Moving past "feelings"

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scapularkid8

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How can I? I can’t figure out why I’m so dependent on consolations in prayer…why can’t I move past the need for a “good feeling” when I’m praying…I guess I think that if God loves me, then He would want to comfort me when I come to Him, but maybe He’s showing me even greater love than if He were consoling me because I’m a child learning how to walk now and He doesn’t need to hold my hand because I’m walking on my own and I don’t know it yet!?? Does that make sense? I can figure that logically in my head, but I still can’t get past the desire for a feeling of consolation in prayer…advice?
 
What helps me is to think only of what I can give in love to God–in everything I say and do. So, when I pray I don’t think about how I feel but simply about giving to God everything–my dryness (if I have dryness), my joy, my pain, my needs–everything.

And, I thank him for every mercy, grace, and blessing, temporal and eternal he has given us in Christ Jesus. If I feel something, I offer that, too, so that I am less inclined to cling to feelings instead of clinging to God alone. I hope that helps. 🙂
 
Sometimes just the fact that I am praying, feeling that there is a connection - is consolation. Just not feeling alone anymore. God protecting me. Like a father. With His big loving arms, figuratively speaking.
And I don’t think there is anything wrong with wanting to feel consoled in prayer. 🤷 … I assume you are talking about feeling bad if you DON’T feel consoled? The gtimes when you can’t feel that connection?
 
scapularkid8 said:
How can I? I can’t figure out why I’m so dependent on consolations in prayer…why can’t I move past the need for a “good feeling” when I’m praying…I guess I think that if God loves me, then He would want to comfort me when I come to Him, but maybe He’s showing me even greater love than if He were consoling me because I’m a child learning how to walk now and He doesn’t need to hold my hand because I’m walking on my own and I don’t know it yet!?? Does that make sense? I can figure that logically in my head, but I still can’t get past the desire for a feeling of consolation in prayer…advice?
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As an “old person” one thing I do when dryness is starting to wear me down is to pray to the Holy Spirit before reading Scripture, and ask that he show me what he wants me to see . . . This is not presuming to tell God how to deal with you, but rather to ask that he open you to the radiance that is always waiting for you in his Word, if only your the eyes of your heart can be opened to see it.
 
I found the best way to feel good when doing ANYTHING, is to drink plenty of fluids, take a multivitamin, work out, and eat right. Whenever I can keep that up for any multi-day period, life is one big rush from dawn to dusk.

Then I get to pray and thank Him for giving me the ability to feel good.
 
Faith without feelings is definitely something that God is trying to teach me right now. I used to be entirely dependent upon the feelings I would experience during prayer, my faith was dependent upon them.

I have two blog entries that deal with my struggles in moving past feelings, if you would like to look at them:

I believe, Lord help my unbelief

I dislike this feeling…

The way I have to look it at is that the Lord is working with our souls, bringing them closer to Himself when He keeps His presence hidden from us. It is easy to say “Yes, Lord” when you can feel Him, sense Him. It is harder to say “Yes, Lord” when you have nothing, neither logic nor feelings, to help you along. It is this “Yes” that you make with no feelings that means the most to God. It is the leap of faith. It is the greatest leap of faith one can make.

It’s hard… God only knows… but, trust in the Lord, that He is leading you and drawing you ever closer to Himself.
 
Yes, I know exactly what you are saying. When I started to get into prayer life I had these warm feelings all the time, then I started having no feelings and it puzzled me, thought God had left… I finally figured it out, that I needed to persist with the prayer anyway, as I actually went into another deeper level of prayer trying to find Him again. Yes, I definitely think God is trying to call us closer and to have more faith and less feelings here.

Glad you brought this up. You are not alone.🙂

Blessings
 
scapularkid8 said:
How can I? I can’t figure out why I’m so dependent on consolations in prayer…why can’t I move past the need for a “good feeling” when I’m praying…I guess I think that if God loves me, then He would want to comfort me when I come to Him, but maybe He’s showing me even greater love than if He were consoling me because I’m a child learning how to walk now and He doesn’t need to hold my hand because I’m walking on my own and I don’t know it yet!?? Does that make sense? I can figure that logically in my head, but I still can’t get past the desire for a feeling of consolation in prayer…advice?
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Hi Scapularkid…I think you have made it to the first stage beyond self (which a need for and desire of consolation is most often) and that is to desire to be less concerned about oneself…to seek the God of Consolations and not the consolations of God (Cloud of Unknowing). I think moving to this next “stage” (if I may call it that) is a great gift and blessing. Tell God of your desire to be less concerned about what you feel or dont feel and to be more concerned with Him, for I suspect to move onto the next stage again is the prerogative and work of God alone and no work we can achieve of our own. Ask The Holy Spirit to teach you to pray in truth.
Can you think of it this way: One person is kneeling in Church deep in prayer and consolation…another has just dropped in to make a visit after a hard days work and is tired and drained lacking in consolation. It is the same Faith that has led them to prayer. The same blessings, the same Grace and gift. Is it not the same God and Lord who smiles lovingly on both His loved children. We can change, but God never changes. If God desires one be consoled and another lacking in consolation, would our God give to us what was bad for us, what would not be condusive to our sanctification and His Glory? As it says in the book of Job that if we take from God’s Hands blessings, then should we not take with equanimity if He sends misfortune. For God is Forever God, Faithful and True.

smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/16/16_14_2.gifBlessings and God bless you - Barb:)
 
St. Therese wrote that her consolation was to have NO consolation. The lack of it, in other words, eventually becomes consoling, if you can believe that and trust that everything is ok.

