The Everyday Mystic

Habits of thought and habits of false beliefs can imprison us. Many times, we aren’t even aware of the habits, much less their sentence of imprisonment. Awareness of the habitual thoughts and false beliefs is the first step to freedom.  Sometimes, that’s all that’s needed.

In her book, The Secret Lives of Bees, author Sue Monk Kidd describes how the main character, Lily, is swarmed at night by bees that have set up residence in the walls of her bedroom. Lily captures the bees in a lidded mason jar and keeps them there for for several days.  When she opens the lid, she is surprised to discover that the bees are so accustomed to their captivity that they will not fly out of the jar, no matter how much she taps on or rotates the jar. The captive bees are an analogy for Lily’s life with an abusive father. Warned by the bee’s strange behavior, she escapes from her father to find a new life with a trio of beekeeping sisters in a distant town.

Too often, we are imprisoned by limiting thoughts and beliefs that restrain us from taking wing and reaching our full potential.  Do you hear an inner voice that says you aren’t good enough, or you have to work really hard to prove your worthiness, or you always have to do what you are told, or that you must please everyone or that you will never be smart/pretty/rich/thin enough?  These demon voices inside us imprison us like the bees in the mason jar.  Even when there is substantial evidence to the contrary, these false beliefs compel us to crawl around the inside of the jar, living small, closed-in lives.

Living big is all about recognizing the limitations of those false beliefs, taking the lid off the jar and flying free.

What do you want to do with your life but are afraid to try?  What would you do if success was a given? What is keeping you imprisoned in a jar?

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We do not often think of forgiveness as having anything to do with the workplace, but surprisingly, forgiveness is an essential practice of a highly effective work team. Thanks to recent psychological and medical research, we know that the act of forgiveness has many benefits to the individual. “People who are taught to forgive become less angry, more hopeful, less depressed, less anxious, less stressed, more confident, and they learn to like themselves more.”¹ What manager would NOT want people who are less angry, more hopeful, less depressed, etc. on their team? For a team, the benefits of forgiveness can be multiplied by the number of people who work together. An atmosphere of forgiveness will improve the teamwork, productivity, spiritual integrity and creativity of a workgroup. When practiced by a whole division or company, forgiveness can mean increased profitability.

What do we mean by forgiveness?  Forgiveness is a process that we choose to take after we are wronged or hurt by another person. It does not happen automatically. Forgiveness takes a conscious effort - often, the amount of work needed to forgive is proportional to our perception of the gravity of the hurt. Forgiveness is a way to let go of the past so it doesn’t imprison you. We already know it is good for your health and good for your peace of mind. Lastly, forgiveness is a spiritual practice that we can use in the workplace. For step-by-step instructions on a personal forgiveness process, please visit a previous post called Seven Steps to Forgiveness.

To create an environment of forgiveness, a leader must start by establishing and communicating a purpose that is greater than just increased revenues or reduced costs. A compelling purpose for a team might highlight benefits to the customer and reference some of the higher values of customers and employees. For example, Mary Kay Corporation’s mission/purpose statement is "to enrich the lives of women". The leader of a team that practices forgiveness will be quick to spot conflict among members, and will coach the disputing parties to 1) air their grievances in a calm manner 2) look for the unmet needs of both parties and 3) look for mutually beneficial resolutions to the grievance - before the grievance has a chance to fester and gather emotional energy. A good leader will model forgiveness by personally following those steps toward resolution of a grievance.  A good leader will create an atmosphere in which both personal and team failures are seen as learning opportunities rather than causes for recrimination.

What happens when a team does not practice forgiveness? Unresolved grudges build up resentment to levels much higher than the seriousness of the original grievance. People stop talking to each other. Opposing camps are formed, and often if one person is seen talking to a person of the "other camp" they are labeled traitors. A colleague recently described such an atmosphere at her workplace. "It’s gotten to the point that I don’t want to go to work anymore," she lamented. "I try to be nice to everyone, but sometimes I’ll try to talk to a person from the other camp, and he completely ignores me.  He might refuse to perform job duties that are clearly expected of him just because he is working next to me." An unforgiving workplace is toxic, stressful, ineffective and non-productive. Absenteeism, health care costs and attrition all rise in an unforgiving environment - at great expense to the employer.

