Yes, it IS sometimes hard to focus when we pray. Certainly Satan tries to divert our attention and get us thinking of things other than God. A glare in our eyes, a blaring horn, a crying baby, the telephone, even sleepiness can cause us to lose our train of thought when we are praying. However, we should just shake the thoughts out and look again towards God. We don't want to beat ourselves up about it, just catch ourselves at the wandering thoughts and pull ourselves back into the prayer. We are only called to do the best we can. As we do this over and over again, we will discover that we do better and better keeping our focus. It's really a training of ourselves.
There is a wonderful image which St. Faustina described in her Diary which helps me sometimes: She prayed that she could be like a flower that follows the sun. What is she talking about?
I think of the fields of sunflowers when I lived in Kansas. All the heads would face towards the sun. As the sun moved across the sky, the heads too would move their positions so that they were literally following it. It was a really incredible phenomenon. Those heads continually 'looked towards the sun.'
So as I ponder St. Faustina's image, I realize that she has given me a pattern I should strive to mimic when I pray: That is "Follow the 'Son.' " As long as I am looking towards the Son, my prayers will become more focused. I just need to keep on practicing it ... pray and focus, pray and re-focus. Pray, pray, pray.
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