Do you pray? What does that mean to you?
As I said in my intro all those months ago, I’m a practicing polytheist and working on my ordination in the barely organized church I belong to. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that I pray.
As for the meaning of prayer, my view of the gods/goddesses, spirits of the land, and ancestor spirits is the crux on which the meaning is built. Since I consider all of these to be individual entities worthy of honor and potentially open to relationships, my prayers consist of conversing, asking for favors, and that sort of thing. I say a short prayer every time I fire an arrow, for instance, and also when trying to perform some sort of divination.
Since most of my religious practice is centered around ADF (the organization I belong to), and ADF rituals are primarily sacrificial in nature, it’s more common that I give gifts to the Kindred (what we call the gods, land wights, and ancestors) in the expectation that they’ll eventually give me help with something.
yeah, i’d say i pray.
i guess i have a strange background, religiously, but even tho’ i’ve rejected organized christianity, i do maintain good ties w/ JC (albeit, prolly not in ways that would generally be recognized as such) as well as “pagan gods” (or whatever). in general, i consider land wights and the like to be more important to maintain ties with.
prayer for me can mean many things, tho’ i guess you could sum it up as simply as “relating” or possibly “communing”.
like incendiary_dan, i’ve very much taken “a gift for a gift” to heart and it often shows in prayers*.
*i should prolly go ahead and state, before someone brings up “capitalism”, that there is a significant difference between a gift and a payment. not that payments are necessarily bad, but there is an important difference…
I usually only pray after the fact, as a kind of gratitude. I have actually done this a lot, and I find that it is good to just sort of acknowledge that gratitude and direct it somewhere. I also usually include in these kind of gratitude prayers some kind of gift thing like dan mentioned, like a promise to pick up more garbage or do one more random act of kindness, or even a gift in the form of forcing myself to get focused and organized, sort of a gift to myself, but it also helps me be better able to do good things in the world.
I guess it seems kind of like a round about way to get me to do things I should be doing anyway, but it gives me an extra motivation, and I think that it is still appropriate.
I am still trying to come to terms with my perception of gods or something to pray to, so that makes praying kind of weird, but generally I just go with a general to the gods sort of thing.
how far r u willing to stretch the word “pray”. Define “pray”, cuz really i AM curious in general, so i’ll use ur answer as a guideline to answer the next time someone asks me a question abt “prayer” as well.
Note: i am a Panthiestic Shamanic Animistic Daoist. Pardon me if i reapeated ideas there.
Well Tj, I guess whatever you call praying, is praying, for you.
I guess some people think it’s odd or rude for me to ask a question but not offer my own answer. I didn’t want to set a tone or create a slot for “prayer” to fit in, which is why I didn’t say what I do at first.
I pray every day, several times a day. I try to pray every morning. I pray in gratitude, I pray for help in doing things I need to do. I pray for understanding. I pray to support other people.
I pray to the Creator mostly. I sometimes call the Creator “Grandfather” but that is really not gender specific. I also pray to other “Spirits”. Sometimes my prayers are more formal. Sometimes I pray by singing. Sometimes it’s more like talking to a friend. Sometimes I ask people to help me pray about things. Sometimes my prayers are in ceremonies, sometimes they are spur of the moment.
My prayers for myself are about having what I need to do the work that the Creator put me here to do. About aligning myself with the flow of Creation.
Nowadays I really don’t pray in a conventional sense at all. I mostly listen, I guess. When I do pray, I pray through my writing, I think. I used to pray a lot, but then I slowly, unconsciously came to the conclusion that I kept asking for things and help that I didn’t need, so now I work just to listen to stay in line with the flow of the world, similar to heyvictor.
Heck, maybe listening counts as prayer. 
In some ways I think the word pray connotes too much of christian ideas for me to understand it.
Willem-
I know what you mean about the baggage that the word prayer might carry with it. There are a lot of words that do that for me as I mentioned in another discussion about the word “shaman”. Words dealing with any sort of religious or spiritual stuff can really do that.
My friend Bob who helped me with my “vision quests” suggests that when we go out to do something like that, that we get community support. So we give tobacco to people who we would like to support us and ask them to “hold a good thought” for us while we are fasting.
