Tuesday, May 16, 2006 at 12:12am
Does your mind pray? Or does your heart?
Column: Writing Down Your Soul
We pepper our language with the words "pray" and "prayer" as if we have a clue what they mean. But scratch the surface and you'll soon discover that no one knows exactly what prayer is. Not theologians, not ministers, not me, not you. People have theories and favorite practices, but there is no one definitive definition. When in doubt, I always check the Oxford English Dictionary. The brilliant writers of the OED know the definition of everything — except prayer, I guess. The none-too-brilliant definition of "pray" in the 2002 edition is: "Ask earnestly or humbly; beseech...make devout supplication to God."
Ask. Ask. Ask. Surely, there's a richer definition of prayer than that.
When Jesus was asked, "teach us how to pray," the gospels record him responding with a list of sentences that we now label the "Our Father" or "Our Lord's Prayer." If we stick with the Lord's Prayer for a moment as a potential example of effective prayer, the OED definition crumbles to ash.
The first five ideas in the Our Father are statements of faith, not requests: 1. Our Father, 2. who art in heaven, 3. hallowed be thy name, 4. thy kingdom come, 5. thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Only after all that high praise do the "gimmes" start: give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our trespasses...and lead us...and deliver us....
Four requests to five big, fat, glorious descriptions of God. Six, if you tag on: for thine is the power.... Hmmm. If that's a perfect prayer, how can the definition of prayer be ask, ask, ask?
Probably because that's what we do all the time. Please, please, please, dear Lord, grant me this, or give me that, or help me find this, or take away that. We've got this ask thing down pretty well. Problem is, it doesn't work. If it did, our prayers would be occasionally answered and we'd stop asking and start thanking. How many people do you know who pray prayers of joy and gratefulness? Not many, I'll bet.
So, why do we hold on to this idea that prayer is asking? Well, first, because life can seem pretty rough and a little help would be a grand and wonderful thing. But, second, we are in the habit of praying in words, words, words. We were taught to pray as children in words and no one ever undid that premise. Prayer, in our minds, is synonymous with words.
Words begin as thoughts and thoughts are little energy bursts in the brain. Or, at least, modern neurobiology would indicate so. Now, I grant that there is a considerable leap between the science of identifying a spot in the brain where synapses fire and the whole philosophical realm of consciousness. Exactly how those little bursts of energy become human consciousness is not thoroughly mapped out. But, for the moment, let's leave that very deep and very complex discussion aside, and proceed with the idea that thoughts begin in the brain and manifest themselves largely in the form of words.
If that's true, then our brains are doing our praying, right? They are pulsing away generating thoughts and words that become the sentences that become the prayers that are intended to transcend earth and reach God's ear.
But what about your heart? Isn't your heart supposed to be engaged in prayer, too? Jesus spoke of love all the time. The number one commandment, he said, is to, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, and...You must love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22: 36-39). If the number one commandment — the entire purpose of life — is love, surely love is a part of prayer. Even if the OED doesn't say so.
As little as we know about the workings of the mind, the power of the heart is an even greater mystery. People who have had heart transplants report sudden urges for foods and places and experiences that they never felt before. Occasionally, when they uncover their donor, they discover that the donor loved that food, or that place, or that wild and crazy thing to do.
The heart is so much more than a muscle pumping blood. Humanity has always known this, even if we couldn't explain how or why. For eons, we've spoken about the heart as the source of feelings, great and small, wise and wicked, gentle or outrageous. Love, we say, comes from the heart. And love, we know, can mend a heart or shatter it into countless pieces.
So, where does this leave us? Is prayer in the mind or the heart? I think the only answer is both. If we pray solely from the mind, but our hearts are not engaged, we are praying a half-prayer, and a pretty ineffective one at that. Because if the mind says one thing, but the heart says another, to which does Spirit attend?
For example, if your words say, "I trust you, Lord, to provide for us," but your heart wallows in fear about money, the heart will out and the prayer will not — can not — be answered. Not only do the words and feelings not coincide, but the time devoted to the words is miniscule compared to the all-day, all-night state of panic. If you could weigh the amount of energy devoted to the words of faith, compared to the amount of energy expended in the feelings of fear — well, the scales would be painfully obvious.
The key to effective prayer is to align your mind and your heart. In other words, send one message, not two. As always, the question is how do you do that? And that, is a great question, one that mystics have struggled with for centuries. The way it's been described to me best is this: Begin in your mind, hold your thought, and then, bring your thought down into your heart and send your prayers from your heart. I know that sounds a bit woo-woo, a bit weird, a bit impossible. But just try it. Sit still. Say a prayer, a simple prayer, just one phrase or sentence of a positive nature, and consciously see that prayer coming down from your mind into your heart, and then, just hold it there. And breathe. That's it.
Don't expect a great "aha" the first time you try this or the second or even the hundredth. This is a lifetime's practice. The great mystics of every spiritual tradition have struggled with this, so give yourself a little slack. Just try it. For two minutes. Then three, then five. Try it, and your prayers can not help but be more effective.
(Next week: Pray always? You gotta be kidding!)
— — —
Janet Conner, S.E. (Spiritual Explorer), is an expert on the power of practical spirituality to heal your broken heart and transform your world. She is the cartographer of the map of spiritual healing and author of the seven travel guides in the Spiritual Geographyseries. In addition to divine dialogue, she welcomes human conversation at {email janetconner@tampabay.rr.com}janetconner@tampabay.rr.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Janet Conner
— — —
UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum is a big tent for all expressions
of faith and spirituality, neither excluding nor favoring any.