God weans his friends who have advanced and can wear the rough robe of the desert. It is really a blessing, for when we walk in sand with no water of consolation for a long time, it is comforting indeed to receive only a droplet. That little drop is very much appreciated, more so than it would have been in the time of plenty, for when one has abundance of water, droplets are not valued, nor recognized for their precious worth. I think I have given God more praise and gratitude for the droplets than I did with the waterfall. 😃

Proverbs 27:7 sums it up nicely, “The one who is full, tramples on virgin honey; but to the man who is hungry, any bitter thing is sweet.”

Think about it though – love has matured, and desires to glorify Him are stronger, taking on a different type of strength that finds consolation in simply serving Him in little things. The interior lights one receives change from the occasional display of fireworks, to simple, loving, quiet communications that are not even recognized as God speaking, because they no longer come in the form we became used to, the whirlwind, as Elias might say.

Carole
 
Oh my, your post speaks so strongly to the ‘discernment of spirits’ in Ignatian spirituality, I had to read twice 🙂 .

Feelings in prayer are good. Prayer is relationship and if you never had any feelings in a relationship, something would be strange.

However, feelings are likely to change. One of the maxims is ‘when in consolation remember, desolation is coming. When in desolation remember, consolation is coming’. If you are experiencing consolation, enjoy it, savour it, welcome it as a gift of God and ‘store it up’ (maybe by journalling) so that it reminds you of that feeling whenever desolation inevitably comes.

I find the Examen very helpful here (there’s an outline americancatholic.org/Newsletters/CU/ac0303.asp or a downloadable ‘review of the day’ pray-as-you-go.org/. Doing the Examen helps me to remember that no matter how I’m feeling, God is at work in my day, and reminds me to give thanks for that.
 
I think I’ve figured it out: the fact that the absence of consolations bothers me is irrelevant. All that matters is that I recognize my state as a blessing and that does more to praise God than offering back any gift He already gave us. For by freely offering and/or acknowledging a personal struggle we are conforming our inner-self to that of the Christ. Nothing could give the Father more praise than for one of His children to be conformed to the likeness of His Son. In that I can find peace, and it seems that the consolation comes in knowing that I am walking the Way of the Suffering Servant and paradoxically learning more than I ever could from a prayer in which I am showered with “feelings”.

Pray for me that I can continue to understand this mystical blessing He has given me more.
 
I have a book recommendation for you. The Way, by Saint Josemaria Escriva. Most Catholic bookstores have it, small book, about $8. It revolutionized the way I pray, and I think it could help you too.

Blessings.
 
scapularkid8 said:
I think I’ve figured it out: the fact that the absence of consolations bothers me is irrelevant. All that matters is that I recognize my state as a blessing and that does more to praise God than offering back any gift He already gave us. For by freely offering and/or acknowledging a personal struggle we are conforming our inner-self to that of the Christ. Nothing could give the Father more praise than for one of His children to be conformed to the likeness of His Son. In that I can find peace, and it seems that the consolation comes in knowing that I am walking the Way of the Suffering Servant and paradoxically learning more than I ever could from a prayer in which I am showered with “feelings”.

Pray for me that I can continue to understand this mystical blessing He has given me more.
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I’m pretty new at prayer, so I’m not exactly at the point where I’m feeling much aridity. But…

The other day as I was meditating on the sorrowful mysteries, I was thinking how Jesus endured intense aridity during His Passion and Death. That’s how St. John of the Cross interprets His cry of dereliction, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?

And thinking about how Jesus Himself experienced such intense aridity helped me to understand why I’m not supposed to look for consolation, but only for doing His will.

I think the Agony in the Garden is a photographic negative of the Transfiguration. The Transfiguration is uplifting in its consolation, and the Agony is in the depths of darkness… but it’s what Jesus did, especially from the Agony through the Cross which saved us. I don’t know, it just helped me to understand that wanting consolation is meaningless, and that to walk in Christ’s path means forsaking consolation and going God’s will (let this cup pass from me, Jesus prayed, but not my will, but thy will be done!).

It’s hard to sit in prayer for a while, trying not to be conscious of time passing, but simply dedicating oneself and one’s time to God, but I guess He wants to teach us that.

-Rob
 
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