Methods of Prayer

Sorry Twirlip I will have to wait till tomorrow to answer you, I did not forget you and I loved your answer, a wealth for me to wax with.
All the best and have a nice walk or dream.

Stop. Reset.

You've asked me to prove something to you.

I'm telling you that there is no point in me setting out to prove anything to you if you don't define what I have to do to convince you, hence the "burden." You didn't say burden, but it is the appropriate term for what I need to structure my statements to you.

I'm doing you a favor here. This is your thread, and with it, your claim. You should be having to defend your claim, not the other way. It's fine though, I'm willing to adopt a counter-argument, and prove the support for it. You however have to provide the standard of evaluation for me to meet in advance. You've asked to be convinced of something. Frankly, ego gets in the way. So I'd like you to define what I have to do to convince you. Otherwise, I'll lay out a perfectly reasonable argument, and you can choose not to be convinced at the end.

In the practice of law, the prosecutor must meet a burden of evidence that is established prior to the trial to convince a jury, and the judge. I'm asking for you to tell me what I have to do to convince you.

If we do not do this, then you could simply be unconvinced, and my time would be wasted. It's a request to demonstrate you're reasonable. This is a method which keeps you honest in the end since you'll ultimately say if you're convinced or not.

A
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THANK YOU so much for this response failures art.
I have absolutely no way of knowing how to tell you how to convince me.
I merely ask for your words.
And with these I will be able to see if you have a point worth my time investigating and then I will ask more questions.
And you will give me good content answers.
I suppose what you may be asking also is how I like my arguments structured for my own accessibility and what mode of transport you have for your convincing words that might best suit the ride.
I am free lance, and you will see moods in my own form of response and debate and exchange,
what ever you give is good enough for me,
seriously I am just honoured you respond at all,
as long as constructive and not antagonistic or with hurt in mind or possessional conquest as goal, as long as what you give I can see that you have troubled with and taken enough care that I am able if not agree with you then at least I can appreciate your form and effort and desire and intent.
I feel blessed you have not given up on me or this thread, and I actually mean this, unless you are playing tricks that is.
Again, I don't know how to tell you how to convince me else I would have convinced myself already.
Do you see?
Bit of a paradox this to my mind.
How can you know what it is that you need to know when you have not already known it?
How can you describe the sunlight if you've never sensed it?
I hope you don't see this or your work with me a burden, if so its not surprising you have a short fuse and easily dazzle people.
If this is a burden, take a load off and don't bother with me.
I really am not in this to make your work harder or heavier.
If I am to hard to handle keep your hands to yourself.
If all I am is hassle I would rather you not bother because your tiredness will show in your work.
Simple, If its to hard, give up

I would you not say you are doing me favour, this makes me feel unworthy and undeserving of your time and effort and belittles me and my creations, even if I do feel blessed by your company and words I do not think they are more important than mine.

I then must try in some way to describe what I am like and what it is that I 'claim' and what my purpose with my threads are.
What I would like them to be, but never expect them to be anything other than a place for me to listen to people and think and ask and hopefully on occasion be answered, they are either a place to wax and create and imagine and impression people with each others skills of description and knowledge of the subject and what connects them personally and professionally to the thread and questions there in.
It is supposed to be enjoyable.
I must say as soon as I post the thread they are no longer just mine, equal ownership, every one who participates constructively to the thread is as equally owning and deserving of said thread.

My claim sure, but I will only defend it so much as it is shown worthy of my defence or participation or enjoyment of the knowledge gathering situation.
As long as it is constructive for me to defend I shall try to so, and as you might have guessed I only have a notion and try to be as unprejudiced and unbiased and unpresupposing and uncondemnatory as possible, to make it as wide and broad as is possible.

