If you're new here, check out the Best of Balanced Life Center and be sure to subscribe to receive the latest updates via email or RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

In 2004, 4 months behind on the mortgage, the bank threatening to foreclose on my house, the electric company one day away from cutting off the electricity, numerous collection agencies calling, and a business on the verge of collapse, I felt the squeeze of desperation. In those moments, it was essential for me to ask for a way out.

Asking did not change God’s mind so that my wish of the perfect job could come to me. Asking got me to the point from which I departed, the point where I returned my focus to God. I returned my focus to the abundance of the Universe, the guidance that was always available to me, and the resources that were readily available.

This is the last installation in Petitioning Prayer during the year long series, Year of Prayer. I thought I would pose the question, “Why are we still asking God for stuff?” All religious texts point us to a life staid on God. They all say in some form that when our attention is on God we don’t have to worry about material things. They all say that, in fixing our gaze on God, all the things that we need will be provided. This is not to say that we do nothing. It means that we direct our attention and awareness to the Presence, the Spirit, the one Consciousness that is always available, and that we are guided to our highest good.

Those who surrender to God all selfish attachments are like the leaf of a lotus floating clean and dry in water. Sin cannot touch them. Renouncing their selfish attachments, those who follow the path of service work with body, senses, and mind for the sake of self-purification. Those whose consciousness is unified abandon all attachment to the results of action and attain supreme peace.

– Hinduism: Bhagavad Gita 5.10-12

How many animals do not carry their own provision! God provides for them and for you. He is Alert, Aware.

– Islam: Qur’an 29.60

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

– Christianity: Bible Matthew 6:25-27

The Master said, “What need has nature of thought and care? In nature all things return to their common source and are distributed along different paths; through one action, the fruits of a hundred thoughts are realized. What need has nature of thought, of care?”

– Confucianism: I Ching Great Commentary 2.5.1

In all of your asking, be sure to ask for guidance, for courage, for willingness. Ask that you remain open so that you can be a full expression of God, so that Spirit can work through you.

In Spirit,
Nneka