Taming the passions

Passions come from our senses. If you are to become truly free and learn to live by God’s will, you need to learn to control the passions that result from your senses. For example, you may crave certain foods. You think you cannot live without them. When you are deprived of them you become disturbed. Gaining freedom from these likes and dislikes allows you the freedom to do God’s will and to love others by being less focused on your own desires. This does not mean you have to deprive yourself of good food or entertainment. But, it means you must to learn to enjoy what is beneficial to you and to forego all the indulgences. You cannot simply ignore the passions, but you have to train them to come under the control of your soul and mind. You must live in ways that do not undermine your health, security, or freedom from sinful tendencies such as anger. It is like we have a wild team of horses pulling our wagon. We think we are the driver, but the horse decide to go where they want. The challenge is to harness and train them so they will follow our commands. This is what is meant by taming the passions.

This task begins with acknowledging that you ARE often controlled by your likes and dislikes. This involves your attachment to what you taste, smell, watch, listen to and touch. True freedom comes when you learn to control your reactions to your senses, i them to lead you to what you approve of and to obey when your better judgement says no.

The place to begin is by learning to say no when you are being led to indulge in something you know is not good for us. You need to bring the conditioned response in your mind over to your higher side and train your mind to obey. Gaining discipline in what you eat is a first place to start. This is one of the benefits of the fasting we are asked to do. By choosing to not eat certain foods, you are in effect training your mind to be more obedient. When it becomes obedient then it will be capable of doing God’s will. In the tradition of the church fasting was always one of the first disciplines taught after prayer. This was taught to us by Christ Himself.

The Orthodox Way of life involves many fast periods and days. We have the Great Fast before Pascha. We are to fast each Wednesday and Friday. We fast before taking holy Communion. YOu can follow the church calendar ad the advise of your spiritual father on the fasting guidelines that have been established by the Church to help you in your efforts to tame your passions.

Often you find that you are stuck in a rut and so conditioned to a particular like or dislike that you cannot bear even the thought of tearing ourselves free from it. It is like there is a deep groove engraved in your mind, like a rut, that you cannot get out of. You do then same thing over and over without even thinking. These ruts need to be identified and eliminated so you are free to choose. When you are stuck with following your own desires automatically and you engage with others who are also fixed in their desires with their own ruts, you find there is conflict. This conflict often leads to a negative reaction and you find that you are unable to love as God commands. What you need to learn to do is to become playful with all your likes and dislikes. This means being able to say yes and to say no. We want to go beyond relying on abstinence, but abstinence may be necessary as a start to break a pattern that controls us.

This is where the practice of the Jesus Prayer can help you intercept these automatic patterns. Instead of reacting you can condition your mind to instead call upon the prayer to interrupt and lift you out of the rut. This becomes what we call being watchful. As you identify your man ruts you can pray for God’s help and if you have a regular prayer life, participate regularly in worship services and the sacraments, God will help you.

Our passions are like a pet. If you have ever had a puppy you will remember how they take a shoe or other item and chew on it and tear it apart. They growl when you try and take it from them. This is normal behavior for a young pup, but not one we want to have continue so we have to train it. If we do not train them in the beginning, they will stay wild and even turn against us later on. Our passions are like puppies. Unfortunately many of us have grown up without properly training our passions. When we try to confront them they are not eager to cooperate. They rebel like an angry pup. Controlling them becomes a difficult task, but an essential one to a virtuous life.

When you first begin to tame your passions you may experience inner irritation. As you wrestle with them you will find that the block is in the mind. And, as you mature in your prayer life you will find that you have increasing means to overcome the ruts conditioned into your mind. As you seek God’s help you will be aided in this struggle. You will even be able to create new ruts that are beneficial to the health of your soul. Eventually the soul will regain its normal position of being in control. The mind then becomes a powerful and useful tool under the enlightened direction of the soul for living the life that God desires for us.

source: http://www.stgeorgegreenville.org/TenPointProgram/Training%20Passions.html