The power of positive thinking Saint Paisios of Mount Athos

 

A good thought is equivalent to a long vigil! It has great power. So try, as much as you can, before temptation could plant bad thoughts, to plant good thoughts yourself, so that your heart becomes a flower garden and your prayer is accompanied by the divine fragrance of your heart.

When one has even the slightest bad thought about someone, whatever one does, either fasting or vigil, is a lost cause. How can practice help somebody when one is not struggling to cope with bad thoughts?

 

Why don’t you empty all the sediment settle from the jar first, which is only for soap, and then pour the good oil in it? Why do you prefer to mix the good oil with the useless one? A pure and good thought has more power than any practice.

 

“You should always have good thoughts for everyone”. “The entire foundation of the spiritual life is for people to think of others and put themselves last, not to think of themselves.”

 

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Elder Paisios was constantly stressing the importance of pious thinking in spiritual life. He used to say that a single positive thought equals a vigil in Mount Athos

 

The spirituality of a person is defined by the quality of his thoughts.

 

-Father, what made our saints, not only endure their martyrdom but also constantly feel joy about it, while we can’t even stand the bite of a mosquito?

 

– Everything has to do with having a correct thinking. If our thoughts are firmly secured in our faith, no one can ever take them away.

 

Then, he brought the Old Testament and told me that section 4 in the Book of Maccabes explains very clearly how positive thoughts can help us disregard pain and torture. He began reading the text and explaining it to me. When he finished, he told me:

 

– This text from the Old Testament clearly indicates that man is free and with his good thoughts, he can overcome his passions and desires and whatever else derives from them.

 

Father Paisios explicitly stressed that the words “I can’t” have no validity in man’s life. It is the words “I don’t want” or “I don’t love” which lead man to say “I can’t”. When people are tortured by a specific passion, they claim that a certain power prevents them from restraining and being good. They should know that this power, which acts as an obstacle, is rooted inside them; it can make them love, but it is turned to the wrong direction. Since they love their passions, it is natural that they are unable to get rid of them. When you love something, you want it, and you cannot let it go because you do not want to lose it. First, they must hate their passion and then find something better to direct and transfer their love to. Otherwise, they will keep on suffering.

 

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Elder Paisios always urged us to think positively. Our positive thinking, however, should not be our ultimate aim; eventually our soul must be cleansed from our positive thoughts as well, and be left bare having as its sole vestment divine grace granted to us through Holy Baptism. “This is our aim,” he used to say, “to totally submit our mind to the grace of God. The only thing Christ is asking from us is our humility. The rest is taken care of by His grace. In the beginning, we should willingly try to develop positive thoughts, which will gradually lead us to the perfect good, God, to whom belongs every glory, honor and worship; on the contrary, to us belongs only the humility of our conceited attitude.”

 

“We must always be careful and constantly question the nature of our thoughts. When someone is preoccupied and trusts his own way of thinking, he becomes vulnerable to the devil, who is capable of transforming us into sly persons, even when we are honest by nature. The older fathers never trusted their own thoughts. Even for minor problems to which they had to give answers, they prayed to God, or fasted, as a way to “force” divine grace to reveal the answer according to God’s will; and after they got the “information”, they gave the answer.

 

“God opposes the proud, but gives Grace to the humble.” (1Pet 5:5).

“We must have positive thoughts, otherwise none of the spiritual fathers- not even the saints- can help us.

 

“We should never, even under the worst circumstances, allow a negative thought to penetrate our soul. The person, who, under all circumstances, is inclined to have positive thoughts, will always be a winner; his life will be a constant festivity, since it is constantly based on positive thinking”

 

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Father Paisios always insisted by saying:

 

“When one of our brothers has a negative thought, we must try to kindly and humbly correct it. It is our duty to do so. Today many people, unfortunately including some of our spiritual fathers, instead of trying to correct falsified thoughts, they either consent to them, or even distort the positive ones. I will give you an example so you can understand the way they function:

 

Suppose a young man says to his spiritual father:

 

– A friend of mine did this and that to me.

 

And thus, he starts telling him his negative thoughts about his friend. His spiritual father, instead of trying to change his thoughts and make him love his friend again, views his problem from a social point of view, and wishing to be nice, says to him:

 

– Since you know what kind of person your friend is, do not pay attention to him. Just ignore him.

 

The young man may superficially feel better after listening to the words of his spiritual father, but his negative predisposition towards his friend is still inside him. Now, when his friend goes to the same spiritual father to tell him the same things, the spiritual father faces the problem in the same way. He once again regards the problem from a social point of view and calms him down. He lets him, however, keep inside him the negative thoughts he has for his friend.

 

This way, the Elder said, I can even please the devil if I wish to. You will now see what happens next, since divine justice exists in our lives. At some point, the two friends, who still have negative thoughts inside them, meet and begin accusing each other: “You are this and that…I talked to my spiritual father and he also thinks the same way of you.” Eventually, they discover that what their common spiritual father tried to do was just to be nice to them. As a result, they end up losing their trust and respect for him. The correct way of dealing with similar cases is the following which I also apply:

 

A married man came to me to discuss the problems he was facing with his wife and how her behavior has affected his thoughts. I immediately started finding excuses for his wife’s behavior. In the end, I told him that he should glorify God for the wife He gave him and he is the one responsible for destroying their loving relationship. I made him question his behavior and love his wife again, by convincing him that he is in the wrong, and that he should get rid of all his negative thoughts. I did exactly the same thing with his wife, when she came to see me. I also scolded her, so both of them got rid of their negative thoughts, and ended up loving each other again. Moreover, they also understood why I scolded them, as they realised that my only aim was to bring them back together.” (Priestmonk Christodoulos “Elder Paisios of the Holy Mountain” (1998) Holy Mountain)

 

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Pray that God will raise spiritual people, Maccabees, because there is a great need. The time has come to fight good and evil, because illegality has become law and sin has become fashionable. But when you see disasters in Greece, the state to make crazy laws and there is general instability, do not be afraid, God will help… The whole world is boiling like a cauldron. The Church, the state, all nations are up and down! And no one knows what development we will have. God help! […] As much as you can, humbly wish for the people who gave many rights to the wicked and suffering.

 

Do not forget there we are going through difficult times and much prayer is needed. You must remember the great need that people have for prayer today and the great expectation God has of us to pray. Praying for the general outrageous condition of the whole world that Christ may have pity on his creations for they are heading for destruction. Pray for his divine intervention in our outrageous time for the people are heading into general confusion, into madness, and an impasse.

 

God has called for us to pray for the people, who have so many problems. The poor people don’t even have time to cross themselves. If we who are monks and nuns don’t pray then who will? The soldier in wartime is on alert always ready with his boots on. The monk must also be on alert. How I would have loved to be a Maccabee, to withdraw to the mountains and pray constantly for the world.

 

Pray with pain in your heart for the world. Do you know what great power such prayer has?

 

Also it is better for the monk to help others with his prayer that his words. If he does not have the power to keep someone from doing evil then he should help him from afar through prayer, otherwise he may himself be harmed. A prayer from the heart has more power than a thousand words especially for someone who won’t listen.

 

In these difficult years let us not neglect the work of prayer. Prayer is security; it is communication with God.

Spiritual Awakening, St. Paisios of the Holy Mountain