Humility is a huge force for life! How to learn patience and humility.
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In the first year, upon receiving the Holy Spirit, I thought: the Lord has forgiven my sins: grace bears witness to this; what more do I need?
But that's not how you should think. Although sins are forgiven, one must remember and grieve about them all one's life in order to preserve contrition. I did not do this, and I ceased to grieve, and I suffered a lot from demons. And I wondered what was happening to me: my soul knows the Lord and His love; How do I get bad thoughts? But the Lord took pity on me, and Himself taught me how to humble myself: “Keep your mind in hell and do not despair.” And by this the enemies are defeated; and when I go out of the fire with my mind, my thoughts gain strength again.
Who, like me, has lost grace, let him courageously fight demons. Know that you yourself are to blame: you fell into pride and vanity, and the Lord graciously gives you to know what it means to be in the Holy Spirit, and what it means to be in the struggle with demons. Thus, by experience, the soul learns the harm of pride, and then vanity, and human praise, and thoughts run away. Then the soul will begin to recover and learn to keep grace. How to understand whether the soul is healthy or sick? A sick soul is proud; but a healthy soul loves humility, as the Holy Spirit has taught it, and if it does not know this, then it considers itself the worst of all.
A humble soul, even if the Lord took her to heaven every day and showed her all heavenly glory in which He abides, and the love of the Seraphim and Cherubim, and of all the saints, then even then, taught by experience, will say: “You, Lord, show me Your glory, because You love Your creation, but give me weeping and the strength to give thanks You. Glory befits you in heaven and on earth, but it befits me to weep over my sins.” Otherwise, you will not save the grace of the Holy Spirit, which the Lord gives to the tuna, by His grace.
The Lord took pity on me a lot, and gave me to understand that all my life I have to cry. This is the way of the Lord. And now I am writing, pitying those people who, like me, are proud and therefore suffer. I am writing to learn humility and find peace in God.
Some say that it used to be once, but now it is all out of date; but with the Lord nothing is ever diminished, but only we change, become bad, and thus lose grace; and whoever asks, the Lord gives everything to him, not because we are worth it, but because the Lord is merciful and loves us. I write about this because my soul knows the Lord.
To learn Christ's humility is a great blessing; it is easy and joyful to live with him, and everything is sweet to the heart. The Lord reveals Himself only to the humble through the Holy Spirit, and if we do not humble ourselves, then we will not see God. Humility is the light in which we can see the light of God, as it is sung: "In Your light we will see the light."
The Lord taught me to keep my mind in hell and not despair, and so my soul humbles itself, but this is not yet real humility, which is indescribable. When the soul goes to the Lord, it is in fear, but when it sees the Lord, it rejoices indescribably from the beauty of His glory, and completely forgets the earth from the love of God and from the sweetness of the Holy Spirit. This is the paradise of the Lord. Everyone will be in love, and from the humility of Christ everyone will be glad to see others above themselves. The humility of Christ dwells in the lesser; they are glad they are smaller. So the Lord made me understand.
Oh, pray for me, all saints, that my soul may learn the humility of Christ; my soul longs for it, but I cannot acquire it, and I tearfully seek it, as a lost child seeks its mother.
“Where are you, my Lord? Hid from my soul, and tearfully looking for You.
Lord, grant me the strength to humble myself before Your majesty.
Lord, glory befits You in heaven and on earth, but to me, Your little creature, grant Your humble Spirit.
I pray Your goodness, Lord, look down on me from the height of Your glory and grant me the strength to praise You day and night, for my soul has loved You with the Holy Spirit, and I miss You, and tearfully seek You.
Lord, grant us the Holy Spirit; With them we will praise You day and night, for our flesh is weak, and Your Spirit is alert, and gives strength to the soul to work easily for You, and strengthens the mind in Your love, and reposes in You with perfect peace, and he no longer wants to think of anything but love. yours.
Lord, Merciful, my weak spirit cannot come to You, and therefore I call You, as King Abgar: come and heal me from the wounds of my sinful thoughts, and I will praise You day and night, and preach You to people so that they may know You, all nations, that You, the Lord, as before, work miracles, forgive sins, and sanctify, and live.