I come here to be convinced, you judge me wrong if you think I for a moment suppose my answer is 'better' or 'more righteous' than yours, see my answer to Phoenix I think, which basically states one mans answers are not the best answers for another mans understanding.
I don't for a second believe my personal truth is 'better' than yours.
I know you may be used to people opening threads to tell people 'how it is' or 'what you are not' I don't do this,
I want you to tell me how you are or not or how I am not or are.
Which means one of three things will happen, I will extol my virtue to you, you will extol your virtue to me or we will come to agree to disagree.
But along the way we will have a bloody good exchange of investigations and positions and source material. And what ever the outcome of gained enlightenment is all just icing.
I will get to ask you all sorts of questions with out the goal in mind to disprove you but for you to prove yourself to me, merely if I may, prove myself to myself, if I happen to get you to answer a question or to ask one of me, my heart is full and satisfied,
I am really NOT looking to convert anyone.
I may act like a preacher sometimes but I am blowing in the wind and usually talking to myself, like now, I would love to think these words would change or mould your view of me, but I have come to learn I am nearly one of the only forum goers I have ever met who have admitted they were wrong and eager to change their view to any other proven beyond my circumspection and benefit that what they say or mean does in fact have basis.
Is truth.
Ah the benefits of being more truthful.
As long as you show me it MEANS something to you this truth of yours, you have already gotten me to appreciate and trust that at least for you the idea or notion or thought or conclusion or trust or truth is worth much.

I will say again I want to see what you see, not just to see myself better but to see you better.
I wish people would not take my constant questioning as a way for me to pull one over on you or that it is a weapon of doubt, it is an investigation, a genuine need to know what and as you know,
not so I can just tear it to bits and poke fun at you for saying it.
You will rarely if ever hear me say you are wrong.
All I am asking for is your right.
To possibly after time has passed and had the chance to adjust become my truth as well.
Not mine to force on you, I tell you what I believe, you are welcome to question me and most times we will come to another question or answer together but I will rarely if ever say that just because I believe I am right means you must be wrong.
I truly don't see why we both cant be right.
But what ever I do not understand I will ask about it.
A keep asking.
Until I get bored that is, you have to be pretty engaging to keep hold of me for very long.
And there is MUCH I do not understand, but would very much like to.
People, and I am guessing you shall be one shortly, (I can make a lot of predictions) often dismiss me because I have often no opinion but to understand and learn instead of preach and teach.
I am the first to admit I know nothing,
But what I think I know I love to know.
And I certainly don't know love very well apart form how to try to give it.
so please try not judge to harshly someone who quite frankly is rummaging around in the void.
But I will still if you are wrong to my satisfaction try to introduce you of a right I hold, for what good and honour do I have in taking away someone lie or delusion to replace it with another's lie or one of my own?
Unless of course it is a matter of facts then I think it my duty to give them to you. But as with most things facts are doubted and all I can do is supply you with what I have, not insist you swallow it before I move on to more force feeding of others.
Take me or leave me.
I really don't expect either.

I get a kick out of asking, people get sick of this and stop answering.
Believe it or not people want you to either label them, judge them, or discredit them, they do not however like to explain them selves very often to anothers satisfaction.
Our relationship will usually end when one of us cant understand what the other is asking or answering, not that one is no trying, just that some things some just will never be able to at least quickly understand what and especially with me HOW someone else comprehends.
Sometimes just can not be done.
No one need lose face because of it.
Just a difference of gauge and depth.
Some people can only swim in the shallow end of some ideas and some people only the deep.

At least this un explaining and expressing entity is what I am usually met with, which is why you will see me excited (like now) at the opportunity to write and ponder sentence structure and see what ideas come to mind as I go on and on and on and on, about nothing sometimes, about to much at others.

I would gladly defend my claim, ask me a question and I will always try to answer you, always.
It may not be always mathematically or logically well dressed, but I do try at least to always answer and always will ask for your answer above mine any day of the week.
I already know what I know, this bores me, it is your attention and exercise and answer that interests and invests me.

So I will defend to my abilities when and if you ask me a straight question,
and stretch my mind trying to answer a bent one,
the answer as said wont always from me be straight, a bit loopy at times, but you will always get my attention and reply to the best of that days abilities.
I have some days off where I should not be here, but I am a personalist as well as a impressionist.
I have moods.
But my core always remains the same, seek and ye shall find. Find and ye shall seek.
I love asking questions, I love investigating and hearing peoples ideas as long as I am engaged and interested.

