Married, Father, United
The greatest virtue is in the simple Tao:
Tao the intangible, the inscrutable Tao.
Inscrutable, intangible,
and yet containing form.
Intangible, inscrutable,
and yet containing life.
Profound, obscure, but with an essence,
an essence which is in harmony.
From eternity until now
the nature of Tao has remained unchanged.
It is inherent in all things
from their beginnings
How do I know of the origin of things?
I know by Tao.
1. It is true
2. There is an answer
3. Take time to step up
4. Understand diversity
5. There is a solution
1. Don’t multitask
2. Listen
3. Follow directions
4. Pay attentions
5. Feel alive
1. Don’t laugh
2. Understand wisdom
3. Peace
4. Understand wisdom
5. Don’t panic
1. Posture
2. Preserver innocence
3. Pleasure
4. Patience
5. Perseverance
Even a pious person is not immune to spiritual sickness if he does not have a wise guide — either a living person or a spiritual writer. This sickness is called “prelest”, or spiritual delusion, imagining oneself to be near to God and to the realm of the divine and supernatural. Even zealous ascetics in monasteries are sometimes subject to this delusion, but of course, laymen who are zealous in external struggles undergo it much more frequently. Surpassing their acquaintances in struggles of prayer and fasting, they imagine that they are seers of divine visions, or at least of dreams inspired by grace. In every event of their lives, they see special intentional directions from God or their guardian angel. And then they start imagining that they are God’s elect, and often try to foretell the future. The Holy Fathers armed themselves against nothing so fiercely as against this sickness — prelest.
Honor and shame
are the same as fear.
Fortune and disaster
are the same for all.
What is said of honor and shame is this:
Whether absent or present,
They are inseparable from the fear
that they give rise to.
What is said of fortune and disaster is this:
They can befall any person.
By the accident of good fortune
one may rule the world for a time.
But by virtue of love
one lives forever.
1. Responsibility
2. Honesty
3. Accountability
4. Relax
5. Clarify your feelings
1. Do what you signed up for
2. Pay attention
3. Do not think my ideas are right
4. Make sure that you smile at things
5. Brush your teeth
When despondency seizes us, let us not give in to it. Rather,
fortified and protected by the light of faith, let us with great
courage say to the spirit of evil: “What are you to us, you who
are cut off from God, a fugitive for Heaven, and a slave of evil?
You dare not do anything to us: Christ, the Son of God, has
dominion over us and over all. Leave us, you thing of bane. We are
made steadfast by the uprightness of His Cross. Serpent, we
trample on your head.”
David Given Schwarm 