Prayer is degraded submission

Prayer is communicating with God and meaning what you pray. Prayer need not be expressed in words – it can be expressed in desires that are offered to God. Prayer can be petition or it can be praise.

Let us consider petition. God is all-knowing so God doesn’t need to be told what we need. Since it is left up to God to answer the prayer or not it follows that the only real prayer is not, "God give me this and give me that" but simply, "Let your will be done and I will accept whatever you do." To pray any different would only be mocking God. Prayer then is not about what you want at all but about God. Prayer is not petition at all but submission. To feel the need to submit to God is a denial of the fact that you are wonderful as you are. It produces fear. Prayer would soon lose its appeal if more people realised all this. But the Church uses a curtain to hide the truth.

Do we pray to feel comforted? It might not be God's will that you experience comfort. He could send you depression.

Do we pray to ask God to do something in the hope that he will act the way we wish in response to our prayer? But prayer is about willing God to do his own will. It's adoring submission.

If we are grateful not that we got what we wanted but that God did whatever God wants to do for it's good anyway even if not good for us then gratitude has no meaning.

Religion says prayer must be humble. If you order God about, if you demand any blessings as your right, this is considered to be disrespectful and blasphemous. Christian humility involves asserting to God that you are a sinner and so that you do not deserve the gifts you ask from him but will ask anyway counting on his mercy. We do not accept this line of thinking - it fails to see how wonderful we are. We boldly stand in the place of God and demand that the universe does our will.

True self-confidence is based on the conviction that happiness and joy are our natural state and that it is the harmful form of negativity that is unnatural. It is not faith or prayer that we need but a stronger level of optimism. You can be both realistic and optimistic. Whoever affirms that prayer or faith are what matter is putting a block in the way of happiness. Gently correct your negative thoughts and they will become positive thoughts and the more you believe this the better you will perceive your life. You will be able to handle trouble for you will see it as a challenge that you can handle. Life will work for you! Spend so much time improving yourself and being a source of happiness for others that you will not be able to pray or criticise. To pray is to declare that there is something wrong with this approach. To pray for someone is saying their is something wrong in them or their life. It is judgemental and offensive. Prayer and the power of self-belief are not only separate but contradictory. Prayer is an affirmation that seeks to diminish life working for you - it is dangerous.