As leaders, it is our spiritual imperative to build forgiving organizations. A spiritually intelligent team is a team that learns to forgive. How can you contribute to the forgiveness quotient of your workplace?

¹ Dr. Fred Luskin, Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness, page 78.

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If you had to answer honestly, could you truly say that  you are present in the moment most of the time?  I think that most of us (I include myself, but I’m working on it!) are neither mindful nor fully present  for the majority of our waking moments.  Mindfulness is an important part of many spiritual practices, most notably Buddhism.  And for good reason - mindfulness keeps us from worrying about the future or fretting about the past.  By definition, the present moment is the point at which we live, so why not be fully aware and engaged in it! It is in the present moment that we are most alive and in connection with the Ground of our Being.

Being fully present in the moment is a decision that we can make any day.  It is perhaps best to start being present during less stressful times, so we can develop our mindfulness muscle, so to speak.  Then, that muscle will be strong enough to carry us through the rougher times.  I suggest that you practice mindfulness at home and on the way to work to get used to being in the moment.  Of course, you can and should practice mindfulness at any time - I’m just saying it’s easier to start when you are doing something with less emotional charge than a tense situation at work.

Being mindful is simple and yet difficult.  It is focusing your mind on exactly what you are doing in that moment.  The Buddhists say, "Chop wood, carry water." So when you chop wood (or brush your teeth, drive a car, load the dishwasher, etc.) you do only that - you don’t also mentally plan for tomorrow’s presentation at the board meeting.  What we are trying to do is train our brain to focus and be aware of what you are doing in the moment, which increases your calmness, equanimity and focus.

Independence Day in the US was two days ago, and I prepared a rather large feast for my family and some friends who came to dinner for the holiday.  I heartily enjoy entertaining but have less fondness for cooking, so I confine my culinary endeavors to major holidays and parties that we throw. This time, I made the decision early in the morning that July 4th would be a mindfulness day for me.  As I chopped vegetables, I was fully present to the rhythmic sound of my knife cutting the carrots, to the sight of the onion slices lined up like soldiers on my cutting board, to the smell of the vegetables releasing their aroma as I cut them.  And then, I noticed my hands, scooping up the sliced vegetables and putting them in the bowl.  Suddenly fascinated with how hands work, I admired and appreciated them as they did their amazing job, prehensile thumb and all. My mind would wander to worrying about this or that, then I would notice and gently bring my awareness back to what I was doing.  I found that by the end of the day, I was feeling happy and fulfilled, not tired and resentful as I usually feel after spending the day in the kitchen.

I think that you, too, will discover the benefits of mindfulness.  You will be less tired, happier and more energetic for the next moment that comes. So, how can you build mindfulness moments into your day? 

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Have you ever attended an all-day meeting or had back-to-back meetings from morning to night? Ever wonder how you can keep a sense of balance or a connection to the All-That-Is during a day in which there is no time for contemplation or even much of a break? The business world demands much of us, with schedules that tax the mind and soul at times  A psychologist friend once remarked to me, "I’m amazed at how little time executives and managers have for thinking and deliberation." We get used to thinking on our feet, making quick decisions while running from meeting to meeting.

So what can an Everyday Mystic do to reconnect with Source energy during a busy, stressful day?  There are several easy, quick methods that can help you feel centered, energized and focused.  Try these:

