Theophan the Recluse on Combating the Passions
“Keep to one thing: When the passionate is detected, immediately arm yourself against it with wrath and hostile anger. This anger in spiritual warfare has the very same significance as when an evil person is assaulting you; you have to strike back at him hard. . . . What does the victim of an assault by an evil person do? After striking the person, he calls for help. The watchmen answer his call and save him from trouble. This is also what must be done in spiritual warfare with the passions. Once you have become angry at the passion, you have to call out for help: Be attentive to my help, O Lord of my salvation! O Lord, be attentive unto my help, make haste to help me! When appealing to the Lord in this manner, do not fall away from Him through attention toward what is going on inside of you, but keep standing before the Lord, imploring Him for help. Run at once from this enemy as from a blazing fire. There is something others have done, and perhaps do even now. That is, once they