Importance of prayer and a deep inner life in Dealing with life (Part 2)

Mark Dohle

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Importance of prayer and a deep inner life in Dealing with life
(Part 2)

Prayer is not a luxury. Neither is the development of a deep inner life, a life of deepening self-awareness and reflection. Which I believe is a response to a calling from beyond me, to deeper freedom, compassion, and love of others. Prayer is often considered as ‘asking’, of constantly seeking ‘something’ from the Eternal One. When in fact, most forms of prayer are based on deepening a listening mode when it comes to dealing with our relationship with the transcendent… which hopefully influences how we listen and relate to others we come in contact with.

It is about being a ‘pilgrim’, being on a journey, seeking to bring that ‘listening’ that is needed in prayer, to learning to ‘listen’ to others and not reacting. One way of listening in prayer is to seek to have a deeper understanding (speaking as a Christian) of the life that Christ is calling me to, and how that affects how I relate, listen to and treat others. This takes time, reflection, humility, and the desire to become inwardly free enough that something helpful can actually be brought to others in my life.

It also leads me to understand just as I need to listen in my prayer life, to reflect, to deepen my understanding…..so it is true with those with whom I interact, to listen and not to react, to step back, and monitor my inner responses to someone who comes from a different perspective. No one of us can be forced to believe anything, our faiths, or our secular beliefs, if not respected lead only to further social alienation.

I believe in the “Mind of Christ”. A way of being that is paradoxical, but if followed, absorbed, and related to, leads to a life of less conflict with others, more understanding of the human condition, and in that there is less need for the fear and anger, that is often at the root of many exchanges that are so common today.

We are an emotional, intuitive, and intelligent species that struggles to overcome the irrational in our lives, but often fails

. Each generation seems to make the same mistakes, fight wars, add fuel to bigotry, that only points to the fact that we are in the grip of deep irrational forces, that reside within each of us. We have to struggle to become actually rational, and we at times do achieve this, but more often than not are in ‘sleep mode’ in how life is often dealt with.

Get up, have our coffee, tea or whatever, break our fast, go to work, on the way to work have the radio blasting while fighting traffic, worrying often about money, our kids, aging, etc. Go to the doctor perhaps for an appointment, while there, a TV is blasting some sort of message, some good, some fearful, most annoying. Come home, eat supper, watch the news, and watch a movie maybe, go to bed and get up the next day and start all over again.

Even in Monasteries, this can happen and very easily. Little time for reflection, when in fact that is what is needed in most lives. To be silent, to ponder about our lives, and to seek some deep personal relationship with the Infinite, to give some meaning and significance to our existence is often overlooked and replaced with endless forms of entertainment.

Lip service is often given to the concept of ‘Love”. If secular humanists really believed what they say they do. Or if Christians actually lived the message we love to give out, or those who say their Muslim faith is a religion of peace, why it is then the world is the way it is? If atheists are really so rational, why do they fall into the same trap that many religious people do? Why do we make the same mistakes every generation? I believe we are driven by unconscious forces that more often than not are fear-based.

How can they be dealt with? I believe that prayer, or if you prefer mediation, the openness to the reality of an Infinite loving intelligence that is in fact our creator, is one such way to be able to have the courage to face what is within and to come out healed and whole. Though this takes time, effort, and our knowing that we need ‘outside help’ or grace to achieve this. For in fact, the most rational response to reality is to actually love one another, to forgive, and through self-knowledge to grow in empathy for all life, which is the only way to stop our seemingly communal addiction to war as a way to deal with our problems. What we tend to do unthinkingly is not working.

An eye for an eye form of justice seems to only make things worse, so perhaps faith in God, in living out our traditions, embracing life, and seeking to allow grace to transform our hearts, is in fact the most logical way to live.-Br.MD

 
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