You say not the other way,
but how can I defend something I say before I know who and what I am defending against?
I'm not that paranoid or detailed in knowing how others are going to try and discredit me and my ideas.
I am the one who believe s it remember, how am I to say or know how not to believe it?
Seriously how?

My ideas mean squat unless I know how to reach you.
And unfortunately sometimes you cant not inspect the person and just the idea. At least that is how I like to be inspected, where a truth comes from and how it is reached is just as important as the finish or conclusion or resolution.

I am theorist and I love the investigation and experiment more than I am interested in the outcome.
I am a prophet not a messiah.
I am a disciple not a leader.
I will nudge you, but I wont force you.

Please do have an argument, just don't expect me to always disparage or disagree with you, I really only disagree with myself.

What do you mean by adopt an argument?
Oh and I think I've got you now, you are a professional debater?
How absolutely wonderful, I can see you will be worth following if this is the case.?
I have always had a love of the form of the professional debate even though I rarely use traditional forms my self.
Yes any thing you can back up the better, like I said I will be the one asking all the questions.

You say I must provide the standard of evaluation.
If you don't want to ask me a question or give me your opinion for me to ask about you I really don't know how I can help you.

I have never had the chance before in my life to defend and justify most anything I think about here, what makes you think I have an argument waiting or a standard when I don't know what it is you want form from me?

Ask me a question I shall tell you no lies.
You may very well expose them as such, but that is your job not mine.
I am the one after all believing and spouting the nonsense.
You ask for a standard of evaluation from me, how can I provide anything I don't know you are looking for?

My ego always gets in the way as does other peoples.
I however know how to shrink mine.
But the ego is after all a breeder and must always regularly be trimmed and cut down to size. Constant grooming.
Another thing you need not fear to ask for a reason or justification for is my ego.
If I have done something unprovoked or unseemly or foolish, I welcome correction.
I welcome correction.
I know not everything I believe will be truthful but I presently don't know what that is when I haven't ven made up my mind for the most part.
sometime sun sits on fences.

Again your job if you so choose, is to question and convince me, I am not in the business of conversion.
I am the convert not the converter.
If ever a convert happens it is purely by chance.
I really am not trying to prove anything to you other than my will and maybe my intelligence and who knows maybe even my soul.
Or however a soul can or not prove its presence.
My heart then, another metaphor, my spirit, another, my self.
Yes that will do, I am trying to prove myself to and for you.
And trying to help you prove what ever you so wish to prove to and for me.

Again how am I to know how you can convince me?
If I knew how you can convince me I would be convinced already wouldn't I?

So go with the 'otherwise', lay out a perfectly reasonable argument, I have not seen one of those in quite a while. (sun smile)

Why do you automatically decide that I will choose not to be convinced, do you have such a low opinion of your argument, or is that low opinion that of me?
Which screams bias in my eyes as you do not know me apart from three or so posts I sent to you, was I disrespectful in any way?
Did I laugh at or insult you?
Was I unreasonable with you?
Did I dismiss you?
Did I threaten you?
Did I not welcome you properly and give you the care of my attention?
My idea may be unreasonable to you,
but was I ever anything less than respectful until it seems cheep shots were being fired at me?
You decided to have your fun with me before we had even been introduced and properly came to rate me as any kind of equal.
How is that fair?
How is that intelligent?
OOh I know the world is not fair.
But if you want to get any truth out the endeavour of this forum I would say you at least need to play by courteous rules.
Somewhere someone is screaming 'rules of engagement' 'rules of engagement'

So if you think so poorly of your skills of convicting and convincing someone
don't blame it on the person who merely asked you to answer some questions for him to be better equipped at conversing with you and yes even on occasion constructively argue with you.

The reason I got a kick out of your little game of me was for the simple fact you got me to question myself about my interpretations of you and your words, you were hard work which I enjoy but have only provided me with one simple answer to my many questions I have asked you,
and the answer you gave was just the original question thrown back at me.
I did like how you did it but there was a void where the content would be.

But again it was enjoyable because I saw it more as a meet and greet, I am here to find you as much as what you are found with.

Again to convince me,
ask me a straight forward question that will make me have to defend or describe myself and position,
and make yourself available for me to ask questions of you and answer me intelligently when I do ask a question.
That is how you might be able to convince me.
How reasonable does that sound?

Or as said if I am to much work, quit.

All the best, sometime sun.

Beautiful, sometime sun. Makes me glad I decided to stick around the forum, at least for a while.

Stop thinking of burden as a negative statement. It's simply a word that defines a standard of evaluation.

I'll compose something for you when I can.

In the mean time, food for thought: You absolutely can describe sunlight to the blind. Both the Sun and light itself are material things and are not simply defined in terms of how our eyes process them into information.

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i think this is about where i stand.

i like this answer, and that is what i would be doing if i wanted to give god another chance. i am still a bit miffed at him...

i put in bold those remarks that really resonate with me. a poem came to mind: 'caught in the grip of world unfaith, i cannot even pray'.....anne morrow lindbergh (might be called the stone, it was on the old forum)

i do ritual prayers five times a day, which i consider to be a meditation and yoga for the mind and body. the part where prayer is supposed to be inserted i leave blank, for the same reasons you say you think you do not pray.

why be jealous of those who can pray? do you think they get some benefit from it? or are you jealous of those who think there is a god who listens to them personally and will actually help them? were you looking for a loophole to be able to speak to God? or the person who is able to pray?

i think making a wish counts...a really heartfelt wish for something is a prayer and if a god hears it, what he does with it is up to him.

it would be a comfort, wouldnt it, to be able to pray to whatever and get help...but i dont think that is how it works. i can tell you that if i do pray, it will be for endurance and understanding...peace...not for any particular thing, not to change anything, not even for an end to suffering, because you have to be careful what you p[ray for...but the strength to endure...oh yeah, that's the serenity prayer i think...

I think you will find I said "that which has never sensed the sunlight" that is not just blind, that is senseless.
All five and maybe six senses,
without any of them how could you experience sunlight?

And burden still sounds like a chore, I would rather be a pleasure.
Thanks

Sorry failures art the exact quote question from me was.
"How can you describe sunlight if you've never sensed it?"
This is all senses not just sight, it originally did indeed say 'never seen it' but on my edit I knew this was wrong, so it became sensed,
no senses not even touch.
no senses no sunlight.

Thanks again and look forward to your words.

With no senses at all you could not describe sunlight. Nothing for that matter could be described. Without any stimulation, you could not even construct any material concept.

Are you comparing yourself to a senseless person?
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No I was comparing it to your request for you to 'convince' me.
I likened it to a slight paradox first.
And then went on to say I could not tell you what I thought you could tell me because I did not first know what you knew or could tell me and how to ask for it.
How can I tell you what I want when I don't know what it is that you have to give or want me to have?
or
How can I know what to ask for from you when for you to tell me anything means I must know what to ask from you.?
or
How can I know what you know with out knowing what you want me to know.?
or
How can I know what you know by knowing not what you know.?
or
How can I experience something with out any way to know what or how experience is.? other than not?
or
How can I know or be known if I cannot be known or know.?
or
How can the senseless know if it is sense?
How can the senseless make any sense?

I was not calling either myself or you senseless,
I was calling the paradoxical entreaty of yours paradoxical.
Do you see?

I love "Without any stimulation, you could not even construct any material concept" which sums up exactly what I think the request for me to show you what would convince me without actually being convinced.
Can you not see the fun and the paradoxicality intangible intangibility of it?

When do you think you might have something for me?
I'm itching to get going with you.

