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Thus, in general, Maximos does not consider movement and energy as identical; in his mind, the second is a personal elaboration of the first and every created nature is defined by its energy<¹⁹>. The same terminology was used by John of Damascus one century later<²⁰>. For Maximos, nature without energy would be something absurd, as later it would be for Gregory Palamas. And movement as expressed in each particular being by its own energy, is a power which leads to a purpose, either positively or negatively. 

The division of will into two categories corresponds completely to the previous distinction between movement and energy. Natural will is a capacity of the natural being, both appetitive and cohesive, of all properties which belong to the category of nature<²¹>. Οn the other hand the gnomic will is a self determining impulse, executing the turns towards either direction and also a capacity of person<²²>. The natural will is, therefore, connected with nature and movement, while the gnomic will is connected with person and energy<²³>. 

Maximos places the distinction between image and likeness in the same frame. The first belongs to the category of nature and exists in the space between being and well-being, είναι and ευ είναι, while likeness belongs to the category of person and points to the perfection of man. It is worth citing a very characteristic chapter of his on this subject: 

God, in bringing into existence the rational and intellectual beings, communicated four of tlιe divine attributes, in order to suppοrt, to guard and to preserve beings: being, ever-being, goodness and wisdom. 

Two of these, being and ever-being, were offered to essence. The otlιer two, goodness and wisdom, were offered to the gnomic capacity, so tlιat creation became by participation that which God is by essence. That is the reason why it is said that man has been made in the image and likeness of God: In the image as being of the being and as ever-being of the ever-being, if not without beginning certainly without end, and in the likeness, as good of the good and as wise of the wise, one by grace of the one by nature. Every rational nature is in the image of God, while only the good and the wise are in the likeness<²⁴>.

According to this type of theology, being and ever being have been offered to the nature (or essence) and therefore they became properties of the rational beings by nature. The meaning of the image is exactly this, that created essence received the properties of being and ever- being, the second, though, not without end. Αll rational beings have been created in the image of God, which belongs to their nature. Τhe other two properties, goodness and wisdom, have been given to the gnomic capacity, i.e., to energy. Rational beings are not automatically by tlιeir creation endowed with these properties, but obtain them througlι their free operation; these are ingredients of likeness to God, being attained only by grace. Likeness is connected to personal freedom and consequently belongs to the category of person. The person is not something completed in advance. Rather, it is formed through hard struggle, aiming at elevation of nature, or rather at its surpassing. For man to form his personality means to transform his movement to energy, his natural will to gnomic will and his image to the likeness to God; it means to be elevated to the level of God and converse with him, person to person. 

The purpose put in front of man illuminates clearer Maximos' aspect of a close connection between man and God. The fact that man was made as a particle of Gοd is not a sufficient property and, if this is not accompanied by a participation in the divine glory, it remains meaningless. The Confessor clearly defines man's purpose in analysing the mystery οf Christ. He says that the great and hidden mystery is the προεπινοούμενον τέλος for the sake of which God produced the essence of beings. It is, namely, the hypostatic union of God and man in Christ<²⁵>. Certainly, the exact meaning of this passage is given a reverse interpretation, when one concludes that the pιιrpose of man's creation is his union with God of which the hypostatic union in Christ was to be the archetype. 

The destiny of man is the communion of the divine nature and the participation in tlιe eternity of God, attainable through God's implanting the respective logos into man in his creation and through his energy within the world as a whole. The distinction acccording to the λόγος φύσεως is sharply contrasted with the uncreated, while the distinction according to the τρόπος υπάρξεως is not separating but unifying. God is that which is participated in; his energies are goods which may be participated in by rational beings<²⁶>. The achievement of man's high destiny is realized in the terms of that dialectical relation between μετεχόμενον and μεθεκτόν and μετέχον.

The fιve great divisions οf nature<²⁷> were put before man as a labor for unification "by the proper use of the natιιral faculties"<²⁸>. Beginning with his own division into male and female, he should by an apathetic relation to the divine virtue shake off his natιιre and become simply "bare man"; then, proceeding through the other divisions he could, at the end, unite the created nature to the uncreated, revealing these two as one and the same by virtue of grace<²⁹>. However, the first man not only was unable to secure a unification of the remaining elements, but even failed to approximate to his prototype, because he was not ready to use properly his natural powers. Therefore, instead of subjecting his senses to himself, he was subjected to the perceptible world, led to further division and came very nearly to non-being<³⁰>. And ever since, all of humanity has followed the same way. Ιn this situation another extraordinary process was initiated: to be not according to nature, nor against nature, but above nature. God himself became man in order to unite the divided and to show the reasons by which it would be possible for union to be realized. Τhe Logos of God became "a perfect man out of us through us to us, possessing all our properties, except sin"<³¹>. Of particular importance in this reference is a second paradox; namely, that Christ, through his incarnation, makes human nature another mystery. He elevates it with himself and transforms it<³²>. However, elevation has not been realized οnce for ever. According to the personalistic view of Μaximos, God and man are παραδείγματα αλλήλων, examples of each other. Gοd makes himself man out of love for men as much as man deifies himself οut of loνe for God; and God lifts up man to the unknowable as much as man manifests God, invisible by nature, through his virtues<³³>. There is one person that imparts grace and another that receives grace; on the other hand, man in general and also each person separately is the one that has given to Christ humanity and Christ is the person that has accepted it.