessness) because you imagine yourself to be too good or too spiritually advanced to have such bad thoughts. Pride deceives you into imagining that you are high and mighty, until reality smashes your ego-tower to bits and you fall hard on your face. If you see your own imperfection with a sober view of yourself, remaining grounded in humility, bad thoughts will not cause you such distress.

pig in pen

Do not despair over your past sins, either. It is healthy to feel ashamed that you have sinned. Shame is good if it drives you to repentance, but avoid guilt that keeps you stuck, lying in the thick mud like a pig, self-reflecting on what a miserably sinful person you are. Guilt prevents you from making progress. Like the Prodigal Son, get up, repent, and be reconciled to God. If you sense that God is distant, you are the one who created the distance. God made you, loves you, and awaits your return so that He can bless you. He desires to forgive you so that your sins are removed from you as far as the East is from the West.

shoes pexels-photo-609771

Even if you feel alone and depressed, you are not really isolated from your fellow human beings unless you choose to isolate yourself. Sometimes, we tend to separate ourselves from the help we need most. Keep seeking the guidance of your priest for fatherly counsel and remain connected to the community of the Church. We all need the care of the physician and the Hospital. God works through our fellow human beings to heal us and move us toward our destiny.

Thank you pexels-photo-268344

A good medicine for despondency, despair, and anxiety is giving thanks. Giving thanks is natural for the human being who has been healed and perfected. It is effective therapy for those of us still in the process of healing.

Remember everything good that God has given you and be thankful. Always be thankful. Even give thanks for difficulties because these experiences, by the power of God, can be transformed into opportunities for growth in character, maturity of faith, strength, and good health. Do this by cultivating your humility. If you are prideful, you will focus on whatever you want and whatever you think you need, but lack. If you are humble, you will be thankful for what you already have been given as a blessing.

Maintain a thankful inner disposition, but don’t stop there. Go beyond thankful thoughts and feelings to outwardly express your inner thankfulness through action. Wishing a friend “Happy Birthday!” as you place a personal card and generous gift into her hands is superior than just harboring a thought about it. Give thanks to God in the morning and throughout the day as an expression of loving thankfulness. Your effort to genuinely offer thanks to God and to others will soften your heart so that you are able to receive more of the good, healthful, healing Gifts that God desires to bestow upon you.

Read: Ezekiel 33.11, Psalm 103.12; Psalm 139.1-16; Psalm 118; Luke 17.11-19

November 24, 2017

40. Defeating Bad Thoughts

Your mind is a combat zone. Prepare to be attacked by arrows, that is, by bad thoughts. These thoughts may distract you from a spiritual mindset, lead you into despair, or tempt you to sin in your heart and, sometimes, with your body.

If you focus on a bad thought, you place yourself within the arrow’s target zone. When it captivates your attention, you forget your vigilance. It flies straight at you, but you lose the sense of danger. You allow the arrow to hit you because of your carelessness. Protect yourself from oncoming arrow, instead of becoming fascinated by it. If this happens, instead of using your energy to protect yourself, you will allow the thought to take hold you.

Carefully look out for thoughts when they are far across the field so you can deal with them before they get too close to your heart. Cut off the thought immediately. Avoidance is the best defense for tempting thoughts. Do not stand in front of the arrow, staring at the arrow as it approaches you, but move out of its way. When you reject and dismiss a bad thought from the moment it enters the field of your mind, it will fly past you.

If the bad thought is already firmly and clearly in the forefront of your mind, deflect the arrow by focusing your mind on something else. Quickly, turn your attention to God and to good, virtuous thoughts. This is simple. The mind can only focus on one thought at a time, so if you have a bad thought, think about something good.

Avoid attempts to psychoanalyze yourself, asking, “Why am I having these bad thoughts.” Why you have the thought doesn’t matter. You don’t need to find a reason. Thinking about the bad thought focuses your mind on the bad thought, which is harmful, not helpful. Simply reject the bad thought.

