Through confession, a person discards everything that is useless within and becomes spiritually fruitful. One day I was digging in my garden to plant a few tomatoes. Right then someone came and said to me, “What are you doing, Geronda?” “Well, I am confessing my garden,” I told him. Puzzled at my remark, he asked, “Does a garden need confessing, too?” “Of course it does! I have discovered that when I confess it, that is, when I remove the rocks, the weeds, the briars, and so on, it then produces healthy vegetables; otherwise the tomatoes are yellowish and sickly!”
Saint Paisios the Athonite, Spiritual counsels, III