Don't pray when it rains...

Don't pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines.

I laughed when I read this quote earlier today. It's so true. How often is it that we can't seem to handle the messy stuff in life, yet we are so quick to blame G!d and be very angry that G!d "lets all these bad things happen"?

Really, this all points to spiritual immaturity and control issues. When things are sailing smoothly, we take it for granted and think we're doing such a masterful job of things. But when the bumps in the road come, the ones over which we have no control or the people over which we have no control (which are all of them) aren't acting as we want them to, suddenly it's G!d letting these bad things happen and we end up angry and frustrated. Is G!d at fault here, or is it us?

How much less our frustrations if we prayed and were grateful for ALL the times... when it rains AND when the sun shines, and if we also looked for the sun in the midst of the rain. If some situation needs to change, what are we doing to make it happen? What part of ourselves is asking us to grow?

When we blame G!d for the rain in our life, we live by what appears to be the whims of a capricious G!d, until we accept that very little is under our influence and within our control, and those few things that are, we are the ones responsible for making the changes. Thinking we have control over other people and situations is the construct of a very childish imagining of who we are and who/what G!d is.

How do we mature spiritually? Gratitude. When we can live every day finding a way to be grateful, even for the rain, it begins to change us. When we can learn to pray when the sun shines as well as when it rains, it begins to change us.

The truest sign of a more mature spirituality is acceptance, because acceptance is the key to everything.

When we are disturbed, it is because we find some person, place, thing, or situation—some fact of our life —unacceptable, and we can find no serenity until we accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment. Even if something needs to shift, most often the shift that is needed is our own perception, not the other person or situation. And if it is a situation which we can do something to change, then, we do the work.

Because Life is the greatest Teacher of all, usually what is rubbing us the wrong way is the very lesson we most need to learn, if we will stop and listen, and accept it with gratitude, and look in the mirror for what most needs to change within ourselves.

If we aren't grateful for the sunshine, we have no right to pray when it rains. How much do we take for granted when it is smooth sailing?

Bottom line, prayer never changes others nor situations; it changes US. It reminds us of beauty and gratitude and all the many privileges we have. If we are praying for G!d to change others or situations or outcomes, we are not praying correctly. We wrap our thoughts in prayers so that we might shift our own perceptions. If something is wrong and needs to be changed, we must become that change, do the work. And we ought never overlook all those things which are good and right in our life. In these ways, prayer changes US, not others.

So, we don't pray when it rains in our lives if we never pray (give thanks) when the sun shines.