1. Breathe.  When we get stressed, we have a tendency to breathe shallowly and from our chest only. No one will notice if you consciously remember to take a deep, belly breath during a meeting. The deep breath will prevent tension from accumulating in your body, clear your mind and enhance your concentration.
2. Breathe through your heartspace. Imagine opening your heart and breathing through that part of your body. Your heart has neurons (brain cells) in it, just like your brain, and when you focus on your heart, you invoke the heart’s intelligence and intuition. Your decision-making abilities will be enhanced. You can do this exercise as you listen to someone speaking - it can be something you do in the background of your focus.  Thank goodness for our minds, that can process information at a rate 4 times faster than a human can talk!
3. Optimize your restroom breaks. Ah, a moment alone in the restroom stall! Take advantage of your private time and breathe consciously and fully. Observe your breath through 5 inhalations and exhalations. Be in the moment, be in your body. You will return to the meeting refreshed.
4. Wash your hands mindfully. Also in the restroom, ceremonially wash your hands. Wash off any negative energy, emotions or judgments you may have accumulated. Watch them swirl away down the drain, leaving your hands and your psyche clean and fresh, ready to return to your activities with a clear mind and an open heart. While drying your hands, appreciate your hands and all they do - type, write, shake other people’s hands, make gestures.
5. Conduct a body scan for emotions. To make sure you are aware of your emotions, and therefore can manage them effectively, periodically scan your body for emotions. Start at the top of your head and move down your entire body, looking for areas of tension, heat, tingles or stress. You can do this in a blink of an eye - during a lull in the conversation, for example. If you find an problem area, consciously relax it and try to determine what emotion it represents. Typically, nervousness or fear show up in your solar plexus or stomach, anger appears in your upper back and shoulders, tension and anxiety manifest in your head, and sadness and grief appear in your throat and neck area. Awareness of your feelings allows you to manage them. If you feel angry or threatened, you might breathe into your heartspace (see above) and be prepared to choose your behavior, rather than react without consideration.
6. Mentally bless the food before you eat. Even during the most insane day, most of us catch a moment to eat something. During all-day meetings, lunch is often catered in. Before taking a bite, lower your eyes for just a moment and give silent thanks for the meal you are about to eat. Silently recite your favorite meal-time grace. This will embed a moment of reverence in your day and ground you for the next segment.

It is possible to keep your sense of balance during an insane day. Other than the desire to stay centered, it only takes a moment here and there to reconnect to the deep calm that is always within you.

Do you have favorite ways to stay in-the-moment during a busy day? Please post a comment here and share them with us. Blessings to you on your journey.

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Limiting beliefs are those mental blocks that keep us from living happy lives and fulfilling our potential. They tell us things like, "I am not good enough" or "I will never have enough money". Limiting beliefs are created in reaction to life experiences.  The most powerful limiting beliefs are formed when we are children and adolescents, when our brains are not yet fully developed. When we are young, we react to events the best we can, forming beliefs that protect us from further psychological harm. Not all limiting beliefs are formed during our young years, however.  Adult experiences can cause us to form limiting beliefs, too, but they generally don’t exert as strong a hold on us as ones created when we are young.

Becoming aware of our limiting beliefs is a large contributor to overcoming them.  I know about this from first-hand experience.  I recently became aware of a limiting belief formed during adulthood, and the simple awareness of it has made a huge change in my life. I’ll share how it was formed in hopes that others can relate to the story and begin to identify some of their own limiting beliefs.

The limiting belief that I was operating under was "I shouldn’t travel for work because bad things happen to my family when I’m gone."  This belief has caused me extreme internal conflict every time I travel for business - I love my work, but I hate to leave my family.  Here’s how it was formed.

When my son was an infant, he was chronically ill with asthma, extreme food and environmental allergies, ear infections and constant colds.  Every time he caught a cold, he would have a severe asthma attack. Asthma in an infant or small child is extremely dangerous - their small airways get so closed down that they cannot breathe. We called him the canary in the mineshaft, because he was so sensitive to almost everything.  He was hospitalized numerous times during the first three years of his life, and my husband and I nursed him through many anxious nights.

When he was three years old, I planned to extend a business trip to New York City to spend the weekend in Maine with an old friend. This was the first time that I had planned a solo pleasure trip in the three years since my son’s birth. The night before I was supposed to go to Maine, my husband called and told me that our son was getting a cold. My husband and I kept in close touch by telephone.  By noon on my last day in New York, it was clear that my son was in the middle of a severe asthma attack. I needed to go home to take care of my family. I changed my plans to go to Maine and re-scheduled my flight so I could return home that night.  My husband said he would meet my plane and drive me home from the airport.

