Κεφ. ΚΖ'
Self-Comfort in Acedia
When facing the spirit of listlessness, we are encouraged to use tears and the Psalms to restore hope in God.
When we face the demon of acedia, let us divide the soul in two with tears, making one part the comforter and the other the one being comforted. Let us sow seeds of good hope within ourselves and repeat the words of holy David: “Why are you so sorrowful, my soul, and why do you trouble me? Hope in God, for I will praise him again, the salvation of my countenance and my God.”1
Read the original Latin
Ὅταν τῷ τῆς ἀκηδίας περιπέσωμεν δαίμονι, τὸ τηνικαῦτα τὴν ψυχὴν μετὰ δακρύων μερίσαντες τὴν μὲν παρακαλοῦσαν τὴν δὲ παρακαλουμένην ποιήσωμεν, ἐλπίδας ἀγαθὰς ἑαυτοῖς ὑποσπείροντες καὶ τὸ τοῦ ἁγίου Δαυΐδ κατεπᾴδοντες· ἵνα τί περίλυπος εἶ, ἡ ψυχή μου, καὶ ἵνα τί συνταράσσεις με; ἔλπισον ἐπὶ τὸν Θεόν, ὅτι ἐξομολογήσομαι αὐτῷ· σωτήριον τοῦ προσώπου μου καὶ ὁ Θεός μου.
Notes
- 1 ↩The Greek ἀκηδία names the monastic affliction of spiritual listlessness, dejection, and aversion to one’s discipline; the traditional term is retained for precision.
The Praktikos companion
A daily portion of stillness
Chosen Portion delivers one short contemplative reading and a guided moment of silence each day — the ascent, one step at a time.
Chosen Portion is the paced doorway into this collection: it portions the dense mystical treatises into one daily reading plus guided silence, exactly as the 14-day plan teaches.
- Daily bite-sized excerpts from the contemplative classics, never a wall of text
- A built-in timed stillness practice that grows from 2 minutes to 10
- Gentle progression through the tradition — the app remembers where you are on the ascent