Elder Silouan of Athos. Part II. The writings of Elder Silouan
M hello to you, dear visitors of the Orthodox website "Family and Faith"!
WITH reconciliation is an evangelical virtue that, through the action of Divine grace, settles in the heart of an industrious Christian. True humility is achieved by a virtuous life according to the commandments of the Lord.
To check whether I am a humble person, you need to look at your reaction when I was suddenly insulted, treated with disdain, began to scold, and so on.
The heart of a humble person immediately responds with a joyful feeling. He thinks:
“Oh, my benefactor. The Lord gives me a chance to cleanse my terrible grave sins.
But such joy is the highest state of humility. The holy fathers said that humility is already the state when an unpleasant feeling arose in the heart at this insult, but in the next few seconds the person extinguished this feeling in himself, did not let it come out either with words, or with his appearance, or in any other way. action or bad thought.
If you exercise your heart in such unforeseen situations, then sooner or later a person will be reconciled with God and will begin to respond with gratitude to his offenders, giving them bonuses, as one person did.
This man wanted to learn humility and did not know how to do it. He understood that he was unhumble, and understood that it was impossible to be saved without humility. And so he went to work in a brigade, where notorious rude people worked, who could not connect two words without cursing. They insulted each other, behaved as they wanted. And so he came to this brigade and said:
Guys, I will pay you for every curse you say against me.
They wondered:
Here is the income we have rolled!.
And they began to exercise and train him. And they strictly believed that for each such case he would give them a coin. And so several years passed. During this time, he came to humility from these voluntary exploits of his and gave almost all of his salary to them - they trained him well.
Once in the city, he was at the market. There, either something was being carried, or something was being carried, and he ended up on the road with a driver, who was in a very difficult situation, and this man prevented him. The driver scolded him very strongly. And the man laughed and stood with a satisfied look.
The driver's anger immediately passed, and he says:
Why are you laughing? I scolded you so. Usually the reaction is different.
The man replies:
And I pay my fellow workers for this money. And you scolded me for free. It's good to get such pleasure for free.
IN we are people. And because of our fallen human nature, we cannot lead a sinless life. We commit certain sins on our life path. And how wonderful that we have a wonderful spiritual “bath of humility”, bathing in which, we begin to see better. true meaning earthly existence, which is salvation unto eternal life.
Discussion: 3 comments
Marina, in the lives of the saints you can meet with such behavior of the righteous.
If we read the description of the martyrdom of the saints, we can see similar moments. For example, many martyrs told their executioners that they tortured them weakly, tortured them little, burned them, and so on. That is, it turns out that they kindled anger in the executioners, introducing them into even greater frenzy.We think that these actions were necessary to save the souls of these people, including the hero of the story. Again, it can be rightly assumed that some scolders, seeing the unusual behavior of a humble companion, thought about their behavior and their lives.
Answer
I can’t come to terms with the idea that my beloved is married. Unfortunately, I found out about this a few months after we met. I reproach myself terribly. I can’t live with this thought. But I can’t leave him either. this situation. Please, brothers and sisters, pray for my sinful soul. Do not judge strictly, I beg you! I feel very bad. Sincerely, Ekaterina.
Answer
A very strange parable, an unexpected understanding of "humility".
The hero himself deliberately provoked those around him into foul language, cultivated a selfish interest in them, and even spoiled them with money. That is, he led others into sin in order to allegedly save himself. More like gambling.
If he put the same money to people secretly, or simply parted with his own capital voluntarily, and having heard a bad word from one person, would help him or someone else without explaining the reasons, then it would probably be work on himself and his humility. Because it is more difficult to come to an agreement with oneself and not deceive oneself in one's secret vows than to fulfill a promise made publicly.
Although it is not for me to judge, of course, because we are all very different people. In any case, an interesting food for thought, thanks for the article.
Answer
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit!
Dear brothers and sisters, today we remember one of our brothers and fathers in Christ - St. Philaret (Drozdov). It was one of the wisest people of his era. He compiled the famous Catechism - a concise and understandable statement of the Orthodox faith - which still does not lose its relevance. The saint foresaw how important it is for the Russian people to have access to the text of Holy Scripture on their mother tongue and initiated the creation of the Synodal translation of the Bible, which we still use today. It was he who was entrusted by Emperor Alexander I to keep the secret document on the succession to the throne, and Emperor Alexander II instructed him to draw up a manifesto on the liberation of the peasants.
