According to the same holy Father, St. John, who authored the famous spiritual book, The Ladder, true prayer is both mother and daughter of tears. Contrition and compunction are its regular companions.
Compunctious prayer is based on an attentive life – attentive to the ever-presence of God in our life, to the purity of our heart, to the genuine humility of our spirit, and to the mystery of death which we must ever remember and contemplate. As it is impossible for fire and water to live together, it is similarly impossible to mix compunction with a life of luxury. And if we could only direct our awareness to the many salutary interventions of God in our life, our eyes would fil with tears of joy for His abundant blessings. Orthodox hymnology is replete with such sweet tears – tears of gratitude combined with tears of compunction, which in ascetic terminology refer to harmolypi (joyful sadness).
Should our prayers be favored with such tears, let us be careful not to lose this blessing because of pride.
Mark the Ascetic informs us that with these tears Christ has visited us and has opened our eyes. The memory of our sins in general, and not necessarily specific sines, is sufficient for compunction. St. Barsamouphios says that compunction wil come when we tame our wil such that we are able to abandon our non-spiritual rights and our love for worldly popularity. It is important to distinguish true compunction from the tears of superficiality, vanity and sentimentality. And we must be careful. Compunction can be wiped out by a careless tongue.
Prayer without compunction is like a meal without taste, according to Elias the Elder. The saintly Theognostos tel s us that compunction can be gained in prayer by temperance, vigilance and humility. And Niketas Stethatos observes that compunction begets humility and humility compunction.