Advent Day 1

How to Pray “Instruction Sheet”

As a child, I grew up saying nightly prayers. The “Now I lay me down to sleep…” and then God bless my family, the dog/cat, and maybe someone else, but it was pretty rote. My daily prayers, other than in church, have not been very consistent or good, and I’m 65!. I try at night and am good for a bit. I get in prayers for my immediate family, but then my mind wonders. I bring it back, and then it goes off on its own again. So I try praying during the day. Same results or I can possibly fall asleep. I am great at saying I will pray for you, and I am totally sincere, so I do immediately say a little prayer lest I forget for whom I said I would pray,. But thanks to Steven Falci’s daily reflections about St. Ignatius and his Daily Examen, I am learning how to pray for real. Here’s how.

Steven shared the five steps. I have a shortened version next to my bed and try to reflect on them each night. Here they are.

“Become aware of God’s presence.”
“Review the day with gratitude.”
“Pay attention to your emotions.”
“Choose one feature of the day and pray for it.”
“Look toward tomorrow.”

Some days I need to reread the full explanations to help me think more deeply about my prayers, but this is working. My praying is evolving with tiny baby steps. I feel more confident with this tool. So thank you, Steven, for making St. Ignatius’s words come alive. I have gratitude for your insight, and you have been in my prayers as my feature of the day. If you have trouble praying, I invite you to try this. And remember baby steps are still going forward; my steps are still in the infant stage.

And as Rob quotes his bishop friend from Rob’s youth, “I don’t care if you don’t feel like it, pray anyway.”