Mother Siluana Vlad: How do we make progress in our lives?
We need to free ourselves from the toxins of malice, envy, laziness - through Confession, by nourishing ourselves with Holy Communion, by fasting from bad things, until we become addicted to joy.
Question:
How do we find the motivation to make progress in our lives? How did you make your life better?
Mother Siluana:
To make progress in our lives, we need to know ourselves, and to know ourselves; we need to have a relationship with someone who helps us know ourselves. We generally live our lives among people who judge us, who assess us by criteria of this world - and depending on how others see us, we form an image of ourselves.
If our parents praise and reward us, we develop a positive image of ourselves and say we are OK. Usually, however, when parents praise us, they criticize others. People generally suffer from the disease of comparing themselves with others - you are better than your cousin, or you are better than your brother - and this gives us a positive but unhealthy self-image. From this comes unhealthy self-esteem. From this, people become selfish or narcissistic. They see themselves as better than others, know better what to do than others, want to do good by force, impose their "good" on others, control and lead others, and use others as instruments. They are usually called "abusers" in the language of psychology. They are leaders, but in a diseased way, not in a healthy way.
If our parents, especially the mothers, criticize us, if they compare us with others by showing us our bad parts - you are not as good as X, you are bad, you are good for nothing - then our self-image is ugly, and our self-esteem is negative. We don't appreciate ourselves well. But we are still selfish, and this is still a disease of the self: it is the disease of one who suffers from complexes but is still centered on the self. I still think only about myself, and I am focused not on what I need to heal in myself but on how others see me, on what I need to do so they like me. - with the conviction that nobody will like me, that I am good for nothing. Because of this, I will be attracted to people who are unjust, and criticize me harshly, so I have reasons to feed my feeble self-esteem. So these are the illnesses.
I started from a third position: the position of the victim. I started from this third position where I was not good, I was not perfect as a child, and I was told these things by others - but I was intelligent and brave enough to see that they weren't good either. This is the position of someone who says: "I am not good, but neither are the ones around me!" This is the category of depressed people who consider that there is nothing to be done, that we live in an idiotic world, that I am an idiot, and there is nothing to be done.
And so I started from this position until I reached the stage where I felt it was impossible to live in such a world, or in any case, someone like me cannot live in such a world. This is the position of one who is depressed, and I became depressed, so I had to be hospitalized and follow the treatment recommended at that time.
Around that time, I discovered - through reading, through paying attention to myself (I was not going to church at that time), through the questions I was posing to myself - I discovered that all these experiences I had were like parts I had in a play. And I thought this was a bad part in a bad play. At that time, there were many "artistic productions" put on by "political agitation brigades," - and I felt like my life was a lyrics book written for one of these agitation brigades (these lyrics were supposedly critical or self-critical and they were sung on melodies already composed by others by replacing the original lyrics.) And so I experienced this revelation, and I decided to stop being a lyric book for the agitation brigade and instead write my own scripts. They were worse than the ones imposed on me by the world, but they were original, they were mine.
And then, little by little, I became unable to live with myself the way I saw myself, and at the same time, I had a knowledge of something profound and beautiful within myself. I felt I was wonderful, and I didn't understand how, being so wonderful, I could sometimes behave so abjectly or how I could feel things in such a non-wonderful way. And then I started to cry out and realize that something is escaping me, that I was not a superiorly organized matter, or if I was an organized matter, then I could not organize myself in a superior way.
And little by little, I started to look for my Creator, for that Someone Who made me wonderful; and I believed that by entering into a relationship with Him, He would teach me what to do so I become wonderful in every detail. This necessity of being wonderful brought me to God, and this incapacity of continuing to live the same way: petty, mean, resentful, angry; and, by God's mercy, He helped me, He humbled me, He enlightened me. I met Him, I rejoiced greatly for meeting Him, and I promised Him that I would be well-behaved and obedient, but He needs to make me good! And we are both in the midst of this work! I haven't finished yet; it seems that it is only now that I am starting it.
Question:
Which thoughts and activities make our lives better?
Mother Siluana:
First of all, renouncing oneself. The Savior says: "Whoever wishes to follow me" - where? Of course, on the cross, in hell, but then to resurrection and joy; joy comes from Him, on this path - "whoever wishes to follow me must deny himself." So here we have two aspects of my identity. I am, on the one hand, that "who" that God calls out to, and on the other hand, I am that "self": oh, how stupid I am, or ah, how great I am. And so God requires of me, so I can reach His joy (which He gives to me freely, I only need to make room for it) - He asks me to renounce this "stupid me" or "smart me."
Therefore, the first thing is forgetting oneself and renouncing oneself. For this to happen, I need to direct to others all this energy invested in my ill self-love. First of all, to the Other, which means to God - and every time I think of myself, I need to think of God. I need to call out to God: "Lord, I don't want to be selfish anymore; it is selfishness that brought me to this state! Have mercy on me, heal me, grant me to love You, and respond to Your love! I have proof You love me; You did this, this, and this for me. Heal my soul!
And then comes forgetting oneself for other people. Go to sleep only after making an inventory of how much good you did to someone else. For whom did you do a good deed today? For whom did you live? The selfish person will die unhappy, will always be unhappy, will reach out for drugs, and will be addicted to unhappiness. An unhappy person is someone who lives for something. A happy person is someone who lives for somebody but not in an unhealthy way (because I can live for you with an unhealthy, dependent attachment.) I live to help, to do good, to help others carry their pain - because we have had and always will have pain since this life is a birth, and birth is accompanied by pain. And we are birthed into eternal life.
