Steeping ourselves in a place, simmering in its bounties, celebrating its wonders, and loving its peculiarities are necessary steps on a spiritual journey. We often take for granted the places where we work and play. To get to know them again, or perhaps for the first time, involves acts of consecration and imagination. Or as Wendell Berry puts it: "My most inspiring thought is that this place, if I am to live well in it, requires and deserves a lifetime of the most careful attention."
Prayer is action you take in order to realize yourself fully with your neighbor and with God. It is the fulfillment of the great commandment to love God and neighbor. It opens the gate to heaven; heaven is the complete recognition of your potential to be who you really are, uniting you in pain and joy with God and with the whole world. Embracing your own alienation and brokenness with honesty and openness is the foundation of prayer; prayer can be choked off by self-will. Prayer is anything you think, say, do, or feel that opens you up and out to love.
