The longer I am in the HeartPaths program, the more I am convinced that they put together their program with a lot of thought and an active response to prior students’ experiences. I think the roots of that sentiment began with today’s topic: Centering prayer. I learned, quickly, that Breath Prayer was really a warm-up for centering prayer!

If trying breath prayer was challenging for me, centering prayer made breath prayer look like a breeze! In centering prayer, you again empty the thoughts in your head and just try to be with the Lord. The difference between it and breath prayer, or the Jesus prayer is that you choose one word (yes, just one word) and use that word to bring yourself back to just a state of being with God whenever your mind begins to wander.

You’re not even supposed to change the word as you pray. In the Jesus prayer it was common for me to change the phrasing I used if I felt like I couldn’t settle myself with the current phrasing. Thus, settling on just one word and sticking to it was really challenging!