The Mind

True prayer that will work, cannot happen inside of a cluttered and unsettled mind. Racing thoughts, anxiety, worries, and resentments, thoughts of great things that will be, thoughts of terrible things that will be, these are all ALWAYS either in the future or the past, and not right here and now. I encounter people every day who are not "present". I encounter people every day who are in a really big hurry, as if they are going to save a dying person, and I know that they are usually going to work, home, or shopping. I also know that when they get wherever they are going, they are going to be in a hurry to get to the next place. It is so easy to fall into the traps of "there, not here" "when, not now", When we get to where we are going, or when we get what we want, we don't even look at it! We focus our attention immediately on the next place or thing. Do you have things that you just had to have, but you never use? I do too.
If your mind isn't quiet, it probably won't quiet down in a minute or two. It is something that can take time, and also practice. I sit every night and take 25 breaths, and practice focusing. I don't take the biggest breaths I can take, but I breath my body. After the 25 breaths, I stop breathing my body and just watch my body breath on its own. During the day, when I notice that I am not "present", I just become present. ATTENTION. FOCUS. I have battled racing thought on and off for most of my life, sometimes It feels like I am taking a beating. My brain just goes and goes, but I find that if I don't get in there with it and push it on, the thoughts will usually go away. I think of it as watching clouds in the sky. I just sit and watch them move by. The less involvement I have with them, the more likely they are to just pass along.
A quiet mind. A sound mind. Relaxation therapy, meditation, yoga, tai chi, walking, soothing music, a good book, anything that will help you quiet your mind, is a good idea. Think of a lake with no ripples. Seek and find ways to calm your mind. When the mind is calm, reasonable, sound, quiet, that is when the Great Spirit can appear. The Divine Mind.
Trust me, I know it isn't easy to learn how not to worry. We have been developing ourselves for years, and this quieting the mind is not such an easy task for some of us. It can require much self examination, perhaps help from a friend or therapist as well. Whatever it takes is what we will do. If what you are doing isn't working, or you want to improve, then you gotta start doing something else.
The Divine Mind, Divine Ideas, Divine Power, Divine Life.

Prayer

"Behold, the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand". God is omnipresent, all through us and all around us. Our breath that happens automatically, our site, our hearing, all of our senses are gifts of Creator SPIRIT. The SPIRIT lives through US, and in that sense, we are all parts of the Creator. I look at all living things as God, and truthfully, if we examine things we would call "dead", we would learn that nothing is "dead". Look at a 2x4 board under a microscope, and see for yourself. Look at a rock of any kind, and see for yourself. Everything is AlIVE and in its own way, a piece of the SPIRIT. The Great Creator.
How we learn to communicate with SPIRIT is of the utmost importance, because in our cultures, and in many cultures, people are many times taught ways of communicating that don't work. Does prayer work for you? Do you have a working relationship with SPIRIT? Do you wish to gain more of a relationship with the Creator?

YOU are a prayer! Your "being" is a prayer. Everything about you is a prayer. Your actions, your feelings, your thoughts, are all prayers. Right now in this moment, we all have LIFE. Skin and bones, eyes and ears, the senses of smell and taste and touch, hearts, lungs, entire organisms called "BODY". Also right here in this moment, we all have "MIND". As a piece of the Creator, we have access to the Divine Mind. We also have "SPIRIT", or energy that we actually emit from ourselves. You may have said or heard statements like: "He/she really gives off a positive vibe", or "When he/she talks to me, he/she is really THERE". We are all attracted to different things, different people, different places, and in upcoming blogs, we are going to talk more about MIND, BODY, and SPIRIT. We will more closely examine prayer, and what it means, and how to build a better, working relationship with the Universe.