"Whenever I lead retreats one of the first things I ask participants to do is 'pray to be open.' If there is openness, wondrous transformation can take place. If the mind or heart is closed, little can happen. If our spirit remains blocked, we end up holding on to our weaknesses and self-absorptions, misjudging the goodness of God, refusing to trust, and insisting on having our own way. Divine love waits for us to let go of our hesitancies and resistances so we can freely receive what is being offered.

"Growth through prayer requires us to release thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that hold us back from discovering our true self. To be open in prayer is to be willing to acknowledge the totality of who we are, to divest of what no longer adequately serves our life and our God-relationship. In his book With Open Hands, Henri Nouwen describes this movement by telling the story of a woman in a psychiatric center who would not let go of a coin clutched in her clammy, tight fist. Nouwen comments:

When you are invited to pray, you are asked to open up your tightly clenched fist and give up your last coin. But who wants to do that? A first prayer, therefore, is often a painful prayer because you discover you don't want to let go. You hold fast to what is familiar, even if you aren't proud of it . . . . When you want to pray, then, the first question is: How do I open my clenched hands? Certainly not by violence. Nor by a forced decision. Perhaps you can find your way to prayer by carefully listening to the words the angel spoke to Zechariah, Mary, the shepherds, and women at the tomb: "Don't be afraid."

"Fear can keep us clinging to our old ways. Fear also keeps us from embracing new ways. How well I remember the fear I felt when I moved toward a new way of meditation. For over thirty years my morning prayer focused on pondering the daily scripture passages. Then there came a time when the words of scripture (actually any words at all) crowded the silence that drew me into the stillness of God. Meditation on scripture always seemed the best way. Now there I was, sensing the need to let go of this mode of prayer and move into a non-verbal, non-thinking, more contemplative way to be with my divine companion. I was scared I would lose the insights scripture provided. I was frightened to detach from the security of thoughts.

"When we acknowledge fear's presence, it does not immediately disappear. For several years, I struggled in and out of meditation and contemplation. Eventually, trust in God became stronger than my hesitations. I was able to let go and enter where I was being led — away from the comfort of inspiring ideas and into the open space of simply being with God. In the process, I discovered that scripture could still reach and teach me but at times other than during contemplative prayer.

"When I was struggling with the move to a more contemplative approach, I was fortunate to have a wise spiritual guide accompanying me. Spiritual guides are helpful for many reasons, particularly because of the tendency to judge the experience of prayer falsely. We have our own preconceived notions about how we ought to pray and about whether our growth is, or is not, happening. Thus, we cannot stand outside our self to see the truth clearly. An objective person listens and encourages us to remain faithful in the midst of prayer's diverse rhythms.

"My spiritual director spoke with me about 'letting go' and encouraged me to detach from my old way of praying. Detachment is often misunderstood as meaning one has to let go completely or to stop caring and become separate from what one enjoys. Quite the opposite is true. Angeles Arrien describes detachment in The Four-Fold Way as 'the capacity to care deeply from an objective place.' She explores this notion further and remarks that true detachment urges us to invest fully but that we also need to 'be open to outcome, not attached to outcome.'

"In prayer we come with a heart centered on the One we love. We give ourselves as fully as possible to this Great Love but we do not clutch on to the results of that loving relationship. In my situation, I was still fully invested in my relationship with God, but I had to let go of what I expected from it when I moved into another mode of prayer. I had to put my faith in the process, stay open, and leave the outcome to God."