Suggestions for fixing prayer "burnout"

[mphill85]

Hello all!

For the longest time I didn’t have much of a prayer life. Over time as I started to slowly reconnect with the church I’ve tried to improve my prayer life. While I don’t have any issues with prayers said during mass, lately I’ve been having issues with prayers that I say outside of mass.

For example, back in September I started saying the rosary daily and for a couple of months I was good at that. However recently I’ve found that it’s been harder to get myself to do the rosary. I started off saying it in the morning, then I started saying it in the evening, and now I say it within 30 minutes of midnight. And being set on doing it daily when its almost midnight I end up speed praying (I think my fastest time is 17-18 minutes) which I know is not a good thing.

And it’s not just the rosary. Other prayers (such as dealing with illness, temptations, and the like) seem to have the same issue. I would say them in the beginning with a certain frequency and over time it became longer and longer between those prayers. The worst is having to deal with the thoughts going through my head that they are not good enough for some random reason (worthiness, saying it right, correct “situation”, etc.) I am diagnosed with ADHD so that makes it all the more difficult.

Anyone have an idea on how I can get this mess fixed and sorted out? I want to avoid getting in a rut where I end up feeling like prayers are more of a chore instead of a way of communicating with God, Jesus, Mary, the angels and the saints.

 

[stoplooklisten]

…appreciate the honest sharing.

Consider the quality of meditation upon the Mysteries of the Rosary and the prayers themselves. There is much below the surface in the Our Father, Hail Mary, Divine Mercy Chaplet prayers.

Consider reading Saint Faustina, Saint Louis de Montfort, Fathers Donald Calloway and Michael Gaitley of the Marian Fathers.

 

[Cham65]

When I pray the rosary I have 5 particular intentions spread over each decade I light a candle in quiet room, this helps me focus on our lord.

 

[JosephDColeman]

For me, it’s harder to keep up prayerful habits when I don’t feel into it as much. But it’s important to remember what St. Theresa said (I think it was her): “when we pray and feel good, that’s God’s gift to us. When we pray and don’t feel anything, that’s our gift to God.” I like to think of it as being married…I didn’t always feel love for my wife, but by doing things for her when she needed me most I was still loving her…and it may even be a greater act of love to pray to God when you receive no consolation from it!

This really helped me see how to get out of my rut…or at least helped me to feel like it wasn’t a hopeless place to be:

https://www.catholicity.com/devoutlife/4-14.html

I hope this helps!

 

[TheLittleLady]

For the time being, don’t focus on formal prayer (pre-written prayers), simply talk to God. Tell Jesus about your day, how you feel, thank Him for the good things. Running convo in your head “Jesus, that dog is so funny! Thank you for the animals that brighten our world” “I am getting impatient with this person in front of me, were you every impatient? I know you did not have to deal with bank drive up tellers, but, there must have been some other thing where you had to be patient and wait your turn.” Just talk to Him.

I know one friend who put God in as a contact on his phone, using his own phone number, and he texted to our Lord. This helped him to make conversing with our Lord part of his regular day.

Maybe find a podcast or something of Evensong or Night Prayers.

Listen to music, sing songs that are prayers (John Michael Talbot has a wealth of prayerful music on YouTube).

 

[Shakuhachi]

On this day in 1952 Thomas Merton wrote in his journal:

"Yesterday, between two cedars, looking at the wagon tracks on the soft earth of the bottom lands and the woods beyond, I know that whatever God will have granted me - whatever solitude- will be truly for the salvation of my soul. I saw how much I need solitude for that reason.

“Not solitude for the sake of something special, something exalted, but solitude as the climate in which I can simply be what I am meant to be: living in the presence of the living God. Solitude in order to be a simple Christian.”

That is true for all of us. No? Not the life of a hermit, but moments of solitude throughout our day, where we can know that we are living in the presence of the living God.