In times of distress, be it the magnitude we are experiencing in Israel, or a personal crisis, a set of reactions causes us, in Gendlin’s words: “to break back to a more primitive level”. During these times we become less able to expand our consciousness and certainly not to enter the field of prayer.
But during these times, prayer can rise in different ways and from different places of the soul.
In times of trouble, beyond the pain and the shock we experience, it is possible to be aware and recognize that the crisis uncovers ‘something’ that no longer works. ‘Something’ is over. Patterns, norms or habits that we could ‘get along with’ or accommodate yesterday, no longer work. This frail state is indeed dark, but if we are awake to it and ready to create our life from a new source – it can contain within it an emergence of a new life possibility.
We want to suggest that beyond all understandable emotions and humane reactions, we must also be concerned with deliberate processes, so that when these times shall pass, we do not inevitably return to previous patterns and normal consciousness. Prayer can be the place where deep processes of this kind can gradually happen.