If you drive away a thought, it may return quickly, again and again and again. Do not surrender as though you are losing the fight. If you had lost, you would not still be in the fight. A bad thought is like a fly that keep returning to the food in your bowl after you swat it away. Keep swatting the thought away until it finally leaves you alone.

It is easier to deal with an arrow flying toward you at a distance, than to wait so that you have to deal with the arrow when it has become lodged in your body. Likewise, it is better to deal with persistent bad thoughts in the rational mind than to solve the problem when the tempting thought is lodged in your heart. These are drugged arrows, full of poison, that cause suffering in your soul. They produce delusion and influence you to sin.

The poison in the arrows may produce an initial feeling of pleasure, but it seeps in deep to confuse and sicken you. Under the influence of the poison, you may choose to sin. You may believe that your choice to sin makes perfect rational sense and is good for you. While you justify your sin, imagining yourself as reasonable person, you have relinquished clarity of mind and goodness of heart to because like an irrational, instinctual animal. The drugged arrow of tempting thoughts can turn you into a mindless zombie, but only if you allow it.

Remember, do not fight bad thoughts by standing in front of them out of curiosity or to test your strength, but reject and ignore them to win. If you do allow the tempting thought to enter into you in a moment of weakness, the ready cure is repentance. Wake up and remove it immediately to stop the deepening influence of the temptation.

As you have learned, be watchful. Prepare for tempting thoughts and guard your heart from their destructive, poisonous influence. Continually practice these tactics to sharpen your skill and keep yourself on the path of salvation.

November 22, 2017

39. Be Watchful

Great Wall tower

A dutiful soldier in a watchtower carefully observes the territory before him. He looks out toward the horizon, seeking any sign of the enemy’s presence. As a soldier, stay actively aware of what is happening around you. Be prepared to be tempted by people, including those who may tempt you unintentionally, by their appearance, words, or actions. Likewise, be prepared to be tempted by things in the world you encounter with your senses.

Pay attention to what is happening within your soul. Watch for the influence of pride. Take control of your imagination quickly. Wisely expose deceptive thoughts by bringing your mind back to reality. Be careful that passions do not arise to catch you off guard. Maintain peace and sobriety. Catch tempting thoughts and feelings early, when they first appear. Internally look and listen sensitively like an alert guard dog.

Watch for temptations, but when you see them do not be seduced by them. When you give them consideration, you feed them, strengthening and emboldening them to invade and take you captive. Drive the harmful thoughts away immediately. Stop the demons by a strong defense. Do not yield.

Also, remain watchful for the end. We do not know when Christ shall return to earth in His Glory. Neither do we know when our end to this life arrives. Stay awake. Do not become drowsy and lazy (slothful), caught unprepared when the Master appears.

Exercise zealous vigilance. Always be watchful, mindful every moment of every day, so that when temptation approaches from any direction you are ready.

Read: 1 Corinthians 16.13-14; 1 Peter 5.8-11; Galatians 6.1; 1 Thessalonians 5.1-11; Matthew 25.1-13; 26.36-46; Luke 12.13-21, 35-40

November 19, 2017September 26, 2018

38. Maintain Harmony and Balance

Baoding Balls

Rotating Baoding balls (also called Iron Balls or Chinese Medicine Balls) in the hand promotes good health, according to tenets of traditional Chinese medicine. Whether or not the claim is accurate, these therapeutic balls from Hebei, China can serve to remind us of the necessity of harmony.

Two Baoding balls in good condition rotate smoothly around each other in the hand as chimes inside the hollow spheres produce a pleasant, relaxing tone. A skilled practitioner can rotate them without the two touching each other. The two spheres work together for the intended health of the body. If someone cut a chunk out of a ball, destroying the completeness of the sphere, the two would not rotate smoothly together. They would likely not work very well at all.

