A Different Way to Pray by Rev. Karen Linsley

Today I am contemplating different ways to pray. One understanding of prayer is that it is beseeching to an outside entity. This idea of prayer is so ingrained in our culture that even people who claim not to be Christian, who replace the word God with the word Universe, still beseech an outside entity. They say things like, “I’ve asked the Universe to help me with this.”

I use this type of prayer--only rarely--when none of the others ways I know to pray work. Sometimes I get desperate. Either that or I must change the thing for which I am praying. Because ultimately, I’ve learned that is really what prayer is all about for me. Ernest Holmes said that “prayer changes the mind of the one doing the praying.” That is what prayer is about for me, more than asking for something to be done for me.

And I’ve sometimes felt a bit “victimy” praying to an external entity, and, most of the time, there was something missing with those prayers. The reality is that prayer goes much deeper than simply asking a God separate from us to do something for us. The reality of prayer is that it has the power to change us from the inside out, and when we change, our world changes.

If I approach prayer as something that changes my mind, I am asking for a change in my consciousness. For example, a shift from lack and limitation to abundance and prosperity. This forces me to look at the habitual ways I think, my habits and patterns of thinking, and change them if they do not serve me. And here is a caveat I always issue when speaking about changing the way we think. It does not mean that the ways we used to think are wrong. Nor does it mean that the ways we used to show up in the world are wrong or that anything else about us has ever been wrong. It simply means we have grown, and now it is time to think differently and show up in the world differently. Those old ways of being and thinking and showing up in the world served us well until they didn’t anymore. When they stop serving us, it is time to pray to change our minds. When how we think and behave gets us into trouble, it is time to do something different.

Viewed this way, prayer is really, in part, a spiritual practice called self-awareness.

And the Bible calls us to “pray without ceasing.”

How is one to pray without ceasing? And what is the real power behind prayer? I believe that prayer is a guiding light, not something to be used when we are in need. Prayer is a way of being, not words. The traditional way of praying is a very good start. Now let’s take it a bit further.

If we are called to pray without ceasing, it means we are called to BE prayerful, 24/7. In a deeper sense than the beseeching sense, prayer means communion and connection. I’m sure you have had times in your life when you felt disconnected. Alone. Lonely. Loneliness is not about a lack of people in our lives. It is about being and feeling disconnected from that beautiful power in this world, that power that is everywhere present. The reality is that we can not be disconnected from It because it is everywhere present. We’ve just shut ourselves off from It.

We shut ourselves off from It by judging others. We shut ourselves off from It by hatred. We shut ourselves off from It by putting up walls of defense. We shut ourselves off from It by acting in ways that run counter to our deepest beliefs and values. And when we shut ourselves off from It, It never goes away. It affirms our way of being because that, in essence, is what we have been praying for. It always says yes. So we judge and hate, build walls, and separate ourselves further from It by separating ourselves from our fellow humans. We live in terms of them and us. And we get lonelier and sicker, and more hateful and judgmental, and we wonder how God could be doing the things he is doing? And then we shut ourselves off from God even more because now we are mad at Him.

I am finding it necessary to take a deep breath now. Breathe. Breathe out that pain and misery born of ignorance, and breathe in relief, truth, and the love of God.

Because, in reality, that is really what God is. It is love, and that’s all. But that is quite a bit, and it covers everything. In some circles, there are seven qualities, or attributes, of Spirit that are mentioned. Those attributes are love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty.

I’m going to make an assumption here and assume that you believe that God is indeed everywhere present. Another way of putting it is that there is no place where God is not. No place, and you are here. And if there is no place where God is not, then God is in you.

I’m going to make another assumption and assume that you believe that the qualities of God are indeed love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty.

If you believe that there is no place where God is not, and if you believe that the qualities of God are love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty, then you must also believe that YOU are made of love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty. And if you believe in what the Bible says, then you believe that the way to pray is 24/7, without ceasing.

If you believe all that, then the way to pray is to embody those qualities of love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty. All-day. Every day. As best as you can. This is the mystical and very deep power of prayer. When we strive to pray like this, prayer does indeed change the mind of the one doing the praying.

In Sanskrit, prayer means seeing oneself as wonderfully made. How much more wonderful can you get than to think of yourself as the essence of love, light, peace, power, joy and beauty?

I am reminded of the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi. You may know it as the 11th step prayer if you are a 12 stepper. This prayer goes like this:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me bring love.
Where there is offense, let me bring pardon.
Where there is discord, let me bring union.
Where there is error, let me bring truth.
Where there is doubt, let me bring faith.
Where there is despair, let me bring hope.
Where there is darkness, let me bring your light.
Where there is sadness, let me bring joy.
O Master, let me not seek as much
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love,
for it is in giving that one receives,
it is in self-forgetting that one finds,
it is in pardoning that one is pardoned,
it is in dying that one is raised to eternal life.


The prayer begins with a beseeching to an outside entity, but then it moves deeper. It asks for us to become at peace. It asks for us to become love instead of hatred. It asks for us to forgive instead of perpetuating the offense. It asks for us to bring harmony to discord. It asks for us to speak the truth. What truth? OUR truth! This calls for an extraordinary level of self-awareness, which calls for a regular practice of introspection, which is another form of prayer, and the topic for another blog post. Back to the prayer. This prayer calls us to replace our doubts with faith, our despair with hope. It calls for us to be the light, shining on the darkness of hatred, judgment, bigotry, and shame. It calls for us to be joyful. It calls for us to turn away from such self-centered and selfish motives as wanting consolation, understanding, and love and to turn towards consoling others, loving others, and understanding others. And it tells us that when we do this, we find ourselves, our true selves. Thus that old self, that lonely, miserable old self, dies, and we reawaken to an eternal life filled with so much love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty that we sometimes wonder about it. How can I, a lowly human, be filled with so much love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty?

And here’s the kicker to this prayer: it is in giving that one receives. In Science of Mind, we call this the Law of Attraction. This law says that what we offer, we receive. I find it somewhat ironic that we are back to where we began, beseeching an outside entity; only now we have accepted what we have asked for because we have become what we have asked for.

So go out into the world. BE love, light, peace, power, joy, and beauty. Every time you find yourself judging, remember. Every time you see yourself separating yourself from the sunlight of the Spirit by building walls of them and us, tear down those walls. Whenever you find yourself hating something or someone, replace that hatred with love. Every time you discover an example of sadness, bring some joy to it. Every time you want to participate in feeding disharmony by choosing a side, instead seek to understand. BE the voice and the example of Spirit in your every action and thought. Allow to die a natural death of pessimism and negativity and replace that with optimism and positive thinking.

And watch what you have prayed for manifest.

-------

Rev. Karen became a Practitioner in 2008 and a minister in 2014. Her mission is to teach the practical application of Science of Mind principles to provide a strong and unshakeable inner foundation that facilitates long term successful living. To do this she has a Focus Ministry called Fearlessly Feral CSL, through which she produces a podcast of the same name. She teaches online classes and workshops and also does retreats. She is the author of two books. In addition, she also serves as Interim Minister for Centers for Spiritual Living and is currently serving at Rio Grande CSL in Albuquerque. She lives in Northern Nevada amongst the sagebrush with two horses, two dogs, and two cats.