A Blueprint for Prayer

Motherhood does strange things to the brain.

Having a baby turns the mind to mush right at the beginning, as many of you can attest, but I think that’s because a mother’s brain radically alters after her first child is born. It divides, segments, and begins to operate not for one person’s day-to-day existence, but two.

And that takes some getting used to.

For the first few years, we forget the diapers at mom’s group or the bottle on a road trip. We forget to shower. We’re late for doctor’s appointments. We can’t seem to have dinner ready on time. But little by little, our brains adapt until, a few years into it, we are able to fairly seamlessly make meals on time, remember appointments, help with homework, do laundry, get our work done, volunteer at our children’s schools and extracurricular activities, and fulfill a thousand other obligations that come with the job of being a mom. And we’re usually able to sweep the bits that aren’t working under the rug, so that –in general– no one knows except our spouses.

I marvel sometimes at the organizational machine I’ve become; My brain works nothing like it did in my pre-child days. My thoughts are  never idle. Even when my body is at rest, my mind is adding items to the grocery shopping list, obsessing over the kids’ schedules, wondering what my two college girls are up to, planning out the organization of the medicine cabinet, mulling over my next writing topics, and a dozen other mundane-yet-critical elements in the lives of a family of six. Too many nights, I can’t go to sleep because of all of these thoughts pushing and shoving for attention in my brain. And too many mornings, I wake too early and force myself out of bed to try and take a few of them off my to-do list. I’m glad that my brain has adjusted to my role, and that I’ve become an expert multi-tasker.

But all this thinking has taken a major toll on my prayer life.

I believe in God, you see, and with that belief comes a need for prayer, and lots of it. But while I find myself praying in spurts throughout the day, I have a lot of trouble lately praying in-depth — because as soon as I get started, other thoughts begin to crowd into my brain. Before I know it, I’ve forgotten what I was even praying about.

Not good.

So what really stood out to me in the Week One video session of Beth Moore’s Living Beyond Yourself study was what I think of as a prayer blueprint. You don’t have to do it this way in order to effectively communicate with God, but I could definitely benefit from this kind of structure.

First, Beth has recommended in more than one study that we get up a few minutes earlier than the rest of our family. This is particularly important for moms — and particularly difficult for those of us with little ones that get up at the crack of dawn! But Beth believes in getting a handle on the day before dealing with anyone, particularly our kids, who can be our biggest challenge.

Find a quiet place to pray and spend a moment first praising God for all the blessings in your life and acknowledging His authority over you. Then comes the hardest part — confession.

Confess all of your shortcomings, your grievances, your sins, your worries- everything that’s on your heart and holding you back. This is the time to empty yourself, to pour it all out, to give all of your anxieties and mistakes and problems over to God, and to be forgiven. By pouring it all out in the morning, you’re starting the day fresh and restored.

Next, take a moment to ask God to pour His spirit into you- to fill your emptiness and shore up your weaknesses.

BOOM. You’re ready for the day.

I am definitely not a morning person. In fact, I’m the most unmorningest person I know. But I’m making a concerted effort to get up 20 minutes early each morning this week to try and have this prayer time that Beth’s talking about. Even looking at it objectively, I can see how this kind of focus could vastly improve my day. Letting go of my grievances and using that mental imagery of replacing them each morning with God’s spirit and love can only help — right?

Many of my Christian friends also use early mornings to study their Bibles and journal. I don’t know if I’m at the point where I can commit to doing that right after I’ve woken up. Prayer seems like a big enough task for my befuddled morning brain, and the Bible study work can wait until later in the day.

But I’m hoping that a specific time set aside for prayer each morning will make a major difference in my day. I’ll let you know.

How do you pray? Do you set aside a specific time for it? Do you feel you don’t pray enough, or put enough thought into it?

This post is part of an online Bible Study I’m hosting: Beth Moore’s Living Beyond Yourself. We’re finishing ‘Week One’ of the study today, but I’m writing these weekly blog posts so that anyone can read and enjoy them, whether part of the study or not– or you can start the study on your own at any time and just read these posts as you get to that week in the study. And if you’re doing the study and want to join my private Facebook group, where we talk about the sessions and daily homework in greater detail, just send me an e-mail (suburban.turmoil@yahoo.com) and I’ll add you to the group.

• I explain how to join the study here.
• My post launching the first week of the study can be found here. 

Image via Irina Petrascu/Flickr