The well-known Russian philosopher-Slavophile Ivan Aksakov wrote about him after the death of the saint: “Filaret is gone! Force, a great, moral, social force, has been abolished. Half a century of edification to all Russian people was interrupted. There is no other equivalent, and even less significant, but popular name.
We can learn a lot from St. Philaret of Moscow. But today I want to talk especially about the virtue of humility. After all, we so often lack humility and meekness in our words and deeds. If the boss criticizes us, or a family member points out our shortcomings, or on the street, in the subway they pushed us, scolded - what do we do? Do we always pray for those who offend us, as the Savior commanded (Matthew 5:44)? Do we not more often want to justify ourselves as soon as possible, to point out in response to other people's shortcomings, to say the last word? And if this failed, then we do not sleep, going over in our thoughts: “Oh, I should have answered this way and that way.” We wind ourselves up, we feel heaviness and blackness inside, we lose peace and connection with God.
This happens in us from a lack of such an important virtue as humility. But the Lord directly says in the Gospel: Learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.(Matthew 11:29). The Monk Abba Dorotheos instructs in his teachings that “first of all, we need humility of mind - in order to be ready for every word that we hear, to say: forgive; for with humility of mind all the arrows of the enemy and adversary are crushed.We need to be ready for every word we hear, to say: I'm sorry
How can we cultivate the virtue of humility? Of course, first of all, to pray to God Himself that He would arrange such circumstances of life in which we can learn, get used to humility in front of other people. At first, these may be light accidents, where it will not be difficult for us to accept and say “I'm sorry.” But if we do not learn from such easy accidents, then God, in order to save our souls, can allow difficult and unpleasant circumstances when we will simply be forced to extinguish our pride and humble ourselves. How can one find out in advance such circumstances and act in them? This we can learn from St. Philaret of Moscow. Let's look at specific cases from his life and how the saint showed humility in them.
Let's say it's unpleasant for us when something is advised to us. In such cases, we often answer: “You don’t need to teach me, I myself know, I wasn’t born yesterday.” Saint Philaret did not act like this. He wrote to his vicar, Bishop Innokenty, in letters so that he would not hesitate to give him advice if necessary: “Do not renounce teaching me or reminding me, but say everything that is fair and useful: salvation is in a lot of advice.”
St. Philaret admitted that he, like any other person, could make a mistake in something and even asked Bishop Innocent to correct him in such a case: “I ask you to speak freely, what you see for the benefit or to correct my mistakes; I hope in Christ, who is in our midst, that this will not only not harm the love between us, but will confirm it. And he also wrote: “Thanks to God, I can’t complain about you in anything; and if you have anything to complain about me, tell me, I'm glad to improve.Saint Philaret admitted that he, like any other person, could make a mistake in something and even asked his vicar to correct him in such a case.
The saint consulted not only with those who were equal to him in episcopal rank, but also with priests. In one of his letters, he sadly reported: “One can marvel at the wisdom of today's people. Having served thirty years in the rank of bishop, in some cases I feel the need to consult with archpriests, students of my students, but they do not find this necessary.
indicative next case. In the mid-1850s, a high-ranking person paid a visit to the Moscow Academy. Displeasure was expressed that the students' rooms were smoky. St. Philaret did not directively prohibit students from smoking tobacco. Instead, he wrote an appeal to them, in which he revealed the harm of smoking, so that after reading it, they would draw their own conclusions. But even at the same time, the saint was worried if he was too harsh, and wrote to the vicar of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra: “There is no prescription in the letter, but reasoning is written. And I didn’t mean prohibition and supervision, but that the students should be given reasoning that would prompt them to draw conclusions themselves. Truly, these are words in the spirit of the Gospel, because the Lord, knowing what our true good is, does not force anyone to it, but suggests: Who wants follow me, deny yourself, and take up your cross, and follow me(Matthew 8:34).
As often happens vigorous activity The saint could not please everyone, and he had critics. Even in this case, the lord did not change his benevolence: “By the grace of God, if they judge me unfavorably, I believe that I deserved it, and I do not change my favor towards an unfavorable judge.” The saint understood that retaliatory criticism was not a way out: “It is better to respond to censure with meekness than with censure. clean water dirt needs to be washed away. You can't wash dirt with mud."Saint Philaret understood that answering criticism with criticism is not a way out
So, brothers and sisters, we see how important the virtue of humility commanded by the Savior is. We looked at the example of St. Philaret of Moscow, who in word and deed showed this virtue in his life.
Let us heed the example of the saint. If we are pointed out to our shortcomings, we will try to say “sorry” more often instead of excuses. Instead of retaliatory criticism, we will try to correct ourselves. If someone in our family or at work has committed a misconduct, we will admonish him not with words of censure, prohibition, orders, but with all meekness we will offer him our help, we will try to understand and understand the situation together. So the apostle advises us: Brethren! If a person falls into any sin, you, spiritual ones, correct it in the spirit of meekness.(Gal. 6:1).If we are pointed out to our shortcomings, we will try to say “sorry” more often instead of excuses
Let us remember that all cases when we are criticized, accused, scolded are allowed by God so that we can grow in the saving virtue of humility. Finally, let us pray to St. Philaret of Moscow that, at his intercession, the Lord would enlighten our hearts. So that when we are in Once again to scold, we had the wisdom not to respond with criticism to criticism, but to say “forgive” to our neighbor and see where we are wrong, but to God to say: Good for me, for thou hast humbled me(Ps. 119:71). May the Lord grant us to free ourselves from the burden of our pride and freely reach the Kingdom of Heaven! He deserves all glory, honor and worship. Amen.
How to overcome pride in yourself and develop humility?
First, you need to understand one important law of life: there are no accidents. Everything that happens to us, literally everything, no matter how small or great, is a consequence of our life up to this moment and is directed to our good.
“Everything that is done is for the better” is one of the sides of this law. “Everything that doesn’t kill us makes us stronger” – also from here.
In the Gospel there are amazing words of Christ addressed to people: “Are not five sparrows sold for two assaria? and none of them is forgotten by God. And you and the hair on your head are all numbered. So do not be afraid: you are more valuable than many small birds.
In the Bible, God tells people about his care for us: “Will a woman forget her suckling child, so that she does not have pity on the son of her womb? But even if she forgot, I will not forget you” (Isaiah 49:15). The proverb says the same thing: "Nor the father to the children, as God to the people."
Therefore, everything He does is for our good. And if everything external influences are directed to us for the better, then how can something happen that we should be upset about?
No! Nothing like this can happen to us.
But why then do all sorts of troubles and misfortunes happen to us?
If we believe the pride that tells us that we are the greatest and most beautiful, we will never understand the causes of trouble. But the gaze of pride is false, false. A sober, honest look is a look of humility.
Humility tells us that we, like everyone else, have many shortcomings. It will be better for us, the less of these shortcomings we have, the more perfect we become.
This is what the Lord wants us to do by allowing us all these troubles. It is “letting go”, and not “sending”. Because the real cause of unhappiness is our previous life and our shortcomings.
How are our shortcomings related to these troubles, and how do these troubles help us to improve? Let's look at a few typical examples.
The plot is the first. The man was cruel in his youth. Often caused mental, and sometimes even physical pain to loved ones. Once on the street he was severely beaten, his spine was broken. He spent about a year in the hospital, suffered a lot. He could become hardened with fate and people, but he understood everything correctly, rethought it and, having experienced suffering, became more compassionate and careful towards people.
The plot of the second. The girl often changed men. In the end, she married a man whom she took away from a strange family. A few years later, he left her for a younger one. She went through a very difficult period in her life. She could be angry at her husband and fate, but she managed to accept this as the result of her previous mistakes. She repented of them and began to live chastely, waiting for her man to truly be.
The third plot. The man was extremely greedy for money. He valued money not only above honor, but even above love. He directed all his strength, all his mind to getting rich. But for some reason, he did it worse than those who had less greed. All his enterprises sooner or later failed, barely approaching success. He could spend his whole life on this crazy race, but after another crash, he managed to come to terms with the fact that he would not become rich. And he became much happier. And then the money came. Sami.
