Help with distraction during prayer?

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Madeline616

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Could anyone recommend a good Catholic book that addresses overcoming distractions during prayer?

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The Work of Prayer: a Manual for Those Who Would Pray Well, by James O. S. Huntington, OSH, from Sophia Institute Press.
 
Prayer
Loving God, Saint Therese of Lisieux encouraged a novice who regretted her distractions during prayer. “I also have many, but as soon as I am aware of them, I pray for those persons the thought of whom is diverting my attention, and in this way they reap benefit from my distractions…I accept all for the love of God, even the wildest fancies that cross my mind”.

Loving God when I experience distractions, please let thought of any person or issue become prayer in me for them.
Let the worries I experiece when praying, be prayer for Your mercy.

You invite us to pray according to our best understanding of prayer. You are gentle and patient, and do not wish to discourage us, but You sometimes correct us by denying specific prayers and hopes. You deepen these lessons through the events of our lives and our interactions with others. Please nurture our true needs, so that they do not translate as need for recognition and acclaim, for accumulation of possessions, or for exclusively human companionship and love.

Let prayer lead us from sin and draw us to Your Spirit of love. Sin cannot prevail in us without our tacit or deliberate cooperation. Nor can events or other persons adversely affect our souls unless we permit. It is our physical and mental appetites, and even our spiritual ambitions, that betray us to sin. Eve sinned, not because she was tempted, but because she chose to disregard You in order to please her own appetites—equally, so do we.

Loving God, please help us to be truly honest with ourselves so that we do not act out of hidden selfishness or neurosis. By such honesty, give us the discernment of genuine gospel motives. Save us thereby from foolish or selfish choices that disadvantage others and ourselves.

If we withhold any part of our life from You, we may obstruct graces that You desire to bestow for service of others. We thus cloud the brilliance of Your glory in us, and prepare a purgatory for ourselves, when death—had we cooperated fully in willing perseverance and in joyful, creative faith—would have brought us instantly before Your face. Let us welcome Your gifts as we wholeheartedly pray and serve.
 
Everyone has distractions in prayer, and over time and practice they can become less.

Let’s say you sit down for 15 minutes to have prayer time. If during that 15 minutes you have 200 distractions, and bring yourself gently back to the presence of God every time a distraction happens, then consider your prayer time fruitful! The Lord sees you keep choosing Him over the distractions, and he will bless you for it.
 
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