The greatest good in life is to know God. One of the ways we learn to know God is through prayer. Dwelling on this, I ask myself, "Why don't I pray more?" Conistency between belief and practice is important to me, yet where is my time spent with God to prove it?

Guilt, soggy self-hate, fills me. I don't pray enough. When I do pray, it's not hard enough, disciplined enough, long enough. I don't get up early. I don't set aside time each day even, though I try.

One of the reasons I feel that I fail in prayer is because I imagine an ideal prayer life consisting of getting up at 5 every morning for prayer, and praying down a list of things for about for an hour or so. While that may indeed be part of a disciplined prayer life, I need to remember that prayer, like all spiritual disciplines, is an excercise. As in physical excercise, the same routine is not beneficial for every person straight across the board. This also means that I need to start small and be consistent. God calls each of us to pray in a different way. He speaks to each of us in a unique way. For me, if I attempt to pray in a very structured way, my mind will end up wandering. Instead, I find that if I pray for whatever topic is at the moment distracting me, I can focus on the prayer, not the distraction. This is also God's way of moving me to pray for things I might not think to pray about normally.

In moments of prayer this week, two things were impressed on me. One was that I need to listen, not just talk/ask God requests. The other was that I am allowed to use my imagination in prayer. As I was frustrated that my mind kept interfering with being still and hearing God speak, the authoritative thought came, "Use your imagination. I want your imagination." Is it God speaking in those authoritative thoughts? I think yes.

This week we read about prayer. Though I had intended to set time aside to pray privately, most of the week I didn't set a nice chunk of time aside for it.  I finally did get a chance for a nice long conversation with God. Fog and rain wrapped around the house, so I curled up next to my open window and listened. Cool wet drizzle freshened the air. At first, the feelings of inadequacy in prayer kept me from  truly praying. When I remembered that God wants me to approach Him as a Father, I allowed myself to simply talk to Him. Peace came as I spoke to Him, and He in turn spoke to me. 45 min. was just not enough time! The rest of my day was centered and God-motivated. As a result, my actions were more focused, and I was able to reach out and put other's interests first much more easily.

After spending time in prayer, life slides into perspective. God wants us to talk to Him, and we ourselves benefit much from prayer. Just think, it's communication with the infinitely good, faithful, everpresent God. What a beautiful gift prayer is. It's so simple, really.