The Struggle Against Thoughts - St. Paisios the Athonite

Oct 7, 2025

Explore the intricate battle against thoughts as guided by St. Paisios. He highlights how the devil attacks our minds, encouraging vigilance and persistent prayer. Learn the importance of replacing bad mental habits and the purification of the heart. St. Paisios discusses cultivating good thoughts and interpreting life's trials positively. He warns against conversing with sinister thoughts and emphasizes the significance of spiritual practices to achieve inner peace. A compelling journey into the depths of the spiritual life awaits!

Ask episode

AI Snips

Chapters

Books

Transcript

Episode notes

INSIGHT

Thoughts Are The Primary Battlefield

Spiritual warfare targets our thoughts first because thoughts are our defensive trenches.
Progress in spiritual life depends primarily on cultivating and guarding right thoughts.

ADVICE

Use Vigilance And The Jesus Prayer

Be vigilant and practice unceasing prayer to keep attention on good thoughts.
Use the Jesus Prayer to call your mind back whenever it wanders.

ADVICE

Install Good Mental Machinery

Replace entrenched bad patterns by deliberately installing 'good machinery' in your mind.
Look upon people as souls or angels to transform perception and uplift your life.

Get the Snipd Podcast app to discover more snips from this episode

Get the app

St. Paisios provides guidance on essential questions about the inner life of thoughts that we deal with our entire lives. A reading from Spiritual Counsels, Vol. 3: Spiritual Struggle by St. Paisios, p. 62-760:12 Spiritual Life is Based on Thought8:03 Cultivating Good Thoughts12:07 The Purification of the Mind and the Heart14:28 We Must Not Be Suspicious21:23 Conversing with Thoughts24:30 Consenting to Thoughts📖 Spiritual Counsels, Vol. 3: Spiritual Struggle by St. Paisios the Athonitehttps://www.athoniteusa.com/products/saint-paisios-the-athonite-spiritual-counsels-volume-iii-spiritual-struggle?srsltid=AfmBOorzehHI_pB20A84pZFWkAJxcyimzUiiZ-lhw3E6bX3XloJV4VFo📖 Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives: The Life and Teachings of Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnicahttps://www.sainthermanmonastery.com/product-p/otdol.htm🎧 On Attention and Distraction - St. Ignatius Brianchaninovhttps://youtu.be/v5ZIEmv8RwQ🎧 Noetic Sound Waves of the Heart - From the Life of St. Porphyrioshttps://youtu.be/n5dWVVDDvhM🎧 Everyone Needs a Spiritual Father - St. Paisios the Athonitehttps://youtu.be/xaSeWRcJPHo🎧 Marriage or Monasticism? (The Young Facing the Two Paths in Life) - St. Paisios the Athonitehttps://youtu.be/g-LGlirprqc🎧 Holiness is in the Struggle! - Elder Athanasios Mitilinaioshttps://youtu.be/Qhm2ffdEBsc⛪ FIND an Orthodox parish and monastery near you: https://orthodox-world.org/https://orthodoxyinamerica.org/_______St. Paisios teaches:You have to remove the worn-out machinery of your mental factory and install good machinery.The best enterprise is for someone to establish a factory of good thoughts. Then, even bad thoughts will be transformed into good ones by his mind. For example, when you look upon a person as a soul, as an angel, you can ascend angelically to Heaven and your life becomes a festival. But if you look upon a person in a carnal way, you descend into hell.All spiritual life is based on thoughts. Progress in spiritual life depends upon our thoughts.-Geronda, how can I be helped in the struggle against these sinister thoughts? -With vigilance and unceasing prayer. If you are vigilant, then you are attentive to good thoughts. For example, you look upon a glass or cup and you recall the sacred Chalice, the Last Supper, Christ and so forth; whereas if you are not vigilant, your mind may wander off to consider non-spiritual things or even wretched things. For this reason, try not to gather useless thoughts, which you will later struggle to get rid off. Concentrate and say the Jesus Prayer. And if your mind wanders, call it back again and again.-Geronda, when do we actually give our consent to these thoughts? -When you suck on them like they're candy. You must struggle not to suck on these thoughts that are sugarcoated on the outside but poison inside, causing you to despair. To have bad thoughts pass through us is not a cause for worry; only the Angels and those who are perfect have no bad thoughts. There is reason to worry when a person levels out a part of his heart to make a landing strip and accepts the little devils that come to him. And if this too happens once in a while, then go directly to Confession, plough up the landing strip, the mind and the heart, and plant fruit-bearing trees, to turn the heart again into Paradise._______Orthodox Wisdom is dedicated to sharing the writings and lives of the Saints of the Orthodox Church. Glory to Jesus Christ!