How to Fit in Lots of Prayer
Don't let prayer with the Lord be the one to struggle to find room in your life.
We all have only twenty-four hours in a day. No more. No less. All the things we want to do in a given day must fit within that span of time. This poses a challenge for anybody who wants to spend plenty of time with the Lord in prayer and meditation while at the same time not neglecting the other parts of their life.
I have discovered that as I commit myself to ample times of prayer and meditation, all the other stuff in my life eventually adjusts accordingly. For the things that are totally non-essential, I've completely removed them from my life. It wasn't necessarily an intentional removal. I just didn't have any room for them anymore. This included things like watching television or playing video games, which doesn't really provide me with much value in the end. I have also become very efficient with everyday activities that aren't at the top of my priority list but are still needed. These are the kind of things that Cal Newport in his book, Deep Work, called "shallow work" such as cleaning, tending the yard, sending emails, engaging in personal care. I'm always on a quest to become ever more efficient (but still effective) with these small but needed tasks in life. Then there are things that I can never be efficient with and I have to make ample room for them in my life. Prayer, date nights with my wife, and spending time with my son are the prominent examples. Because I can't (and I don't want to be) efficient with my times with the Lord and my family, I have to learn to be efficiently effective with all the other stuff in my life because I only have twenty-four hours in a day. This efficiency with the small things allows me to use most of my time for what I consider to be the most important activities such as prayer and meditation.
I'm baffled by how people often say that they need to "fit prayer in somehow" in their lives. I understand the frustration. I, myself, must have said something similar many times over the years. I have realized that trying to "fit prayer in somehow" is a poor strategy that's more likely to fail than to succeed. It's like trying to put in all your dirty clothes in the laundry machine after you've already filled it to the brim with water. "Let me try to fit these clothes in somehow." It's not going to go well. You would be better served by putting in the clothes first and then filling the machine up with water. And so, rather than saying, "I need to fit prayer in somehow," why not switch it to something else such as "I need to fit in cleaning somehow" or "I need to fit in exercise somehow" or "I need to fit in entertainment somehow." Don't let prayer with the Lord be the one to struggle to find room in your life. Let all the less important and perhaps non-essential things be the ones to fight for your time.
From time to time, a day will occasionally come when you've been as efficient as you can but because of circumstances, you still lack time to get everything done, including your time with the Lord. At that point, you'll need to sacrifice something. I usually sacrifice the shallow stuff first (i.e. replying to non-urgent emails, cutting the grass, exercise) so that I can spend the appropriate amount of time I need to be with the Lord. I'll just have to do all those other things on another day. One of the things that I've had to learn is to be OK with leaving things unfinished. If it's been an unusually busy day and I haven't spent enough time with the Lord, I might also sacrifice some sleep just for a day. Isn't it better to sacrifice sleep than prayer? I think so. But with some good planning and foresight, busy days where sacrifices are needed should be a rare exception and not the norm.
Barnabas the Monastic
Servant of Christ. Husband. Dad. Modern Monastic. I have a wild ambition in life: get as close to the Lord Jesus Christ as I can while on earth. I explore and integrate ancient Christian monk wisdom in modern everyday life. Lives in Canada.