In the third plot, the goal could not be money, but fame, power, or the possibility of realizing talent for their own personal purposes. Outcome one.
Plot four. The person was born disabled. He could only move around in a wheelchair. He heard wonderful stories about how healthy beautiful girls fell in love with disabled people and married them, after which they directly and figuratively carried them all their lives. Years passed, he was looking for such a girl, but did not find. Dreams faded. He could fall into despair, drink himself or commit suicide. But he was able to accept his fate. Instead of the love of a girl, he found the love of God. And his soul became beautiful. Life remained outwardly meager, but inwardly became joyful. Later, he realized that external ugliness was a means of decorating his soul, which was too proud and therefore could not love. This deformity cured him of his pride and made him happy. If he had been born healthy, as a result of the progression of pride, he would have committed suicide at the age of 15.
I hope you paid attention to the fact that in each story at a critical moment a person had a choice - to become embittered even more or to reconcile. It is very important! We are free people and always choose between evil and good. No misfortune in itself will make us better if we ourselves do not apply our mind and efforts.
Any trouble is called a temptation, a test, because in this way we test ourselves - to what we direct our will - to good, humility or to evil, pride. If to pride, we fall even lower, and the next test will be even harder. If it’s good, we acquire humility, make life easier for ourselves.
But even if we understand everything and want to put up with it, we may not have enough of our own strength for this. Or rather, it probably won't be enough. Because pride is aided by the strength of the enemy, the strength of evil spirits. And in order to defeat it, we need the opposite - Divine power. She is always ready to help us. "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble."
No good deed can be done successfully if you act lazily or thoughtlessly. That work on oneself, which we are talking about, should be done thoughtfully. So how do you overcome pride and develop humility?
First, you need to strive for a sober look at yourself. The most objective evidence of what kind of person I am is my reaction to a certain situation. It's very simple. Let's say they stole my money. The amount is not such that I then began to starve, but still very, very unpleasant. So, there is pride, and, perhaps, a passion for money.
And try to see the good in other people. The goal of this activity is to stop thinking of yourself as some kind of outstanding person. Get down to earth, get closer to people. When you are ascending strongly, mentally repeating the phrase “I am the worst of all” will help.
There are such amazing words from one of the fathers of the Church: “Blessed is not the one who works miracles, but the one who saw his sins like the sand of the sea.” Now you will not understand this and, perhaps, you will not even believe it, but there is such a pattern: the better a person becomes, the more he sees his sins. Because there is more and more light in his soul, and he already distinguishes such minor vices that he did not notice in the twilight. And we have a lot of vices. All without exception. And if we seem good to ourselves, this only speaks of our obscurity, spiritual blindness. And spiritual blindness does not just mean that we do not see ourselves (they say, turn on the light - and there is purity and beauty), but the fact that we are especially strongly struck by passions - they blinded us.
Secondly, you need to be educated in a religious sense. The goal is to stop seeing yourself as the beginning and end of everything. Begin to distinguish patterns in your life, and see the participation of God in it, as well as dark spirits. How can we not be proud while we attribute our talents to ourselves? And meanwhile - this is His gift, which He is strong and take away. A believer understands that being proud of the talents given to you is like showing off someone else's jewelry.
Strange as it may seem, especially darkened people are able to be proud of the magnitude of the evil they commit. But when they realize that this is not their will, that they are puppets in the hands of Satan, who laughs at them, hates them, destroys them, it will turn out that there is nothing to be proud of. On the contrary, it is a shame and failure.
Third, always do the opposite of what pride wants us to do. As a rule, she wants from us grumbling against God, despondency, evil feelings towards other people. The opposite will be gratitude to God, joy, good deeds towards those with whom we want to be angry.
The essence of humility is expressed in short prayer: "God bless!" or “Thank God for everything!” Therefore, when we want to crush, break, cry, fight, and the like, we will instead, in spite of our pride, say: “Glory to God for everything!” Thus, we will apply our will in spite of pride, and we will call on God's power to help.
You can start small. We all make small mistakes when something falls out of our hands, or we hit something, or find that something has been forgotten or lost. Usually in such situations, a proud person swears. Let us accustom ourselves at such moments, instead of cursing, to say: “Glory to God!”
