Beware also of looking with too much attention at rich food and drink, remembering our ancestress Eve, who looked with evil eyes at the fruit of the forbidden tree in the garden of Eden, desired it, plucked and ate it and so subjected to death herself and all her descendants.
—Lorenzo Scupoli, Unseen Warfare
Category: FOOD
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“It is just as impossible for the person who nourishes and panders to his flesh to fly to heaven as it is for an overfed bird.”
—St. John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent
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Abba Silvanus and his disciple Zacharias visited a monastery. The monks invited them to share a small meal before they continued their journey. Departing, Zacharias saw a pond by the road and desired a drink of water. Silvanus reminded him that they were observing a fast that day.
Zacharius protested, “But, Abba, we have already broken our fast today.”
Silvanus replied, “We ate with them because we love them. Now that we are on our own, let’s keep our fast, my son.”
By Way of the Desert: 365 Daily Readings -
Struggle with your flesh until it is humbled. Once it is used to this modest and rough environment, it will become your mute slave. Humility of the flesh will be granted at last. You should always keep this in sight and strive for it as a reward for your labors. Physical podvigs [spiritual struggles] foster physical virtues: solitude, silence, endurance, vigilance, labor, patience in deprivations, purity, and virginity.
You should remember that this friend of yours will end up in the grave. They say: Do not trust the flesh—it is deceitful. When you come to believe it is humbled, you relax, and it immediately grabs you and conquers you. This war with it continues to the grave, but it is much harder at first. Later it gets easier and easier until finally there remains only attention to its behavior with occasional light sensations of fleshly upsurge.
—St. Theophan the Recluse, The Path to Salvation: A Manual of Spiritual Transformation -
“Are you hungry or empty?”
—Jonice Webb PhD -
“Eat less food and you’ll get more done.”
—Robin Sharma -
Bodily Exercises
The body is by nature pure. Therefore we must only estrange from it unnatural cravings and strengthen it in those things which are natural to it; in other words, we must return it to its natural state.
Besides this, the body should assist the soul as its constant companion. Therefore, besides returning it to its natural state, we must turn the very satisfaction of its basic needs to the benefit of the soul and spirit. In satisfying these needs, some sort of exercise should be assigned to each bodily function as another means of healing our fleshliness, thus benefitting us spiritually as well.
Here are the prescribed rules:
1) For the senses: Guard the senses altogether, especially the hearing and vision (nervous system). 2) Guard the tongue. 3) Abstinence and fasting (the stomach). 4) Moderate sleep and vigilance (the stomach). 5) Physical purity (the stomach).
For the body in general. Wear out (muscular), constrain (nervous system) and emaciate yourself (the stomach). It is obvious how through these ascetic practices the body little-by-little returns to its natural state, becomes alive and strong (muscular), bright and pure (nervous system), light and free. It becomes a most capable instrument of our spirit and a worthy temple of the Holy Spirit.
—St. Theophan the Recluse, The Path to Salvation: A Manual of Spiritual Transformation
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We may fast from time to time as a discipline, but many people fast continually because they have no money to buy food. If we are truly to show compassion to the poor, we must experience within our own bodies the consequences of poverty. Fasting is thus an incentive toward generosity. And the money saved during a fast can readily be given to relieve the enforced hunger of others.
—St. John Chrysostom, On Living Simply
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Therefore the Fathers counsel: act with discernment. Of two evils one chooses the lesser. If you are in private, take the poorest morsel, but if anyone is looking, you should take the middle way that arouses the least notice. Keep hidden and as inconspicuous as possible; in all circumstances let this be your rule.
—Tito Colliander, Way of the Ascetics
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1. Weight: If you eat less … sure, you don’t get the gastronomical pleasures of someone who eats a huge amount of delicious food every day. But you learn to be happy with “enough,” so that you eat good, healthy food, and find pleasure outside of eating instead. And then you’re leaner and lighter, which allows you not only to be healthier, but you can do more activities with more energy, you can zip up a mountain or run a marathon or climb a rock wall with much more ease. Living with a leaner body is easier on the joints, less stressful, and gives you greater freedom.
mnmlist: minimalism: the lean life
SO GOOD QUOTES 