When the various aspects of the spiritual life are kept whole and in balance, they promote the health of your soul. So, nurture harmony within your soul. Bring all your thoughts, opinions, and actions into harmony with the Spirit-guided mind, vision, and life of the Church. Be consistent. Align both your rational mind and your heart with the Way of Christ. If you do this, you will be able to see clearly, think soberly with wisdom, and live well in truth and love.

Ensure that your external action, what you do every day, remains in harmony with who you are within. Contradiction between your being and your doing promotes dysfunction and chaos. Instead, promote wholeness and wellness through harmony.

Your body must be brought into harmony with your soul. Always maintain both your soul and your body in purity. You cannot live a truly spiritual life if you misuse your body. If you are unmarried, guard the virginity of both your soul and body. If you are a man married to a woman or a woman married to a man, maintain purity in your own soul while extending self-denying love and absolute fidelity (loyalty and faithfulness) to your only beloved. Guard your marriage as you guard your soul.

We are called to speak the truth in love and to love others according to the truth. No opposition exists between truth and love. You may be accused of being unloving by someone who does not understanding the fullness of Truth. You may be accused of being narrow-minded and ignorant by someone who misunderstands the fullness of Love. Truth and love are sisters who should always be kept together.

animal-avian-beak-349758

You do not need to look to man-made craftsmanship or symbols to see harmony. The Creator has filled the creation with harmonious balance and symmetry. A bird cannot fly with one wing. Neither can you live well and ascend toward your potential by practicing some aspects of the Way while ignoring other complimentary elements.

Generally, the health of your human body depends on the various systems working properly and cooperating together. A chemical or hormonal imbalance dramatically affects health. The health of your soul also depends on maintaining balance. If you live the whole Way, you will find balance.

You are still imperfect and in the process of healing. When you find disharmony in your life – in your heart, your thoughts, or your actions – immediately repent. Change your mind and your heart. Correct your behavior. Turn away from whatever is causing the dysfunction and, with humility and obedience, bring yourself into harmony with Christ and His pure teaching. Set things right. Bring more and more of yourself into alignment with the Way of Life.

You must constantly repent in order to make progress. Whatever you do to promote harmony through repentance will prepare your soul for God’s healing, transforming Grace to work within you.

Read: Ephesians 4.11-16; Colossians 3.1-17; 1 Corinthians 6.12-20; 13.1-13; 1 John 3

November 15, 2017

37. The Thrice-Holy Prayer

An Orthodox Christian holds to the right Faith (expressed by correct doctrine, believed with the heart, and confirmed through action) and also offers right worship from the heart to the true and living God.

Orthodox worship reflects the heavenly worship of the noetic powers, the various kinds of bodiless angelic beings. Through our worship, we actually participate in this unceasing heavenly worship.

Often, we pray the Trisagion Prayer as part of our private prayers and together in our communal worship as the Church. Through this prayer, we call upon the true God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We recite the Trisagion (Thrice-Holy) Hymn of the angels: Holy, Holy, Holy. Remembering Who God Is, we ask for His Presence to be made real on earth (daily through our lives until the heavenly kingdom arrives fully at Christ’s return). We also ask for our loving God to grant us His mercy, forgiveness, healing, and good strength to resist the evil one so that we may stay on the Way of salvation.

Pray the Trisagion Prayer at the beginning of your established times of prayer in the morning and evening. Learn the prayer with your mind, but also learn to say it with your heart focused on God.

(Make the sign of the Cross upon yourself at the places marked with a cross (+).

The Trisagion Prayer

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Glory to thee, our God, glory to thee.

O heavenly King, O Comforter, the Spirit of truth, who art in all places and fillest all things; Treasury of good things and Giver of life: Come and abide in us and cleanse us from every stain, and save our souls, O Good One.

+ Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal: have mercy on us.

+ Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.

All-holy Trinity, have mercy on us. Lord, cleanse us from our sins. Master, pardon our iniquities. Holy God, visit and heal our infirmities for thy Name’s sake.

Lord, have mercy. Lord, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.

+ Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: now and ever, and unto ages of ages. Amen.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name; thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

+ Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us and save us. Amen.