Like many of my fellow followers of Jesus, I was infected for a long time with an unbiblical and counter-productive attitude toward prayer.
My expectation was that prayer is (like everything else in my life, I assumed) supposed to make me feel good. I expected to “feel” like praying and, when I finished, to “feel” good for having prayed.
Much of the time, it wasn’t like that at all.
As a result, like many folks, I tended to stop praying (or to pray very little) because "it doesn't do anything for me."
Don't get me wrong. I have experienced beauty and bliss in prayer. But it was only when I learned to “pray anyway”–to pray regularly, habitually, even mechanically, regardless of my emotions or moods–that I experienced a new depth and breadth and blessing in prayer, sometimes unexpectedly.
Like the award-winning author Madeleine L'Engle, who talks in the video below about maintaining her discipline of daily prayer, even when it does not feel meaningful:
Share your struggle with daily prayer below, and tell us what you do to get yourself to "pray anyway."
