Spiritual fathers, for their part, were careful in their guidance. Often a period of three months would go by and he had not given an answer, saying that he had not comprehended it. So they accepted his answers as though they were from God himself, approved and shaped by his will. For example, a story is told of Abba Agatho, who was on a journey with his disciples when they came across a little bundle of green peas on the road. Be sure that he directed himself.
Nothing is more grievous than to be one's own director, nothing is more pernicious.
Plotinus and other pagan sages treated the body as if it were a transient and accidental adjunct to the self. Not the monks. For them, the body was grippingly present. We have to run very hard because we have fallen behind our holy company. So let us run, driving on this foul and wicked flesh of ours, killing it as it has killed us.