I arrived at my hometown airport at 1:30 am that night, exhausted.  When I got out to the curb, I realized that my husband wasn’t there to meet me - a bad sign. I called home, and, to my horror, my minister sleepily answered the phone.  My heart sank, fearing the worst. He told me that he was staying at our house for the night to care for my daughter while my husband took my son to the hospital.

I took a cab home and then drove to the hospital, where I exchanged places with my husband, who went home to be with our daughter and send our minister home.  I joined my son in the Emergency Room, where several doctors were working on him.  They needed to put an IV in his arm, but my son couldn’t lay still due to the asthma drugs that made him jumpy. He was wheezing, crying and thrashing his arms and legs. They had to put my baby in a straight jacket to restrain him.  At that point, the doctors suggested that I leave the room, perceiving that I was about to lose it. I sat down on the floor in the hallway, put my head in my hands and wept as I listened to my son scream in the adjacent room.  I never felt so desperate and hopeless as that night.

Although my son and I survived that night, I internalized that traumatic experience into extreme guilt and worry during every business trip I’ve taken since then.  It’s been a limiting belief for me - robbing me of internal ease and confidence when I traveled.  Now that my children are almost out of the nest, it seems time to give that up.

At my prayer group meeting recently, I had a revelation. During our sharing time, somehow this story came up. I told it and wept. Then I realized that this event had caused me to develop a limiting belief around travel. I had told myself that I hate to travel for business, which is not entirely true. I felt compassion for myself, understanding how and why I had built up this belief.  It had served me well during the years my children were young, influencing me to make decisions that kept me closer to home.  But now, girded with the knowledge of this limiting belief and that my family is OK without me, I can start believing that business travel is OK and maybe even fun!

I’m off to both Finland and Nashville tomorrow for a week-long business trip.  I look forward to testing my revised belief that business travel can be fun!

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Most of the time, we go through life totally oblivious to  how our words and deeds can positively affect - indeed, change the course of - another person’s life. It could be a simple observation we say to someone, it could be a random act of kindness (as simple as a smile), or it could be the role model we become for others that can make all the difference.  Several instances have come to my notice this week that remind me of the way we are connected and bless each other.  And most of the time, we have no idea that we have given a miracle to the other person!

Last week, I received an email from a friend who thanked me for helping her get through a tough episode during a recent road trip. I replied to her email saying I didn’t know what I did to help her. She explained that the example I set of praying before meetings at our church gave her a tool and the inner strength to get through that difficult time. I was flabbergasted. I had no idea that I had any influence over her or any other person.

Similarly, I recently received a text message from a friend who thanked me for being an angel for her.  I texted her back to ask if she sent the message to the wrong person!  No, she assured me, I was the intended recipient.  She was thanking me for being there for her during some rough times.

Here’s another example: Several months ago, an executive at a large company hired me to consult with her department.  She assigned a much younger woman to be one of my main contacts for the project.  I took the younger woman to lunch after our project was done, and she told me what an outstanding role model the executive had been to her, teaching her that a woman could be both business-like and caring in a high-level job. With the young woman’s permission, I mentioned her words to the executive, who, like me in the previous stories, was flabbergasted that she had that much influence over another person.

And, the story continues.  That executive (who gave me permission to write about this) recently received a LinkIn.com invitation from another younger woman who thanked her for being a great role model to her.  And get this - this young woman never worked for the executive, but her husband did!

I can think of times when friends and acquaintances have done something for me or said something simple that profoundly affected me and influenced my life’s journey, if only just a tiny bit. Even tiny mid-course corrections can change the ultimate destination of a journey. If you are driving north from Austin, veering left at a critical junction instead of bearing straight can mean the difference between arriving in Dallas or Fort Worth! So that means that I am here, right now, writing to you in this blog because of all the tiny miracles I have so abundantly received, that each changed my life’s course if only a little. It gives me shivers to think about it.

I ask you to do two things:

• Be aware of the simple, everyday miracles that bless your life.  Did someone smile at you at the grocery store?  Did someone hold open a door for you?  Did a co-worker bring you coffee? If you can, make that person’s day by thanking them.
• Take advantage of opportunities to create a simple, everyday miracle in someone else’s life.  Smile, laugh, love and perform acts of random kindness.  You may never know how you affect another person, but do it anyway. It will make you smile even more.