All my thanks

Yes I agree also that although it seems like a natural instinct to pray when in dire need, it to my mind does seem a little selfish and self concerned.
But when we are in danger who is not concerned with their selves?
This is not to say that I judge those who do pray in need, often like lying on the psychiatrists coach I see this form of prayer consoling and hearing the self is a healthy pursuit, until it becomes institution institutionalisation.
I am not sure if it is prayer because it is making myself aware of what I have but I thank Something after I finish every meal I have.

Oh yes, One of the main reasons I think I am forced to stay away from conversations or prayers with God the Parent, Child and Spirit is because I might just start screaming at Him.
But I also think God is no longer wrathful, something happened when Christ completed the set and put Himself to shame.
I wonder if God feels shame?

I have a few idols or icons, all of Mary or Female deities though.
I do not argue with God because I am avoiding God but I find if my faith and belief is not constantly questioned or under scrutiny it is a worthless faith.
You said bargain here, I often see a lot of prayer as bribery another reason I avoid it, I also don't want to seem ungrateful or judgemental or forbid trying to grease palms. Yes God would notice such weak willed antics.
The angels seem to be able to be bribed but God cannot.

Absolutely agree, but I still avoid my confrontation with God, I argue against Scripture and of course my own faith structure.
Yes God MUST have a real and good reason.
I cant not believe this else I may be in trouble.

God keeps a lot more sane than makes mad.
Prayer does the same, I totally see it as therapy.
At least people who back up their delusion with an argument rather than blind or ignorant faith have a healthy 'faith'.
Silly human approximations is the basis for all imagination and creativity.
We all do this as well in one form or another, caricature the universe.
Ever seen a program called 'What the bleep do we know?'(sun smile)


Thank you for your genuineness and ability to answer so deftly.
Much appreciated.

Yes so did I and am disappointed he has not come back to expand.
Maybe later or tomorrow?
Here's hoping.
I wonder if prayer has anything to do with hope?

Yes now you bring up the position.
Could not the very poses in meditation constitute as a prostration?
Is not prostration prayer?
Thanks and great to see you

Thanks Twirlip, your opinion is valued, when and where ever you go let me know and I'll do the same.

He must forgive us, we must try and be the same. (smile)

failures art;
This was my response in a thread entitled "Argumentative Approaches"
It describes what and how I argue.
"I tend to go into arguments believing I am wrong, as only a good argument will hold this true, a bad argument will be that which proves they and I are wrong in our wrongs.
Accepting you are wrong and having someone prove to them selves and you this is a correct assumption is easier than thinking you are right and never being able to be proved anything.
It is harder for someone to prove you are right at being wrong that someone proving you wrong at being right. "

Because I have witnessed the calm and peace it achieves for some people, that they feel they can be closer to God whether true or not must feel blissful.
When ever my Minister comes to see me my favourite part of the whole afternoon is when he gives a prayer of thanks for and sometimes with me.
I nearly got there once with one of these prayers, I went into trance, (the last time in my memory that I actually achieved trance state in recent months) and since then I have not felt as if I either pray or can meditate.
I also started sobbing heavily.
I may not have been connected to God just then but I was connected to something that simply made me desperately sad.


Yes I think there is great benefit for it such as a therapeutic sense of achievement.
DO I think their wishes are fulfilled? No not really unless it is a self fulfilment.

No just jealous of the peace they seem to be able to locate in or after their prayer.
I love listening to the poetry as well.
What do you think could prayer be described as poetry?
All poetry prayer?

As said I think God is always listening, which means you can certainly have a one sided conversation any time you choose.
I on the other hand think I would like to choose to be able to but may find I have the choice but would rather just keep my distance?
I do not look for loopholes concerning God, even though I seem to be very good at creating them.
Magic is a loop hole.


Wishes are both prayer and magic.
A true wish will entreat magic more than God can be entreated.

Yes I see prayer as very useful tool for endurance that I am unable to pick up proficiently.
Words are great instigators of courage and nearly everything else human.
I thought about writing my prayers, but hey then turn into poetry.
Is prayer poetry because then it is likely I do pray more than I am realising..

You believe wrongly

For me, there is literally nothing to avoid

How would you define prayer?