Not to try to come visit us in any way or to send us strength or to ease our hunger or thirst or make it easy or anything like that. Just Hold a good thought for us in what we are doing.
well, i guess i talk to the spirits around me. I do go on “journeys” to the spirit world once in a while. Although i see it more as leaving my mind open for any spirits who want to come in and say hello to do so. I generally try to do so. But i find certain activities make it easier to communicate with the spirits. If i have a problem, i ask my dear friend the wind spirit. If i am sick i ask nature (Brahman or Dao would be a better fitting term here) to show me how to heal myself, or how to feel better etc. I have actually discovered a lot of plant aruond my house that i later found out to be medicinal this way.
I guess those could be counted as praying…!
-Tj
Here is a story about prayer and how it works in my life.
I don’t believe that I do anything on my own without the help of the spirits.
Last fall my wife and I were asked to take a young girl into our home to foster as our daughter. We have known her since she was born and were auntie and uncle to her. She was in the custody of social services in the US and we live in Canada.
We said we were willing. Realistically there were many, many reasons why this would probably never happen. Our house doesn’t conform to any kind of codes, it’s very small. We don’t have a lot of money. There were a bunch of hoops to get through.
From the beginning we prayed and told the spirits that we would be willing to do what is in the best interest for our girl but that we had our limits. We would take care of the things that were in our power to take care of but if it was to happen the spirits would have to take care of the many obstacles that were in the way. We decided that there were so many reasons for it to not happen that if it did then it must be the right thing. Over the course of the last nine months of negotiating, one by one the obstacles fell away. In some cases it was amazing how they fell away. As if the spirits were showing us that it was the right thing and we shouldn’t worry about that.
Up until recently there were still doubts. Different agencies were disagreeing about jurisdiction and responsibilty. But I figured that the spirits would not have brought us this far only to let it all fall apart.
After nine months of working this all out she arrived last week.
We pray about the situation, not a specific outcome. We offer ourselves in service. We ask for help in coming to a clear understanding.
Instead of assuming that we know what needs to happen and praying for that, we pray to see it clearly, and to understand how we can be of service,or not.
Well, in my view, we’re connected, or One, or united, or Related to All to everything, thru our breath, our five senses, thru what we eat and drink and eliminate, etc. We “emit” our thoughts, emotions, etc. We are emitters-receptors in total interaction with ALL.
So, considering all of this, I’d say all our actions, thoughts. interactions at All Time could be interpreted as prayers if praying means to communicate with this Great Mystery Of Life and or ask and or show gratitude and so on.
I used to think that everything I did demonstrated my love for my wife and children so why should I have to say it. For some reason it makes them feel good to hear it.
I love this thread, by the way. Thanks all. I don’t know what else to say - I really get a lot out of hearing other folks relationships to prayer, and of course I always love Billy’s stories. They rock!
Has anyone else ever notice the similarities between a “visualization” and a prayer ?
I’ve read that experiments were made to observe the effects on the brain when one is actually doing something like for example; running, walking, etc. compared to simply visualizing the same actions. The results are pretty interesting, I find. The same things are observed in the brain as well as in the hormonal system and so on whether the actual action or simply visualizing is done. So it would imply that if a person is feeling, thinking, visualizing something negative causing fear, anxiety, etc. , the body would react accordingly. While if one is feeling, visualizing something positive, the body also reacts accordingly.
It seems to me that “faith” is a state of confidence and serenity in a positive outcome. A lack of faith might be a lack of confidence and serenity, and a not so clear positive vision, and even at times a vision of the feared opposite outcome.
I’ve read about miraculous and / or unexplained healings of people who say it is their prayers and total faith in God (Creator, Great Mystery, etc.) that cured them. And I’ve read and heard of people who also miraculously recovered from deadly diseases, etc. and say it is thru visualization.
What are your thoughts on this ?
Misko
I would say you’ve got it. You could also throw in “immersive sensory experience of the imagined outcome” as a lever there, too.
I definitely think nowadays we (culturally) treat our words too cheaply, our jokes and jests too lightly, when they touch on things we actually don’t want to happen.
Folks used to have a healthy respect of the spoken word (and later, the written one). Knocking on wood when you don’t mean what you say (or to avoid a jinx), things like this help me stay clear about my intention as I move through the world.
We make movies and books on horrible things, and expect them to go away as nicely as they came.
This culture chalks up as mere “superstition” tools we’ve always used to stay clear on the world we want to build for ourselves. Just writing that, I feel a spike of anger.
“…immersive sensory experience of the imagined outcome…”
First time I hear about this. It sounds to me like it may mean; using all our senses in the “visualization”. I find that “immersive sensory experience of the imagined outcome” (ISEIO) is concise and precise, I like that. A little long maybe to use in a sentence among friends but hey…!
