The Interior Castle Series, #2: Prayer
This is the second in a series of contemplations on St. Teresa of Ávila’s spiritual masterpiece, The Interior Castle.
One of things about St. Teresa of Ávila that surprises me most is that she spent years struggling to pray. In The Book of My Life, she talks about life in the convent when she was young and says that she was filled with enormous shame around her lack of prayer life. She felt like a fraud, teaching people to pray when she herself was not even praying. I think this deep honesty is one of the reasons I love St. Teresa so very much. She says what we all go through. She lived what we are living and yet, through perseverance and a deep, deep love for the Beloved, she moved past this struggle and into joy and total transformation.
This must mean that we all have the potential for this type of inner transformation.
As a child, I always thought that God was only up on the altar with the priests. I was convinced that I could not access God myself and that there was no way I was ever going to be good enough. There was a very wide gap between me, here, and the man-God that was way out there! Not only was that man-God way out there, but he was also judging me on everything I did. So why pray to that kind of God? I didn’t want to. And I didn’t. In my work with others now, I realize that this was/is a true reality for many of us, not just me.
This changed for me about six years ago, when I woke up to an experience that the Divine was not some man-God out there, but a glorious, infinite energy of Love that lives right inside me and all around me. There is no separation or gap. This divine energy is closer to me than I am to myself.
This new understanding brought quite a shift to my life and my ability to pray.
Suddenly there was an immediacy and a desire to pray to this energy that enveloped me. During the early days of waking up to this, I often fell to my knees with a deep desire to connect, commune, and be in relationship with it. Even though I didn’t understand what was happening, I can see now that this was the beginning of my inward journey—a journey into my own soul. (Up until that period, I did not know my soul existed. I only read about such things in the odd book or two.)
When St. Teresa tells us that us that the first thing we must do to enter our soul (the interior castle) is to pray, I believe her. She is pointing us all to the truth of how to begin an authentic inner journey. She also makes it very clear that when she is talking about prayer, she does not mean prayer that is unconsciously recited.
She tells us,
“When vocal prayer is accompanied by genuine reflection, it counts as true prayer. But if someone prays without awareness of who she is talking to, what it is she is asking for, who is doing the asking, and who is being asked, I do not consider it prayer, no matter how much her lips are moving.”[1]
This spiritual guidance always gets a smile from me. Not only because it highlights St. Teresa’s sense of humor, but because it also reminds me of the hours of my childhood spent reciting prayers in church without a clue about what I was saying! I was completely asleep at the spiritual wheel.
What does genuine reflection offer to our prayers?
It asks us to stop, pause, and allow space to consider what we are saying, just like we would with a dear friend, mentor, or someone who we want to truly hear us. It adds authenticity and allows space for the heart, not the head, to communicate from a place deep within us. It allows us to consciously begin to relate to what is being communicated with care. It wakes us up to the power of speech, words, and relating. We become aware of what we are saying. We become a little more conscious than we were before.
We also might make some space for listening to what is being communicated back to us.
How many of us have people in our lives who, when they talk to us, we can tell they really aren’t thinking about what they say? Or not listening at all to what we are saying?
How does it feel to be in the presence of these people? Do we feel seen? Heard?
Do we really feel like intimate friends?
Imagine how the Divine feels when we are just offering lip service. Really, sit for a second with this and imagine it.
When we are ready to truly reflect as we pray, we are waking ourselves up to a conscious relationship with God. And when we do this, we can then enter something truly magnificent, a conversation with our dearest, most intimate friend. A friend who has been waiting patiently to for us find the courage to just talk and be present in our most authentic way.
Looking at prayer this way has stopped me from being triggered by the word “prayer.” St. Teresa has taught me that prayer is about having an authentic conversation. It is an act of intentional giving and receiving. Talking and listening. As simple as that.
And that I can do. Can you?
If you desire support for your prayer life, or to know more about journeying into The Interior Castle, I am here to walk with you. Please reach out to me at leigh@leighamurray.com or sign up at www.leighamurray.com to set up a complimentary session to learn more.
Reference
1. Teresa of Avila. The Interior Castle. Riverhead Books, 2003, p.39.