It's not difficult at all. And a miracle will happen - in a few months you will see that such trifles no longer upset you at all, you maintain a peaceful mood. This is the beginning of humility.
What is the mechanism of this miracle? The mechanism is simple. Satan does not want you to pray, praise God. After all, this is for your benefit, and the goal of Satan is to destroy. As soon as he sees that you always answer the evil thoughts inspired by him with a prayer, he will immediately fall behind. He is understanding.
With the weapon of grateful prayer one can overcome any misfortune, any sorrow.
As for some of our global plans, desires, dreams, we will be much better off if we simply have a realistic, sober approach to all this.
Let's say the commander draws up a battle plan. He has an accurate map of the area, an accurate knowledge of his own forces and their deployment, and a fairly accurate knowledge of the enemy's forces. With all this knowledge, as well as knowledge of the tactics of military operations, the commander can draw up such a battle plan that will bring victory.
Now let's look at ourselves. Do we know ourselves well - our good and evil qualities, our limits, all our talents? Do we understand how our desires correspond to our real needs? To what extent do we know the laws of life? How well do we know the forces that oppose us, seek to torment us and drive us to suicide? If you are fully informed in all these matters, then you have a good chance of drawing up a plan that will come true.
But the problem is that this is hardly the case. For we are blinded by pride and have little interest in what really matters in this battle. Therefore, our dreams have little chance of coming true. "God forbid our calf to eat the wolf."
These are the plans of the commander, in front of whom is a map of the plain, although in reality he will have to fight in the mountains; his idea of \u200b\u200bhis own forces is exaggerated, and of the enemy - greatly underestimated. And he does not know that he can call for help from an ally, whose powerful army is half an hour away, just waiting for a signal.
Let's not waste our energy on making stupid, unrealistic plans that will surely collapse! What until the last moment will seem to us a victory will certainly turn into a defeat. Let's try to get to know better the plans that that Ally has about us, who knows everything, has the most accurate maps, and his army is invulnerable and invincible.
The apostle James said: “Now listen to you who say: “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and we will live there one year, and we will trade and make a profit”; you who do not know what will happen tomorrow: for what is your life? vapor that appears for a short time and then disappears. Instead of saying: if the Lord pleases and we live, then we will do this and that, ”you, in your arrogance, are conceited: any such vanity is evil.”
Book of Proverbs: "There are many plans in the heart of man, but only what is determined by the Lord will come to pass."
Russian proverbs also speak of the same: “Everything in the world is created not by our mind, but by God’s judgment”, “You can’t make veins, which God will not give”, “You can’t take God by force”, “Man is like this, but God is different”, “You are for the worse, and God is for the better”, “Do not live as you want, but as God commands”, “Without God, not to the threshold”.
You will certainly have success in life, there will be achievement of goals, there will be happiness. But all this will happen only when you begin to coordinate your goals and actions with God's will. Like it or not like it (and you should like it), but it's true. David, who defeated the hero Goliath and later from a simple shepherd became the greatest king of mighty, invincible Israel, knew what he was talking about when he said: “Commit your way to the Lord and trust in Him, and He will do, and bring out, as light, your righteousness and your justice is like noon. Submit yourselves to the Lord and trust in Him. Do not be jealous of the one who succeeds in his way, the deceitful person. Stop being angry and leave the rage; do not be jealous to do evil, for those who do evil will be cut off, but those who trust in the Lord will inherit the earth.” King David said this from his own experience. And there is no more success than him.
But before striving for the heights, we need to come to terms with what we have.
Yes, as a result of depression, you may not have strength. But the forces you need are there. God has them. And He will be glad to give them to you. He wants it.
Just stop slandering Him, complaining and grumbling. Ask Him for forgiveness for all your grumbling and trust Him and come under the protection of the Father to heal your wounds.
Christ in the bosom is good.
He who has humility imitates Christ Himself. Such a person never loses his temper, does not condemn anyone and does not exalt himself. Never craves power, avoids human glory. Doesn't fight for any reason.
He is not bold when he talks, and always listens to other people's advice. Avoids beautiful clothes appearance its simple and modest.
