How to Pray -

Right now, I am facilitating a class called, "How to Pray." It is always an adventure to listen to others speak about how they connect to the Higher Power of the Universe. To connect, through prayer or meditation, is indeed one of the challenges - and joys - of the human condition.

How do you pray? How do you pray when you cannot pray? Through my prayers, I have learned that all of my prayers lead to that moment when I say: Ok, I accept whatever is, whatever shall be, whatever may come! All of the other prayers are like the steps leading to the top of the mountain. And in saying that prayer, I stand at the top of the mountain and take a step out - without knowing Who or What will hold me up.

I know this: Someone always does sustain me when I say that prayer, and when I take that step. Call that "Someone" God or Jesus or Mary or Buddha or Spirit or Allah or Higher Power - by whatever name, that step of faith, into the unknown, is the most powerful experience you will ever have.

And it is in the steps of faith we take every day that we take a lifetime of steps in a journey that is joyous, and free.

When we hear about the journey of faith, it often sounds like a set of rules. We "should" do this; we "should not" do this. What the rules really offer, however, is discipline, or practice in taking the steps that lead to the point of "surrender," or "letting go" into whatever is. This step, like the step off the mountain, is the moment when we realize that all of our planning, all of controlling, has led us nowhere. All we can do is trust, to take that step of faith.

And when you take that step, the step of perfect trust, you are free!
Warmly,
meb