Centering Prayer Part 2: The Maddening Impossibility of Stillness

Centering prayer. Sitting in solitude, silence, and stillness. Stilling one's heart, mind, and body.

It's hard to control your thoughts; they seem to be a part of existence.

It's hard to control your feelings; they're involuntary.

But at least—at LEAST—you can control your physical body, right? Being still is easy. You just don't move.

Wrong.

Well, wrong if you're me.

And this drives me absolutely insane.

Why can't I sit still? Why can't I just SIT. STILL?! It's not hard. It should be the opposite of hard. It's not doing anything, it's doing NOTHING. Can't I just do nothing?

Every morning, I sit myself down and say sternly, "Okay. This is it. Do not move. You can do this. Just. Don't. Move."

And every day, I lose my mind because I HAVE to pop my toe, I HAVE to sit up straighter, I HAVE to scratch my temple. Sometimes it's a choice, like I decide that I'm far too uncomfortable and I must move in order to be able to focus on God. But sometimes it's not a choice. Sometimes I just MOVE, and I'm like, "Wh—? WHY?!"

I know that the stillness part of centering prayer is not this rigid. It doesn't mean that for twenty minutes, the most important thing you can do is remain immobile. The most important thing you can do is...nothing.

It's just that I seem incapable of silencing my thoughts and I don't even want to DEAL with my feelings, so the one thing I feel like I ought to be able to do is sit still.

But no.

Centering prayer is the exact opposite of what Eights are "good at." Eights are good at DOING things. They do things even when they shouldn't be doing things. They do things even when there are massive obstacles in the way. They do things when they should be resting. They do things when they should be listening. They do things when they should be planning. Give an Eight a "to-do" list and he will do it harder and with more attitude than appropriate.

Centering prayer is about dwelling with God. You have to submit to the solitude, silence, and stillness. It is completely passive. There is no checklist. There is no "doing." You can't muscle your way to the state of deep time with God.

I "do" centering prayer every morning. More often than not, I end up punching the floor mid-session and muttering under my breath. I cannot seem to do it and it frustrates me to my core.

I know that's the point, in a way. I CAN'T "do it," for at least a couple of reasons:

1) It's not a thing you can "do."

2) It's probably designed to show me that not everything can be done in my power. Some things—the biggest, deepest, best things—can only happen when I surrender completely and let God do them for me.

I'm going to keep trying. I'm going to keep failing. I hope that one day I'll get this. Or at least get out of the way for God to bring it to me.

~Stephanie