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An Everyday Mystic understands that she must build her life like a Greek temple.  The foundation of the temple represents her personal values, those things she holds most dear and important.  The values support the temple columns, which represent different parts of us that we must nourish in order to be whole people: our hearts, our minds and our bodies.  The ceiling of the temple is our spirit, which depends on support from our values, our hearts, our minds and our bodies.  The roof of this temple is our Holistic Well-being, the pinnacle of a life well-lived.  In order to reach the pinnacle of well-being, an Everyday Mystic makes a commitment to honor and develop each of these aspects of herself, knowing that ignoring even one of them will contribute to an unstable temple.  What is true for the individual is true for the organization or team as well - each of these aspects of well-being must be nurtured in order to build a highly functional and productive team.  Let’s examine each of these elements that contribute to building the temple of well-being.

• Foundation: Values - Values represent the foundation of your character, and include the beliefs you hold most dear about living a good life.  This building block can encompass mission, vision and purpose statements as well as the values which govern your behavior.  Most corporate entities have created mission, vision and/or purpose statements that get shelved or filed in a drawer, never to have life breathed into them.  An Everyday Mystic might wish to create his own mission and purpose statements and discern his personal values.  Values include statements of how important things are to you, like money, achievement and the relative importance of family and friends vs. career.  I am creating some assessments for my coaching clients to help them identify their values, purpose and life mission.  My own personal purpose statement is to be a teacher of spiritual intelligence to others, and help them evolve their souls.  Whatever your values are, the real questions for both individuals and organizations are - are you living them, and how do you keep them alive?
• Column One: Body - The body represents our physical manifestation in this world.  There is great wisdom in the body, and it is intimately connected with mind and heart - indeed, body, mind and heart come together to support and build your spirit.  Some say the body cannot lie.  This is the basis of Applied Kinesiology, an alternative medicine practice that uses muscle testing to diagnose illness.  The fact that the body registers emotions is being proven by researchers, but we intuitively understand that through our own experiences: embarrassment causes our cheeks to flush, nervousness produces butterflies in the stomach, sadness makes us cry. We need to take good care of our bodies by feeding them well, exercising them appropriately and getting adequate rest and relaxation, all of which support the spirit. Column Two: Heart - The heart represents our emotional balance and social abilities.  In building spiritual intelligence, we strive to achieve mastery over our emotions. Mastery of emotions does not mean walling off your feelings and denying your emotions or moods. Rather, it is to feel emotions intensely but to let them wash through you without sticking, as it were - to let them roll off you.  One does that by noticing and deeply feeling the emotions, but gaining perspective on them so they don’t become your self-image.  The heart also represents the health of our closest relationships - are we in right relationship with our families and our close friends?  Are we being a best friend to ourselves?
• Column Three: Mind - The mind represents our intellectual capacities and our innate talents.  An Everyday Mystic is constantly on the look-out for new learning opportunities, whether it be through formal means (such as reading and attending classes) or experiential means (like traveling or trying new things).  The mind also represents self-awareness of our strengths and God-given talents, and the wisdom to know how best to develop them.  The mind, though full of wisdom, also holds wisdom’s opposite - the ego or false self, which is the negative inner voice that says you are separate from Source energy, that evil abounds, and that you are not good enough.  Our job is to feed the true self’s voice so the false self dies of starvation.  Then do we feed our spiritual intelligence.
• Spirit - Our spiritual intelligence is our awareness of our connection to Source/God and to all that is. It is our awareness of the meaning of our life, our conscience, our ability to forgive and let go and our ability to evolve our souls to higher levels of consciousness.  It is spiritual intelligence that encourages us to change perspectives, to see things from another person’s eyes, to keep things in perspective and to honor the inter-connectedness of all living beings.  Developing all the other aspects of ourselves allows our spirit to soar, but an Everyday Mystic spends as much time developing and honoring his spirit as he does taking care of the other aspects of himself.

