Meanwhile Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.  Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.  He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"  He asked, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.  It is hard for thee to kick against the goad.

"It is hard for thee to kick against the goad." (A goad is a stick used to drive cattle; in this context - a stimulus which urges)

The ego likes to puzzle over things so it can lay claim to the ownership of the solution.  These mental gymnastics exist in the head as one's will, and prevent us from following God's will, which arises from the heart and always knows what to do.  We are in anguish insofar as we refuse to give ourselves over to God's will by following the simple and clear dictates of the heart.  But abandoning the complex machinations of the mind becomes the more difficult the longer we reside there.  Thus the need for repentance.  God will give us the grace the moment we abandon ourselves and turn to Him.  Is a state of anxiety anything but our good angel prodding us and telling us we are abandoning God's will for our own?

When we obey ourselves things run amuck and we hear the Word whisper in our hearts: "It is hard for thee to kick against the goad."  That is, it is hard to constantly battle against Providence.  And, like Paul to whom these words were addressed by Christ, when we fall and repent we say: "Lord, what would you had me do?"