What is a PRAYER?

Two days after my friend and I got back from traveling in Peru, she sent me an early morning text message asking for prayers.  She had slipped and fallen down the stairs in her town home, where she lived alone, and had broken a vertebrate in her neck and low back, broken a rib, and had a partially collapsed lung.  She was in a tremendous amount of pain, and shaken to the core.  She reached out from the Trauma Unit at the hospital, asking for spiritual support from friends and family. 


My friend is the most spiritually strong person I know, and incredibly prayerful.  Her steady prayer practice shapes her into the positive, compassionate, caring, and generous person she is today.  Although she was open to receive love and encouragement from others, she was also praying for herself.  Before she had even left the hospital, she was already giving thanks for her recovery.  With confident, affirmative prayer, she was grateful for her healing.  She declared her health, her wholeness, her healed body, and was already grateful for the gifts of the experience. There was no rendering of the problem and no mention of unwanted outcomes.  It was like she was already on the other side of the problem.  


"Saying 'thank you' for a gift that has been received is merely good manners.  Saying 'thank you' in advance is faith." - Ellen Debenport, The Five Principles - A Guide to Practical Spirituality    


My dear friend's faith must have worked, because after only a few week from the accident, the doctors could not believe how well she was healing.  She's still in a neck brace, but is doing outstanding and is getting stronger everyday.  


My friend's accident gave me an opportunity to reflect on my own relationship with prayer.  I grew up in a non religious home, and was a Christmas and Easter church-goer with my grandmother.  To be honest, I was always confused by prayer.  I remember praying for a homecoming date, or to do well on a test.  It was mostly about asking for something I wanted, and definitely didn't require any listening.  My prayer practice has evolved over time, and looks different on different days. The meaning of prayer is more clear to me, but my practice is open and wondrous. Most of the time it is simply gratitude. Sometimes it's quietly walking in the woods, watching a sunset, or listening to the rain.  Sometimes it's cooking a nourishing meal for my family and mindfully chopping vegetables.  Other days it's a moving meditation on my yoga mat.  Prayer happens on Sundays in church, as I whisper the names of people I'm sending love and compassion towards.  It also takes place each night around the dining room table.  My family and I hold hands, take a silent moment of gratitude for our meal, and think about the people involved in getting our food to our plate.  Sometimes it's dancing, singing or chanting.  A prayer in motion is walking a labyrinth and paying attention to each step.  It's watching the rhythmic breath of my children as I tuck them in to say good night.  

My prayer practice started to feel more authentic, free and spacious when I let go of what it was supposed to look like, and instead, focused on what it felt like.  For me, prayer is being present, awake and aware.  It's focusing on the energy of my thoughts and feelings.  It's intentional living, and often feels like an offering to something bigger than myself.  


As much as I would like to keep reflecting on my own ways to pray, I wanted to keep the intention of this newsletter about asking YOU what prayer means to you?  Have you asked yourself in a while?...  
 
What is a prayer?  

How does prayer look in your life?  

When do you pray?  

How do you define spirituality?

How does it feel in your body when you pray?...and more importantly, how does it feel in your heart?   

If these questions are confusing to you, I recommend getting still and quiet.  Sometimes stillness can reveal answers to questions that we didn't even know we were asking.  

Below is one of my favorite poems by Mary Oliver.  Sometimes just reading this poem feels like a prayer.  Enjoy!  

Praying

It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.”

―Mary Oliver,Thirst




Be well,
Shannon 

***Update*** My dear friend Ali, who broke her neck after our adventure in Peru has published a book about her experience!! This books is about her healing journey, her positive outlook, the power of prayer and the superpower of gratitude. It’s called Decompressed, because she had a compression injury to her spine, and was able to heal quickly through body, mind and spirit self care. She even wrote a chapter about me and this blog post I recycled from a newsletter I wrote, which of course, brought me to tears. She is a gifted writer, with unwavering optimism, strong faith, and a heart of gold. This is a beautiful personal story of how to turn a challenge into an opportunity… And maybe even write a book about it!

So much love to you Ali! Grateful to call you my life long friend

You can find her book here: Decompressed: Gratitude, Reflections, and Breath Prayers for Healing and Thriving