It is the aim of The Everyday Mystic to provide avenues to develop each of the elements of holistic well-being.  Stay tuned for future blog posts that will explore the building blocks of well-being.  Be sure to check out our coaching services as well.

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I did a "three hill walk" tonight at sundown.  I live in a neighborhood that’s unusual for these parts - it has hills.  There are three streets that go up that hill, and I walked all three of them tonight. Fast. I got up a bit of a sweat. Despite the glow I achieved, it was an Everyday Mystic walk. Even though I’ve walked that route countless times, tonight I walked those hills like I’ve never walked them before - with beginner’s mind and new eyes.

This afternoon, a summer thunderstorm blew in, dumped lots of rain but blew out the humidity and dropped the temperature significantly. Tonight was a magic night - unusually cool for June, but warm enough to envelope a sundown walker in a wrap of summer evening-ness.  As I walked, my senses were alert.  I noticed that I couldn’t hear any traffic noise - which can’t be said for the mornings, when I usually walk those hills.  What I heard were two airplanes flying overhead, one dog barking and the constant sound of my feet walking - per-thum, per-thum, in 2/4 time, accented by an occasional skreek when my shoe scraped the pavement. And then - oh my! - there were the cicadas in the trees, with their rhythmic drone.  I noticed the music of one band of cicadas fade out as I walked away from their trees; then I would hear another band grow louder as I walked toward them.  It reminded me of going to a parade and hearing five bands march by, spaced out over the length of the parade.  Every now and then I heard a tree frog’s quiet squeak-squeak.  I stopped to put my hand in a stream of water coming from an irrigation sprinkler. I was surprised at how warm the water felt.  I nearly swooned as my nose caught an intoxicating waft of perfume from a nearby honeysuckle bush.

Exercise is a great way to get in touch with our bodies and our connection to something greater than ourselves, if we pay attention to the moment. I enjoy going to the gym to get my exercise, but sometimes it feels like a microwave experience - quick, efficient but devoid of true flavor or aroma.  That’s why I enjoy walking so much. If I remember to 1) go alone and 2) be aware as I walk, I can be present to the sites and sounds around me and to the wonder of my body as it propels me through space.

I recommend an Everyday Mystic walk to you, especially after a busy or stressful day. Open your senses - see, hear, feel and touch what is around you. Feel the stress drain from your body. Appreciate your feet as they carry you on your journey. Be in the moment. Be grateful. Feel alive.

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Lapses in our spiritual practice cannot be cause for beating ourselves up.  If we wish to practice forgiveness in our lives, it has to start on the inside by allowing ourselves to take sabbaticals every now and then from even our most cherished practices. An attitude of acceptance is the best approach - "it is what it is" is a good affirmation. Self-acceptance is spiritual maturity.

I speak from my heart today, as I realized this morning as I was journaling that it has been many days since I have written and meditated. I hadn’t journaled since Tuesday - and today is Sunday, so you can count the days yourself.  I am sorry for my lapse because I promised to you several months ago in this blog that I was committing to a daily practice. But I am proud to look back over the week and appreciate what I’ve done instead. I’m really grateful for this break in my routine, because it has produced such richness.  I give myself permission to take a short break from my mediation and journaling practice. And, I am glad to come back to it now.

The week has been one of discovery and learning for me. I attended a three-day train-the-trainer class to learn about CoreClarity’s approach to training people to recognize and play to their strengths, rather than fixing their weaknesses.  This positive approach to team-building and individual productivity was transformational for me, and I know it will be transformational for the organizations that I hope to bring it to.  The training was exciting but it was also exhausting because of the deep inner work that we did. Plus, it was an hour or more commute each way to the class for me. 

But, an amazing result came out of those long commutes - I created a dream for where I wanted to be in five years.  I was inspired by my business coach who invited me to her birthday party last week.  I couldn’t attend because I was out-of-town on business. What she invited her friends to was not a "come as you are" party, but a "come as you will be… in 2013" party. Come as you will be in five years - now that’s a fascinating challenge!  As I battled rush hour traffic this week, I turned off the radio and mentally envisioned where I would like to be, what I would like to be doing, and what my life is going to look like in five years. I have captured my dream in my journal, and I hope to make a story-board (a visual depiction) of my dream also. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I look back now and am happy that the space in my practice allowed me to do this inner work.

