anastasios
If you want to avoid having fun and relaxing, or at the most consider it a "lesser evil," be my guest.
First, this isn't exactly what I was getting at. You can see my views on pleasure/joy in this thread.
Nicholas,
The principle you speak of is given because some people try to go above and beyond what they are capable of. If a spiritual father tells his children to do something "in moderation," it is not because doing the thing in an extreme manner is bad in itself, but only because the person in question is not ready or does not have the calling to do the thing in question. Again, I'd point to the above thread mentioned, this life is about progress in our spiritual maturity. Stopping everything "joyful" in your life when you first become an Orthodox is a bad thing to do (and very destructive, as Anastasios said); however, if you've been Orthodox for 40 years and you're still playing "games" and "having fun" to the same extent, then there is probably something wrong.
I think I'm being misunderstood here. I don't mean to say that no joy is ever allowed (though Jesus never laughed during his earthly life, an interesting thing to meditate on). What I oppose are the "joys" that take our minds away from God. I use to think (when I was a Wesleyan) that "God doesn't really want us to think about him 24/7... he couldn't". That's dead wrong, that's exactly what he wants, because it is in that state that we are the most human, that we are the most "fulfilled," and as it so happens, it is in that state of being that we are the most content. What really strikes me about Fr. Seraphim is his emphasis on struggle. I think he once said something like: "a man who doesn't stuggle can hardly be a Christian". So, if I have to take my chances, I'm gonna try to land on the side of struggling (as opposed to pleasures), even if I have a hard time even struggling to stuggle.
