" My friend, shut your eyelids and look at what you see. If you
tell me: I see nothing—you are mistaken. You can see very well,
but unfortunately the darkness of your nature is so close to you
that it obstructs your inner sight, to the point that you do not
discern what is to be seen. If you want to discern it and to see it in
front of you even with your eyes closed, begin by diminishing or
by putting away from you something of your nature. But the path
leading to that end is spiritual warfare. And the meaning of
spiritual warfare is putting everything to work so as to repel the
enemies or to kill them. The enemies in this case are nature, the
lower soul, and the devil. "

― Henry Corbin , The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism (Revised)