A person who meekly endures all humiliation and humiliation receives great benefit from this. Therefore, do not be sad, but, on the contrary, rejoice in the fact that you are suffering. In doing so, you acquire the precious humility that saves you.
“I humbled myself, and He saved me” (Ps. 115:5). These words should always be kept in mind.
Don't be upset when you are judged. Sadness over such an occasion means that you have vanity. He who wants to be saved must love people's contempt, because contempt brings humility. And humility frees a person from many temptations.
Never be jealous, do not envy, do not strive for fame, do not look for high positions. Try to always live inconspicuously. It is better that the world does not know you, because the world leads to temptation. With his vain speeches and empty incitements, he deceives us and does us spiritual harm.
Your goal should be to acquire humility. Be below everyone. Consider that you are not doing anything worthy of your salvation. You must pray to God to save you according to your mercy.
Humility, obedience and fasting give rise to the fear of God, and the fear of God is the beginning of true wisdom.
Everything you do, do it with humility, so as not to suffer from your own good deeds. Do not think that only those who work hard receive great rewards. He who has a good intention and with it humility, even without being able to do much and without being skillful in anything, will be saved.
Humility is achieved by self-reproach, that is, by the conviction that in essence you are not doing anything good. Woe to him who considers his sins insignificant. He will surely fall into a graver sin.
A person who humbly bears all the condemnation directed at him approaches perfection. Even the Angels admire him, because there is no more difficult and greater virtue than humility.
Poverty, sorrow and contempt are crowns for a monk. When a monk meekly endures rudeness, slander and contempt, he is easily freed from bad thoughts.
Worthy of praise is the realization of one's weakness before God. It is self-knowledge. “I cry and lament,” says St. Simeon New Theologian- when the light shines on me, and I see my poverty and know where I am. When a person recognizes his spiritual poverty and realizes what level he really is at, then the light of Christ will shine in his soul, and he will begin to cry (telling about this, the elder was moved and wept himself).
If another person calls you an egoist, do not let it sadden or upset you. Just think to yourself: “Perhaps I am like that and I don’t understand it myself.” One way or another, we should not depend on someone else's opinion. Let everyone look into their own conscience and be guided by the words of experienced and knowledgeable friends, and above all, ask for forgiveness from their confessor. And on the basis of all this he builds his own spiritual path.
You write that you can't fight. Do you know why this happens? Because you don't have enough humility. You think that you can only achieve this on your own. But when you humble yourself and say: “By the power of Christ, the help of the Mother of God and the prayer of the elder, I will achieve what I want,” be sure that you will succeed.
Of course, I don’t have such prayer power, but when you, having humbled yourself, say: “With the prayer of the elder, I can do anything,” then, in your humility, the grace of God will begin to act, and everything will work out.
God looks to the “humble and contrite” (Isaiah 66:2). But for meekness, calmness and humility to come, labor is necessary. This work is rewarded. To find humility, it seems to me, one does not need numerous bows and obediences, but first of all, your thoughts must go down to the very earth. Then you will not be afraid to fall, because you are already below. And if you fall down, you won't get hurt.
In my opinion, although I certainly do not read much and do nothing outstanding, humility is the shortest path to the salvation of man. Abba Isaiah says: "Teach your tongue to ask for forgiveness, and humility will come to you." Train yourself to say “Forgive me”, even if it is unconscious at first, and gradually you will get used to not only saying these words, but also feeling it in your heart.
The saints teach that how great your goodwill will be when you ask for forgiveness - in other words, humility - so God will enlighten the other so that the desired truce between you is achieved. When you lament and say, "I am guilty, but I don't realize it," soon you will be able to say, "Yes, I am indeed guilty." And when you convince yourself that you are truly to blame, the other person will also change his attitude towards you.
Persistently ask God to endow you with the gift of self-reproach and humility.
Praying, ask God to give you the ability to see only your sins and not notice the sins of others. “Grant me to see my sins and not condemn my brother,” says St. Ephraim the Syrian.
A humble person considers himself the lowest of all. And therefore he loves everyone, forgives everyone and, most importantly, does not condemn anyone.
Translation from modern Greek: the editors of the online publication "Pemptusia"
