SO GOOD QUOTES

Category: SOBRIETY

  • For wine leads to more wine.  It does not satisfy a need, but produces an inexorable need for another drink, making those who are drunk thirsty and arousing in them an even-greater appetite for more.  But even though they imagine that they have an insatiable desire for drink, they experience or rather deliberately choose something quite the opposite of this.  For by continual self-indulgence they dull their senses.  Just as too much light blinds the eyes, and those buffeted by loud noises are made completely deaf by the excessive beating that their ears suffer, so too drunkards fail to notice that they destroy whatever pleasure they experience by their excessive love of pleasure.  They find the wine tasteless and watery even if it is undiluted.  And when in its place they drink fresh wine, they find it warm, even if it is completely unmixed, even if it is ice-cold, and it cannot quench that internal fire that burns within them from an excessive amount of wine.

    —St. Basil the Great, On Fasting and Feasts: St. Basil the Great, Homily Against Drunkards

  • Drunkards are more pitiable than those sailing on dangerous waters insofar as the latter blame winds, the sea, and external forces, but the former willingly choose to enter the storm of drunkenness.  Whoever is possessed by a demon is pitiable, but whoever is drunk, even though he suffers the same things, does not deserve our pity because he wrestles with a demon of his own choosing.

    —St. Basil the Great, On Fasting and Feasts: St. Basil the Great, Homily Against Drunkards

  • “A thankful person does not need tranquilizers – his peaceful heart is a substitute for these – but the unthankful is always troubled, and this in turn keeps him away from giving thanks.”

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, The Life of Thanksgiving

  • Overcoming a deep-rooted struggle needs time and patience, so be patient with the weak until God’s grace visits and delivers them.

    —Pope Shenouda III, Life of Hope

  • “I honestly have no idea what happened. One day I was just done with it.”

    —Julia E Hubbel

  • Until God’s grace visits you, it is impossible for you to change for the better.

    —St. John of Kronstadt, My Life in Christ

  • When we cannot be delivered from ourselves, we delight in devouring ourselves.

    —Emil Cioran

  • …noonday devil and described with great precision this state in which the monk, after having known the spiritual consolations of starting out, begins to doubt his spiritual journey. It is the great doubt: Had he not after all been abused? What good has it served spending all this time in the desert? He no longer finds any pleasure in the liturgy or religious observances. God seems nothing more than a projection, a fantasy or a childish notion. Would it not be better, therefore, simply to abandon solitude altogether, to be of some use in the world, to do something? At times this noonday devil will incite this chaste and sober person to catch up on lost time especially in regard to sensuality and strong drink.

    In his theory of individuation, C.G. Jung describes very accurately this moment of crisis, when a person in mid-life finds his or her whole life put into question. It is a time when repressed material can suddenly manifest itself with violence. But it can also mark a crucial moment of passage towards a deeper integration. The values of having are substituted for those of Being. From now on the person’s life is no longer oriented towards the affirmation of the ego, but towards this ego taking second place and being integrated into that archetype of wholeness, which Jung called the Self.

    It is a particularly difficult time. All the former supports and certainties fall by the wayside, and nothing seems to be taking the place of this collapsing edifice. If the person seeks help or consolation, it only heightens the despair, the feeling of complete unknowing to which one seems condemned.

    For this affliction, the desert fathers counsel much prayer. One is capable of little else. Their suggestion of manual labour won’t be of great relief. Nevertheless, it is necessary to occupy the mind with simple tasks and to live in the present moment without looking either to the past or to the future. The pain of each day suffices. It becomes a question of holding firm at the heart of the anguish. It is a time for fidelity.

    Being Still: Reflections on an Ancient Mystical Tradition
    Jean-Yves Leloup

  • “You can’t rescue a brother who needs to save himself.”

    —Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

  • “It is alarming to consider how many major life decisions we take primarily in order to minimize present-moment emotional discomfort.”

    ―Oliver Burkeman, The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking