Blog entry for:

this morning i woke up with a little angry about something i had no power over. prayer and meditation did not relieve the screaming bastard in my head and i had to stop and think what is going on. i really have yet to come to any conclusions about what is going on but i am sure it will come to me.
part of the stopping process is saying a simple prayer to get a bit of clarity. practicing prayer is a good manner in which to describe how i have come to rely on prayer over the minute or so that i have been clean.
when i was a child prayer was like some magical spell, you had to say the words just right, with the right emphasis and it was my impression that any deviation, would result in prayers not getting answered. and since my prayers were seldom answered i came to the conclusion very early that i must be doing something wrong.
this attitude changed as i grew through adolescence in adulthood. i came to believe that prayer was just a superstition on the level of friday the thirteenth, something that may be what other people believed but certainly not anything i needed to rely on or do, after all i has intellect and understanding and could move beyond superstitious conditioning.
during the course of my active disease i prayed when times were tough or i was facing serious consequences of my behavior, without ever believing that i would get any relief. i bargained and made contracts in prayer saying ‘ if only You get me out of this jam then i will... ’
in fact the last prayer i said in my active addiction was ‘ GOD provide me the means to get and stay clean! ’ i said this prayer to stay out of prison and you know it was answered and i was sentenced to treatment and the rooms.
so here i was, willing to recover without a clue how to do so and a sponsor saying that i needed to pray. following his suggestion i started and ended every day on my knees reciting my formula for prayer in the same rote manner as when i was a child. it was not until i did my second third step that i looked at what i was praying to and how i was doing it.
today, prayer for me is always different and truly a practice. i never say the same words twice in a row nor do i get down on my knees and prostrate myself before my HIGHER POWER, like a supplicant begging for mercy. there are common elements in my prayers -- asking for the ways and means to stay clean today and asking for open-mindedness and willingness, in the morning and thanking GOD for another day clean at the end of my day. beyond that stuff there really is no magical incantation of a formula to my prayers and you know this flexibility is working.
i know i no longer need to pray for mercy -- i already have that! nor do i have to pray to have the consequences of my behaviors removed -- i have learned to behave in a manner that reduces those consequences.
have i changed my opinion that prayer is part of the social superstitious conditioning? that is a difficult question to answer and the answer is probably a maybe. i do pray every day and night and i am still clean. do i believe that this is a cause and effect relationship? well truthfully i am not willing to experiment with what my life would become without twice daily prayer, to test that theory!
:)
so for now i will continue to practice what has been working and let the rest of the world decide for themselves what prayer is all about!
:) DT :)