Personal Prayers, Part 2
I haven't been on my very best behavior lately (a few other people around the campfire giggle and blush), so won't God be angry if somebody like me is...
We continue on the topic of questions relating to Personal Prayer.
4. I haven’t been on my very best behavior lately (a few other people around the campfire giggle and blush), so won’t God be angry if somebody like me is cheeky enough to talk to Him?
Of course not! On the contrary, talk to God and tell Him what you’re ashamed of. Speak openly and honestly.
5. Yeah, but won’t I be punished?
On the contrary, I’ll give you an example: Suppose you are a parent, and you have a ten-year-old son who’s playing baseball in the front yard. You are in the kitchen drinking your Sunday morning coffee and reading the newspaper. All of a sudden, you hear the crash of shattering glass. Your son has thrown a hard ball right through your six hundred dollar bay window in the living room. Since you are a wise parent, you don’t react for the moment; you’re waiting to see what your son’s next move is.
Your son is a bright child. He runs in the house, tearfully throws himself at your feet, and cries, “Daddy/Mommy, I’m so sorry! I was careless and I broke the living room window! Please don’t be angry (he cries on your lap) – I’ll pay for the damage with my allowance and birthday money, and I’ll do all the chores in the garden, too. Please forgive me!” You can’t possibly be angry with such a child. On the other hand, if the boy runs away and hides, or denies breaking the window, you’d be furious.
By the same token, when you tell God where you’ve made a mistake, you invoke Heavenly compassion. We are His kids and He is our loving Father, simple as that!
(The leader of the group, a forceful political science major by the name of Neville, looks like he’s about to explode. Let’s hear what he has to say.)
6. Lazer, you make it all sound so idyllic, but the truth of the matter is that I’m sick of having religion stuffed down my throat and being forced to do things I don’t believe in. I’m bored out of my skull sitting through services that don’t say a word to me, and listening to clergymen who don’t practice what they preach. How do you expect me to talk to God?
Neville, that’s what I love about Australians – you guys are straight shooters. Your question is superb; now listen carefully:
Let me tell you about the “Cantonists,” the little Jewish boys in 19th Century Russia that were ripped out of their mother’s arms and drafted into the Czar’s army for twenty-five years. Most of them never made it home again; of those who lived through their term of service, many became disheveled drunks in the slough of the gutter.
You ask yourself, how could that be? As soldiers of the Czar, they were impeccably orderly and disciplined. The answer is simple: When you’re forced to do something against your own will and belief, you’ll revolt at the first opportunity.
Your parents forced you to go to services, yet neglected – or didn’t have the tools – to teach you anything about God. Neville, can you imagine how many millions of people attend religious services and have never spoken one sincere word to God? They have a relation with God like you would have with your local bank teller – formal and polite, but without intimacy.
Personal Prayer has nothing to do with religion, houses of worship, or clergymen. We’re talking about your intimate relationship with the Divine Power that not only created you, but sustains you every single second of your life. Do you know how vulnerable we all are? If we could see the trillions and zillions of viruses, bacteria, and life-threatening one-celled animals floating around in the air, we’d all die of fright! Can you imagine the havoc that a tiny ameba could wreak if it penetrated the human brain? We can’t begin to imagine the mind-boggling numbers of favors that God performs for us each minute of our lives; God knows how many quadrillion favors He does for you, Neville. Don’t you think it would be proper to begin with a small thank You? Religion has nothing to do with it.
Neville, you’re not a goose; you can’t be force-fed. On the other hand, you can’t neglect the development of your spiritual self. No one can do that for you. Some people believe in secular spirituality; that’s a negation of terms, like soundless music. If you want to grow spiritually, you have to develop a personal relation with God. Forget the coerced version – that’s not spirituality at all. You wouldn’t stop eating just because you ate at a bad restaurant several times, would you?
I’ll give you an additional example. Elementary school children must learn arithmetic, whether they like it or not. Hopefully, teachers make the subject interesting. But, if you had the misfortune of having a fourth grade math teacher who didn’t know how to deliver the subject in an appealing way, you wouldn’t throw your hands up in the air and refuse to ever learn math again. Why? If you don’t know basic math, your life will be miserable – you won’t be able to balance a check book, you’ll lose money right and left because you’ll think that three soaps for a dollar are cheaper than a single soap for twenty-nine cents, and you’ll never know if the filling station attendant or your employer is shortchanging you.
Don’t be shortchanged in life, just because you don’t like the so-called religious establishment. People squander billions of dollars searching for inner peace, and never find it. They never will, until they give their soul what it needs; you guessed right, a daily session of Personal Prayer.
7. But doesn’t talking to God behoove me to be a goody-goody?
Do you believe in the Ten Commandments? (The entire group nods in the affirmative.) If refraining from idol worship, stealing, killing, and intimacy with another man’s wife mean being a goody-goody, yes – you have to be a goody-goody.
8. When’s the best time to talk to God?
Any time is a good time to talk to God, but the best time is at night. Nights are more tranquil than days, and there’s less spiritual static in the air to interfere with your speech and thought processes. Nevertheless, if it’s difficult for you to find free time at night, take advantage of time during the day that you don’t fully exploit, such as your train or bus ride to work. Many people spend close to an hour or more commuting every day. If you’re not behind the wheel, close your eyes, blot the crowded subway out of your mind, and utilize the time talking to God. You’ll be amazed how fresh you’ll arrive at work, and how sharp your mind will be.
9. Where’s the best place to talk to God?
Rebbe Nachman of Breslev teaches several important spiritual principles that answer this question.
First, try and find a place off the beaten path, where humans don’t normally walk during the day. Here’s why: Other people’s worries, fears, and negative emotions spiritually litter an area. That litter interferes with our prayers, and prevents us from the crystal clarity of mind that is necessary for good soul searching and for spiritual awareness. We all understand how a good tracking dog can pick up a person’s scent hours after that person has frequented a given area. Scent is the most refined of physical senses. Just because we humans can’t smell other peoples’ previous presence, that doesn’t mean that the dog can’t. The more you develop your spiritual senses, the more sensitive you’ll be to the presence of others.
Second, try and find a place that hosts all four types of creation – mineral, plant, animal, and human. Since you’re the representative of humanity and the ground you’re walking on is a good representative of the mineral world, all you need is a place with some plant life, like grass or trees, and some wildlife, like birds or frogs. Once you begin to speak with God, the mineral, plant, and animal life will join in to your prayers. Spiritually, your prayers will assume the dimension of a symphony, which gives God unbelievable joy. Rebbe Nachman says that when one of God’s children talks to Him, He drops whatever He’s doing in order to listen to his beloved child’s Personal Prayer.
Third, try to find a place where you’re comfortable. If you’re afraid to be alone in an isolated spot, then your soul won’t be at ease. In that case, a park bench would be better for you than the backwoods.
Fourth, the more a place is naturally beautiful, the more the soul rejoices. We all love an exquisite sunset or a bubbling brook. A lovely view is always conducive to Personal Prayer.
If you can’t fulfill all or part of the above four conditions, God will be happy to listen to you from wherever you call Him. I know many people who go to bed at night, pull the covers over their head, and talk to God until they fall asleep. People who talk to God literally never suffer from insomnia. I’ve had the privilege of helping quite a few people throw away their sleeping pills in this manner.
To be continued . . .
(The Trail to Tranquility is available in the Breslev Store.)
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