All opinions expressed belong to the writer alone, and are
not necessarily shared by UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum.
Ask. Ask. Ask. Surely, there's a richer definition of prayer than that.
When Jesus was asked, "teach us how to pray," the gospels record him responding with a list of sentences that we now label the "Our Father" or "Our Lord's Prayer." If we stick with the Lord's Prayer for a moment as a potential example of effective prayer, the OED definition crumbles to ash.
The first five ideas in the Our Father are statements of faith, not requests: 1. Our Father, 2. who art in heaven, 3. hallowed be thy name, 4. thy kingdom come, 5. thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Only after all that high praise do the "gimmes" start: give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our trespasses...and lead us...and deliver us....
Four requests to five big, fat, glorious descriptions of God. Six, if you tag on: for thine is the power.... Hmmm. If that's a perfect prayer, how can the definition of prayer be ask, ask, ask?
Probably because that's what we do all the time. Please, please, please, dear Lord, grant me this, or give me that, or help me find this, or take away that. We've got this ask thing down pretty well. Problem is, it doesn't work. If it did, our prayers would be occasionally answered and we'd stop asking and start thanking. How many people do you know who pray prayers of joy and gratefulness? Not many, I'll bet.
So, why do we hold on to this idea that prayer is asking? Well, first, because life can seem pretty rough and a little help would be a grand and wonderful thing. But, second, we are in the habit of praying in words, words, words. We were taught to pray as children in words and no one ever undid that premise. Prayer, in our minds, is synonymous with words.
Words begin as thoughts and thoughts are little energy bursts in the brain. Or, at least, modern neurobiology would indicate so. Now, I grant that there is a considerable leap between the science of identifying a spot in the brain where synapses fire and the whole philosophical realm of consciousness. Exactly how those little bursts of energy become human consciousness is not thoroughly mapped out. But, for the moment, let's leave that very deep and very complex discussion aside, and proceed with the idea that thoughts begin in the brain and manifest themselves largely in the form of words.
If that's true, then our brains are doing our praying, right? They are pulsing away generating thoughts and words that become the sentences that become the prayers that are intended to transcend earth and reach God's ear.
But what about your heart? Isn't your heart supposed to be engaged in prayer, too? Jesus spoke of love all the time. The number one commandment, he said, is to, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, and...You must love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22: 36-39). If the number one commandment — the entire purpose of life — is love, surely love is a part of prayer. Even if the OED doesn't say so.
As little as we know about the workings of the mind, the power of the heart is an even greater mystery. People who have had heart transplants report sudden urges for foods and places and experiences that they never felt before. Occasionally, when they uncover their donor, they discover that the donor loved that food, or that place, or that wild and crazy thing to do.
The heart is so much more than a muscle pumping blood. Humanity has always known this, even if we couldn't explain how or why. For eons, we've spoken about the heart as the source of feelings, great and small, wise and wicked, gentle or outrageous. Love, we say, comes from the heart. And love, we know, can mend a heart or shatter it into countless pieces.
So, where does this leave us? Is prayer in the mind or the heart? I think the only answer is both. If we pray solely from the mind, but our hearts are not engaged, we are praying a half-prayer, and a pretty ineffective one at that. Because if the mind says one thing, but the heart says another, to which does Spirit attend?
For example, if your words say, "I trust you, Lord, to provide for us," but your heart wallows in fear about money, the heart will out and the prayer will not — can not — be answered. Not only do the words and feelings not coincide, but the time devoted to the words is miniscule compared to the all-day, all-night state of panic. If you could weigh the amount of energy devoted to the words of faith, compared to the amount of energy expended in the feelings of fear — well, the scales would be painfully obvious.
The key to effective prayer is to align your mind and your heart. In other words, send one message, not two. As always, the question is how do you do that? And that, is a great question, one that mystics have struggled with for centuries. The way it's been described to me best is this: Begin in your mind, hold your thought, and then, bring your thought down into your heart and send your prayers from your heart. I know that sounds a bit woo-woo, a bit weird, a bit impossible. But just try it. Sit still. Say a prayer, a simple prayer, just one phrase or sentence of a positive nature, and consciously see that prayer coming down from your mind into your heart, and then, just hold it there. And breathe. That's it.
Don't expect a great "aha" the first time you try this or the second or even the hundredth. This is a lifetime's practice. The great mystics of every spiritual tradition have struggled with this, so give yourself a little slack. Just try it. For two minutes. Then three, then five. Try it, and your prayers can not help but be more effective.
(Next week: Pray always? You gotta be kidding!)
— — —
Janet Conner, S.E. (Spiritual Explorer), is an expert on the power of practical spirituality to heal your broken heart and transform your world. She is the cartographer of the map of spiritual healing and author of the seven travel guides in the Spiritual Geographyseries. In addition to divine dialogue, she welcomes human conversation at {email janetconner@tampabay.rr.com}janetconner@tampabay.rr.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Janet Conner
UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum is a big tent for all expressions
of faith and spirituality, neither excluding nor favoring any.
All opinions expressed belong to the writer alone, and are
not necessarily shared by UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum.