Praying Positions

There was a time when I found it impossible to pray indoors. I don't mean reading or reciting prayers, but longer-scale, silent, sitting-alone-and-concentrating kind of prayer. I think the noises and sensations of the outdoors made it easier to forget all the various chatter that clutters up one's mind and silencing which is part of the point of prayer. So when I was in Lamford I tended to go and sit in a shelter in the garden, and here I have done the same - although until recently when I built the Grotto there wasn't really anywhere to escape from rain when there was rain.

Gradually I found myself more and more reluctant to go outside for my early-morning prayers. This was mainly because there was a spell of bad weather a couple of years ago when the meteorological conditions would have provided somewhat too much of a distraction from my own thoughts, and encouraged me to stay indoors instead. But eventually I would look out at the garden and take a slight breeze shaking the upper branches of the oak tree as a good enough reason not to venture out.

This was clearly little more than laziness linked to a reluctance to pray generally. As part of my discipline I aim at having a second short prayer session between noon and 1pm, if I happen to be at home to do it; my resistance to complying with this observance shocks even me, and I am at something of a loss to account for it. It should not be the case that concerted contact with God is something I subconsciously try to avoid, yet it seems to be at the root of my hesitancy.

I now try to go outside and stay indoors to pray roughly on alternate days, though I'm not completely sure, these days, what effect either has.