""The ego abhors a vacuum." From the point of view of ordinary (or cataphatic) awareness, the apophatic will always appear to be a vacuum, and your ego will incessantly try to fill up this vacuum with content. If you grab onto an insight or illumination, or succumb to the temptation to pray for everyone then and there, what you have actually done is to allow yourself to be dragged out of the apophatic back into the cataphatic. Contemplative teaching--at least the most authentic and powerful of contemplative teach--emphasizes that this is never worth the price.
"Why? What lessons are the be learned by staying with the apophatic? ... By your willingness to stay with the apophatic at all costs during the time of this prayer, you are strengthening and deepening an attitude of soul that will protect you and carry you all the way: the attitude of spiritual non-possessiveness."
[45]
[Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening]
