Ibn Abbad al-Rundi (1333–1390 CE) was born in Ronda, in the Spanish province of Malaga, and at an early age emigrated to Morocco, where he spent most of his life. He was one of the major Sufi theologians of his time, and is said to have been a major influence upon the 16th century mystic St. John of the Cross. Among the extant works of Ibn Abbad is a collection of letters of spiritual counsel to various people, and the short passage quoted here is addressed to a man who apparently felt overwhelmed by his faults and shortcomings, and a feeling of helplessness to overcome them.

…Faults are indeed blameworthy. You ought to repent of them and experience sadness and compunction for them. If you do so successfully, you will reap the abundant reward of lasting benefits and win your Master’s good pleasure for having done what He commanded. This does not imply that you need to worry if illness or fatigue beset you in the course of events. However, if you are not sufficiently penitent, and your human nature overcomes you and your passions take hold of you, then hasten, hasten to seek refuge in your Lord…

That which you worship is the first thought that comes to your mind when you are suffering anxiety.

One of the mystics has said, “That which you worship is the first thought that comes to your mind when you are suffering anxiety.” Another, commenting on the words of God Most High, “One who is in need may be sure of an answer when he calls upon Him” (Quran 27:62), said, “The needy person is the one who enters his Master’s presence with his hands raised in supplications, envisioning no particular gift from God as though he had a claim to it, and says, ‘My Master, give me whatever you have for me.'” That is a needy person, even though he attains in this state the privilege of nearness to God and the special gift of love. Since one is able to profit thus even from indigence, the perplexity one experiences pales in significance.

From ‘Letter 2,’ Letters on the Sufi Path
Ibn Abbad of Ronda
Tr. John Renard SJ