“During the nearly 40 days that we were at the monastery, Paisios was always the same: innocent, extremely spiritual, and thoughtful. While he silently labored at his assigned tasks he was most likely at prayer. On my final day there after having said my goodbyes, I departed with the certitude that I was leaving behind me a holy man. As time passed I would hear about Paisios, that he was getting progressively stricter with himself. Not too long after my departure I learned that he left the monastery for a desert place on the Godtrodden mountain and that he lived there given himself entirely to asceticism coming down to the monastery only on occasion.”
Witness describing a Young Elder Paisios in Sinai
~Elder Paisios of Mt. Athos