Concerning Prayer in the cell

While in your cell, do not permit the Jesus Prayer escape from your thoughts and strive to acquire spiritual tenderness of heart in the quietness and profound silence of your mind. Collect your understanding and all your thoughts; stand in prayer; direct your mind and heart to God; pray for spiritual pastors, your relatives, your friends, your benefactors, the Tsar, and the entire world. Repent, ask mercy from your Creator, that He may forgive your sins, join you with those who repent, and deliver you from eternal torment. Constantly reflect on this – no one can be justified before the Lord by their deeds, and no one can be pure before their Creator; all are sinful and weak; all require God’s help and mercy.

Try to prevent your thoughts from wandering around and from being occupied with anything of this world; in such stillness and deep silence of your mind, stand, lower your head, place your hands on your chest, put your feet together, close your eyes, so that you cannot see anything earthly, and, having gathered your mind and heart together, see God sitting on the throne and delivering judgment, surrounded with fearful and trembling Archangels and Angels, Cherubim and Seraphim, with all the heavenly powers. Remember Hell and the abyss, to which He can condemn you, pray with your mind, humble your spirit, weep, moan, sigh, condemn yourself, reproach your soul that you have irritated your Creator and Redeemer with many iniquities. While remaining in contrition and repenting, ask mercy from the Creator, that He may forgive you the sins you have committed and deliver you from eternal torment. Be diligent in ensuring that you have warm love and a desire void of laziness, that your prayer comes from your whole soul and heart without grumbling. As much as is possible, set for yourself prayers in your cell after every church service. In the evening, when you find yourself in the place where you wish to rest a little from your labors, lie down, and until you fall asleep sleep, do not let the Jesus Prayer escape from your lips, mind, and heart, with it sleep will come to you peacefully and sweetly soothe you. Your Guardian Angel, your caretaker, will protect you from all enemy delusions. If you awaken before the appointed hour, then, without becoming lazy, rise and pray briefly to your God and the Holy Guardian who awakened you. Believe firmly that your Guardian is urging you to do this, therefore, you should not be lazy. Pray that you do not drive him away. After praying, lie down again and pray until sleep approaches.

On Prayer, Especially in Church

At night be sure to rise before Nocturns; stand before God and sincerely pour out a prayer to Him. When the time for the morning glorification arrives, arise with zeal and hasten as quickly as possible to the beginning of the Church service.  When you come to the Church for communal prayer, take a convenient place, gather all the strength of your mind’s thoughts, so that they do not dream or fly off to all sorts of lands and subjects that stir up our passions. Guard yourself as much as possible from looking around, it distracts the mind and seduces the senses, and often burdens your conscience and soul; strive as much as possible to absorb the reading and singing of the Church deep in your heart, and imprint them in its recesses. Be as careful as possible not to dare to speak of anything, nor even to look at anyone or anything. Attend to the church reading and chanting and strive, as much as possible, not to allow your mind to wander idly. If you cannot understand while listening to the church chanting and reading, then reverently and silently recite the Jesus Prayer as follows: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” Strive to direct this prayer deep into your soul and heart. Say it with your mind and thoughts, and do not allow it to depart from your lips for even a short time. Combine it as best you can with your breathing, and, with as much strength as you have, strive to compel yourself to contrition of heart, so that you may repent of your sins with tears. If there are no tears, then there must at least be contrition and heartfelt lamentation. See to it that the church service does not pass without this. At the same time, strive to maintain profound silence, so that during singing, reading, or listening, you may have an undistracted mind, a blameless heart, and pure thoughts, for through this you can satisfy your soul with spiritual food, which is the word of God. At the same time, do not exalt yourself, but humble yourself (Luke 14:11). The Lord God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Instill this in your soul and heart, and guard it diligently, lest you become arrogant. If you receive tears from this, strive that those tears serve for the benefit of your soul and would wash away your wickedness and iniquities. You must always remain in such humility and repentance, praying and waiting, until the grace of God visits your soul from above with its divine illumination. 

Standing in the temple of God, imagine that you are in heaven itself, standing before God with the Highest Powers, and doing everything that they do along with them; make it a rule for yourself while imagining this not to leave the assembly of your brethren before the end of the service. After the morning doxology, as you leave the church for your cell, be careful not to stand with anyone or say anything. Above all, avoid harmful idle talk and laughter, return quickly to your cell, without letting the Jesus Prayer leave your lips or mind. Upon entering your cell, close the door, and if you can, stand and pray briefly with fervor, attention, and gratitude for yourself, your parents, your benefactors, and the entire world. Make a few prostrations or bows to the ground with prayer. Afterwards, take a book and read briefly, restraining your mind and thoughts with prayer. Beware lest your thoughts wander to unprofitable, soul-harming subjects. This is how you should act and guard yourself without fail after every church service, having rested briefly.

If you have been entrusted with some task or a general obedience involving physical labor, then take it up, reflecting within yourself, as if this task was given to you by Christ Himself, and not by man. Therefore, arise quickly with love, remain in service without complaint, labor exhausting your flesh. If there is no common service or task assigned to you, then do whatever you can, such as handicrafts, or satisfy your soul with reading books, or do anything else that does not hinder our salvation.

Be attentive without laziness, do not relax your body, do not lean against a wall or church pillar; but join your feet evenly together and firmly plant them on the ground; place your hands on your chest; bow your head and direct your mind to the heavenly realms.

I beg you, lover of virtue, accept all these words with heartfelt love, and consider them the beginning of virtue, since he who desires to live piously, and in a way pleasing to God does every work of God without negligence, but with zeal and diligence, so that he may more quickly be transformed into a man of perfection, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ [Eph. 4:13]. If you stand perfectly according to the order, as stated above, and become greatly weakened by this standing, or by an accidental physical illness, or by old age, then sit wherever you can in the Church, where it will not tempt your brother.

Consider whether you are becoming weak from despondency and laziness, or whether you are losing strength and courage from the distraction of thoughts and bodily passions. With these considerations, reproach yourself for becoming impatient, weak, run-down, lazy, and so, be ashamed before God and His angels and men, and consider in your conscience that he who endures to the end will be saved. (Mark 13:13).

If, while standing in prayer, you find yourself utterly unable to bear a natural necessity or a sudden, severe illness also rebuke yourself as described above, or if you leave the church due to an obedience entrusted to you, even in that moment reflect with self-abasement that you became deprived of the delight and being together with the heavenly citizens.

If you reason and reproach your soul in this manner, and persevere to the end, you will advance from strength to strength and invisibly receive from God both bodily health and spiritual enlightenment.

However, if you grow weak from exertion, illness, or old age, as previously mentioned, and become unable to fulfill these practices, you may for these reasons leave off those labors and instead pray for a time while seated or lying down, using your prayer rope.

Heed this strictly: do not spend even a moment in idleness within your cell. For idleness is the primary teacher of all evil; once it takes root in a person, great effort is required to eradicate it.

Beware of being tempted that on hearing something not to become scandalized or judge your neighbor nor set yourself against another. Run away from audaciousness as from poison for it causes great harm to any person and leads to arrogance.