Therefore, forgetting oneself and giving away oneself are ways we can be healed with God's help. Confession means renouncing oneself and receiving God's grace. Communion is the total renouncing of oneself. "I am not taking Communion because I am not worthy." Then become worthy! That means you are lazy! You don't want to do your canon; you don't want to give up your sins. "But my spiritual father doesn't allow me!" Because you don't want it! Your spiritual father receives the Holy Spirit, Who tells him: "this person doesn't truly want to take Communion; he wants something else; he wants comfort, he wants to be right, he wants to be liked by others," and so on.
And so, if we renounce these unhealthy desires, we find the true desire: "I want to be happy; I want to be joyful!" And joy comes even when you are sick because I don't cling to my body and my life, but I know that the meaning of my life is to gain eternal life. And I am not alone, because I am on the Way with Him, and joy means being with Him! When do you enjoy the person you love? When you are together with the person you love. When do you enjoy God? When you are together with Him. If you forget Him, you have no joy.
Question:
Do you think that independence helps young people make progress in their lives?
Mother Siluana:
Independence is very healthy when it is independence from unhealthy attachments. We need to break away from the tutelage of our parents. And not how young people usually do it, by breaking away from moral tutelage, but from material tutelage, by gaining financial independence as quickly as possible. A young person's actual life begins with financial independence. Yes, it is expensive and difficult; but if we live in poverty with dignity, we will feel joy. Otherwise, if we have food at home, mom does our laundry, mom feeds us, and dad pays rent for us, no matter how "well" we might feel from the point of view of our comfort, our hearts will be gnawed by shame. We feel ashamed; we don't feel respectable. And we are not respectable! So this is material independence.
Then we need to have emotional independence. We need not be dependent on others' feelings. We need to understand that everyone has the right to their own feelings, that they live their lives however they decide, that they cause the events they want and that they feel those subsequent feelings. The important thing for me is to love, respect, value, and help when needed, but not to cause someone to be dependent on me. Unless, God forbid, that person is sick; or if it is my child whom I need to raise.
So this is the first stage. But if we reach independence, it doesn't mean that we make progress in our lives, but that we reach an opening towards this progress. Because as we become independent from the world, we need to become dependent on God. Let there not be a moment when we are not dependent on God. And then, in the vessel of my human independence, God will pour the grace of dependence on Him. He is my life. We are dependent on the air we breathe; how can we not be dependent on the life that is God? Let us thank God that He made the air and gave us the possibility to breathe it, but let us thank God that He is and that He helps me make progress so I can become happy. I can't be happy with these narrow limits.
Question:
What should we do when we find an obstacle in our path? How can we overcome it?
Mother Siluana:
We overcome it by experiencing it and not jumping over it. Some people are "unlucky" by profession. They say: "I am always unlucky!" But somehow, they always have the same bad luck. Why do they say this? Because they have avoided the obstacle. Every obstacle is a college degree or a Master's degree; it is a lesson. And if I don't experience it, the lesson is repeated; it's as if I failed a class and I need to retake it.
The obstacle, therefore, is a practice for our formation. What do I learn from it? I discover that whatever I have rejected so far has tightened me: "I don't want to live through this; I can't bear to experience this." Through the obstacle, I discover that I can experience this, especially with God's help: "Lord, I don't know what to do now. I am afraid. I am in pain. Help me!" And so I enlarge myself, broaden my heart, overcome my limits, and progress in my life. Every obstacle helps me make progress in my life. But it needs to be experienced in detail - with God.
Last question:
How do we fight pressure and stressful situations in our lives?
Mother Siluana:
Well, we don't fight them anymore! It is this fight that brought you pressure and stress! Don't fight them, but live them! We have this tendency to fight against life. And life needs to be lived. We need to say Yes to life: "Yes, this hurts. Yes, I am afraid. Yes, I am cold. Yes, I have no money. Lord, have mercy on me. Lord, enlighten me." So we need not reject anything but say "Yes" and call out to God in everything. And then we don't become stressed anymore.
Mother Gavrilia (I think you heard about her) used to say that Orthodox Christians are never tired because they are with Christ, and Christ gives us His rest. The important thing is to live like Christians. If you are tired or stressed, it means you have not lived with Christ. And you start from the beginning. But if you are physically exhausted, then rest with ease. Do it with measure. There are days when we cannot stop because we have important things to do. When you get to the end of the day, or when you can afford to rest, lie in your bed as if you are in God's arms. Don't look for rest in drinking, in movies, in pornography, in "having fun" - because these don't give you rest. But lie in your bed, in God's arms.
Rest for five minutes while you run from one place to the other, and look at a flower, a leaf, a tree, a cat, or a bird (you cat, don't eat the birds!) So these are ways to rest. When we thank God, we find rest. And joy! Joy frees us from all those stress hormones and all those stress neurotransmitters. But we don't have ears and eyes for joy. Everything is focused on "bad." If we hear something bad, we become very interested.
We need to have a daily inventory of reasons for joy; we need to be joyful and thank God. If we keep this daily "happiness journal," our lives will change rapidly. "Lord, thank You that today was a sunny day, and I spent five minutes basking in the sun, producing D Vitamins, and feeling Your love!"
This is what we need to do, children! We need to be thankful; we need to be joyful; we need to free ourselves from toxins - the toxins of malice, envy, laziness - through Confession, by nourishing ourselves with Holy Communion, by fasting from bad things, until we become addicted to joy. Amen.
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