Boredom, anxiety, and malaise. Sound familiar to anyone? Especially this year with fewer opportunities to connect with others, a lack of engagements to look forward to, and chronic feelings of uncertainty. My prayer life has been affected at times in the same way. I’ve struggled with “dryness” (feeling bored or restless with my prayer) over this last year, no doubt influenced by the year’s challenging circumstances.
It’s understandable that we might be feeling stagnant in our spiritual lives or struggling to see God in the midst of our times. And even if we do have a consistent prayer life, there is always room to deepen it.
Prayer is ultimately about communing with God and something I always remind myself. Some of our best moments of prayer can be when we simply sit under the merciful gaze of Jesus. When we focus our minds and just talk to Him. When we remember that it is God who first loves us—and we don’t have to do or say anything to deserve that love. It is by putting our hearts in a posture of acceptance and gratitude that we can allow the fruit of prayer to really take hold in our lives.
The wonderful thing about the Church is that She provides us with so many forms of prayers to connect with God. We can adopt meditative or contemplative prayer. We can recite the Rosary or Divine Mercy Chaplet. We can pray spontaneously as we’re cooking dinner or walking the dog. We can pray in communion with others at Mass.
With that in mind, a great start to becoming more prayerful this next year we might consider changing things up and try something new!
I’ve had to do this in my own prayer life, and there have been seasons when I’ve felt particularly drawn to certain forms of prayer.
Like any human relationship, as we grow closer to the other, what we talk about, and how we spend time together tends to shift. The same is true in our relationship with God.
Adopting new forms of prayers can be a great way to deepen this relationship and get to know a different side of Him.
If you like a little more direction, start by exploring some tools. For example, Laudate is a great and very popular Catholic app that offers the Daily Mass Readings, the Liturgy of the Hours, the Rosary, Chaplet of Divine Mercy, and other resources to help deepen your prayer life. Hallow is another Catholic app that offers guided mindfulness meditations grounded in Christ. And another great resource is the Magnificat, which you can find online or in print. This is a wonderful resource for enriching your prayer life by deepening your participation in Mass as well as growing in your personal prayer life.
It’s also okay if some forms of prayer feel weird or awkward. Try something else. You may find that you feel more connected to God reading Scripture or saying certain prayers than you do by meditating. There is no one or right way. The key is to keep trying and to keep desiring to connect with God. He will meet you there.
I can sometimes focus too much on the “actions” of prayer. I think about the list of things I need help with for myself and others, offering gratitude to God, kneeling, reciting a certain set of words, etc. Of course, these are all wonderful and beautiful aspects of prayer. But prayer is, at its core, simply bringing ourselves into the presence of God and reflecting on His infinite love for us.
I’m reminded of the story of Martha and Mary from Scripture. Martha was busied by many things in preparing to host Jesus—many good things!—and her sister Mary simply sat at the feet of Christ, listening to Him with love. Jesus tells us that Mary’s response was the better part. I think it can be helpful to remember that as we begin this next year. Our prayer can simply be time spent with the Lord where we don’t have to do anything other than allow Him to love us.
Lastly, try being bolder. Have you ever held back in prayer? Do you ever think, God doesn’t care about this? Or if we’re honest, doubt that what you desire would actually be able to happen?
I have struggled with this, especially when I’m not feeling God’s presence. When that happens, my prayers can grow small. I start to doubt that He does really want to bring healing, love, and fulfillment into my life even though He absolutely does.
But when we admit our weaknesses, fears, and needs and then, with childlike faith, trust that He will help us, I think God delights very much in this.
When we do ask for things on behalf of ourselves and others we can do so with greater trust in God’s goodness. We can boldly claim the truth that He is our Father who desires to hear and answer our prayers generously.
Of course, this doesn’t mean He will answer all of our prayers as we hope or expect. But it does mean that we believe He has heard our prayers and will respond in the way that is best for us and others.
This is much easier said than done. But I think it gets easier the more time we spend in prayer, where we remember how much He loves us (by letting his gaze rest on us in prayer, as mentioned above). The more we do this, the easier it is to trust in God. And the easier it is to trust, the bolder we become in asking God for His mercy and help over this next year.
Especially as we begin another year with so much uncertainty, so many of us are considering how can we gain more peace? How can we find more purpose? How might we better trust in His will for our lives and the rest of the world in 2021?
The simple answer? Become more prayerful.
So, as we enter this next year, consider adopting some new forms of prayer, resting more in God’s loving gaze (as opposed to always “doing” something for prayer), and being bolder in asking for His help and grace. And if we seek Christ consistently in these ways, we will surely find Him this next year.