We must give ourselves permission to take breaks from our spiritual practices.  We can just notice them, just as  we notice our thoughts come and go during meditation.  The trick is in getting back into the practices.  In meditation, we notice the thoughts and let them go - and then direct our minds back to the breath.  We must direct our lives back to our practice in the same non-judgmental way.

That is what self-forgiveness is all about.

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Last Sunday at the Adult Sunday School that I teach at my church, we talked about the different types of prayer. In a group brainstorming session, we listed the different ways we pray.  Far from a theoretical, academic or exhaustive compendium, this is an experiential compilation of how prayer works in the lives of a group of amazing souls.  I share it here:

Supplication - This is prayer in which you ask Source for some outcome, as in "Source, please heal my illness." Sometimes the best way to pray in supplication is to add, "I ask for this or whatever serves my highest good."  This recognizes that our narrow viewpoint may not include the goodness or lessons that Source might offer, which are far more perfect than anything we could conceive of. 

Intercessory - This is prayer is for the well-being of others, as in "I ask for your blessings for my daughter and son."

Bargaining - A form of supplication, you bargain when you promise God or Source something in return for the blessing sought. Hey, we all do this from time to time, but we recognize that Source’s love is abundant and Source probably just chuckles (metaphorically) when we bargain-pray.

Surrender - The best example of this is Jesus’ prayer on the cross when he said, "Not my will, but Thy will be done."  Surrender happens when we hand over to Source or God our worries, our grasping for a desired outcome and recognize the abundance of God’s blessings.

Ritual Prayers (Lord’s Prayer, the rosary) - These prayers are pre-scripted and can carry great emotional significance.

Seeking connection - In this type, we ask for connection with Source energy.

Meditation/contemplative/silence - Although our group disagreed over whether meditation is a form of prayer, I list it here. A participant reminded us of the saying, "Prayer is talking to God while meditation is listening to God." For me, meditation is getting in touch with the Divinity within our souls. It’s our attempt to silence the ego’s talk in order to reveal our God Self’s voice. It’s a way to acknowledge our connection with Source in silence.

Affirmative prayer (saying affirmations) - One participant cited Louise Hays’ affirmations, found in her book, "You Can Heal Your Life", as a prayer that she has memorized and uses as a prayer.  Affirmations are a way of acknowledging your connection with Source and your strengths and talents.

Breath prayer - A breath prayer is a combination of two or four brief phrases that you mentally repeat on the in-breath and the out-breath.  This could be called a long mantra, and is a beautiful way to incorporate repetitive prayers with observation of the breath.

Feel the oneness - Sitting in the knowledge of your connectedness with Source and all that is.

Praise and gratitude - "God is great" is an example of praise, as well as the Hebrew blessing, "Baruch attah adonai, Eloheinu melech ha’olam" (Blessed are you, King of the Universe).  We express the wonder and the mystery of Source in our prayers of praise. Or, we express our deep gratitude to Source for the blessings we receive.

Song, music - Music can transport us to a state that incorporates both our emotions and our spirit.

Nature - Many people, myself included, sense awe, mystery and oneness while in nature. I love to sit in my backyard and just observe - I listen to the birds’ songs and the music of the wind in the tress, I appreciate the vivid colors of my garden, I smell the jasmine vine (see my post about resurrection in the garden), I feel the wind on my face.

Circular prayer -  This is a group experience of prayer in which each person sequentially adds her spoken prayer to the collective.  Once each person in the circle has spoken their prayer, a collective "amen" is said by the leader or the group.

Visualization - This is a variation of the affirmative prayer, in which we visualize a desired outcome, or visualize a process that leads us to a spiritual awakening. For example, I visualize heavenly light pouring into the top of my head in order to initiative a connection with the spirit world.

Walking - Conscious walking, or walking meditation, is a way of focusing your attention on your breath and your body.

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