First thing each morning I pray, then meditate. I think that this process gives me the best chance of living each day.
I say these prayers each morning before meditating: The Serenity Prayer; The Lord's Prayer, The Third Step Prayer, The Saint Francis of Assissi Prayer. If I wake at night and I feel disturbed I say these prayers. They give me peace of mind.
I find the most important part in saying these prayers is that I try to understand their meaning.
Understanding The Lord's Prayer
When I say The Lord's Prayer each morning I intersperse my own understanding of it's words with word's of my own which I find give meaning to it:
| Our Father | who I look up to with respect, |
| who art in heaven | in my subconscious mind, and in the combined subconscious minds of everyone else |
| hallowed be thy name | revered be the spirit of a power greater than myself |
| Thy kingdom come | your way of life |
| thy will be done | not mine |
| on earth | in my actions |
| as it is in heaven | in the minds of other people |
| Give us this day our daily bread | our gift of prayer and meditation |
| and forgive us our trespasses | relieve us from the bondage of our past thoughts, words and deeds |
| as we forgive those that trespass against us | when we pray for all those that we feel resentment to for their thoughts, words or deeds |
| Lead us | for we wish to follow your path |
| not into temptation | nor into thoughts of what we might want for ourselves |
| but deliver us from evil | contemplation of any form of control of others, or by others of us |
| For thine is the kingdom, | I accept your way of life |
| [thine is] the power, | my weakness and mistakes gives me the courage and strength to change |
| and [thine is] the glory | my humility is my most attractive attribute |
| forever | from the beginning, until the end of time. (The past and the future belong to you. They are mere illusions in my mind.) |
| and ever. | every day along the way, (for mine is a daily programme lived in the present moment) |
| Amen | Let it be. Thy will be done, not mine. |
| God Bless | all those people I can think of in this moment, friends and foe alike. |
By giving meaning to each phrase, I deliver a visual image of how a wish to be into my subconsciuos mind immediately before I meditate.
Another of my interpretations of the Lord's Prayer
The "Power of Good" Prayer
Other interpretations of The Lords Prayer
Emmet Fox recognises that The Lord's Prayer was carefully written by Jesus Christ as a formula for a happy and fulfilled life. All 12 step programs teach "Resentments Hurt Me Most", so learning a method of forgiving is extremely important to my recovery. In his explanation of The Lord's Prayer, Emmet Fox describes a process of forgiveness that disempowers the destructiveness of resentments carried.
There are many other interpretations of the Lords Prayer.