According to my limited experience in this domain and from what I read about it, the chances of attaining the desired outcome will be hightened if all our senses are used in the visualization (ISEIO) or prayer. In other words, the more it is real with the emotions and so on, the better.
I hope I’m not making it sound like a recipe or technique for “success” or for materializing all our dreams and desires and $$$ and power and so on…
A little long maybe to use in a sentence among friends but hey...!
You haven’t met my friends…ha ha. Yes, that phrasing sounds a little unwieldly, I agree, but definitely to the point.
the chances of attaining the desired outcome will be hightened if all our senses are used in the visualization (ISEIO) or prayer. In other words, the more it is real with the emotions and so on, the better.
My experiences and what mentors have taught me agree! Vividness, vividness, vividness. Senses and intense emotions. I count the vivid and immersive wealth of our senses and emotions among the treasures lost in the Great Forgetting of our indigenous ancestry.
I hope I'm not making it sound like a recipe or technique for "success" or for materializing all our dreams and desires and $$$ and power and so on...
Right, like in that horrible “the Secret” movie/marketing thing. They should have called it, “the $ecret”. 
Here is an anecdote: "I was in grade 2 and in my class there was this gorgeous girl, tall, black hair, self confident and almost a year older than me. I was short, younger (9), and sorta timid, well, more than sorta…I just couldn’t get myself to talk to her, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have had any conversation anyway (still the case, but now it doesn’t matter cause I caught one, He He!).
At that period in my life I would pray every day, to be better in Judo, school, etc. So lacking confidence to “flirt” with the tall older lady I decided to flirt the only other way I could, and that was “praying”…Some might actually call that “love medicine”…So anyway I started intense praying, and yes it was vivid ! Daytime, I hardly looked at her, too shy. Night time well…
This went on for weeks. She didn’t notice me it seemed. Then one day out of no where, as I’m stepping out of the school and onto the steps, I had to walk just by her and a couple of her friends and I could hardly look at her, too shy …Well she grabbed me and KISSED me
and said she just had to, or something like that! I just didn’t know what to do and so of course did practically nothing except my face was as red as a tomato!
Anyway, it was a good thing I had prayers when I was young because I lacked so much self confidence.
Funny! Whew. Those fundamentalist christians have it right after all - if it gets us smooches, let’s bring prayer back into the schools!!! ;D ;D 
I also think of storyjamming as prayer. Kinda like praying by myth. Except not on purpose or out of a sense of a particular desired outcome, but rather allowing the myth that wants to emerge, to do so.
This thread is reminding me of a true story which many of you have probably heard also. It 's about how a monkey was seen doing something that had not been observed before, at least not by the scientific community anyway. One monkey was seen for the first time washing a potato (or some other vegetable) before eating it. So far, perhaps only interesting for a monkey “specialist”. Then soon after, other monkeys started doing it…Again the monkeyologist might be interested more than me… Here comes the dessert part; eventually, in other parts of the world, other monkeys started doing it. There was no possibility that the monkeys from the various areas around the globe could have had any kind of contact. Well, perhaps “some” kind. But not of the familiar physical kind.
There was also an experiment done with rats. All done under scientific standards. The rats had to figure out how to get their food thru a complex procedure (I forget what it was). The rats succeeded in a certain amount of time. They did the same experiment with another group of rats who had no contact with the first group, and they did this in another part of the world. This second group succeeded but they did it much faster than the first group (I forget the exact duration). Then they did the same experiment with a third group of rats in another country, and this third group did it significantly faster than the other groups too.
What does all this have to do with this topic of prayers ?
Well, to me this suggests that like behaviors, prayers probably can travel far and can also be received by other beings. So far, probably nothing new for anyone here. But what if we could somehow “incite” change among humans this way too. And since what we’d be affecting would be the ideas, thoughts, visions of the people who are open to this new or
more “vivid” vision or idea. And since ALOT starts at this level, if not everything. Revolutions start like this. The “Law Of The Great Peace” of the Iroquois started out with a vision or idea.
Possibly everything we materialize starts out as an idea, feeling, vision, dream, etc. Good or bad, I’d add.
So, I don’t know about affecting the assholes in control of this civilization and the wannabe assholes, but I suspect the open minded and sensible human beings, we might be able to do something about. Maybe we can find ways to become more “effective” in this particular domain where we probably already affect people anyway, and get some people to embrace a viable way of life.
What do you think ?
Any ideas ?