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I’m struggling in my prayer life. Everyone around me seems to be happy but me. What can I do?

On the night before Jesus died, he said to his apostles, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you” (John 14:27). He is offering them peace and happiness. Your question points to a longing for happiness and to the hope that you can find it in prayer.

Jesus says that he gives peace and happiness “not as the world gives.” The peace and happiness that the world gives are entirely based on circumstances. You can only be happy if things are going well. All it takes is one bad thing to come along on the wheel of fortune to take away this happiness. So, we desperately reach for food and drink, entertainment, material possessions, shopping, fun vacations, and endless other worldly diversions. This endless pursuit of worldly happiness will consume our lives, and it will always eventually fail us.
           
However, the happiness and peace that Jesus offers us are not dependent on circumstances. Indeed, it can endure even in the worst of circumstances. One only has to look at the examples of the holy martyrs to see men and women who in the worst of circumstances are filled with an unworldly joy.
           
I think it is wise of you to note the connection between prayer and happiness. It is through prayer (and the sacraments) that we are connected to Jesus, who is the source of true happiness and peace. Yet you say, “I’m struggling in my prayer life.” Let me see if I can help with a few thoughts on prayer.

First, don’t be too hard on yourself for struggling. Struggling in prayer is normal! It is not necessarily an indication that you are doing anything wrong. So often we judge everything as successes or failures. However, there is no need to “succeed” at prayer. We do not need to “babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words” (Matt. 6:7). Prayer is not a performance before God in which we have to do it just right to impress him (which is exactly what the pagans attempted). Instead, we pray to a loving God, who “knows what you need before you ask him” (Matt. 6:8).

Sometimes when we pray, we feel God’s loving presence. Other times we feel nothing. Again, this is normal. What matters in prayer is not success but fidelity—that we make the time for prayer, and we bring our hearts to prayer. For this, I recommend developing a consistent habit of prayer: daily and weekly routines of prayer. If you are just starting or restarting your prayer life, start small. Maybe reading a meditation during breakfast, spending five or ten minutes in prayer during your lunch break, closing your night with a prayer, or reading the Sunday readings on Saturday morning. Regardless of how well you feel your prayer went, you can be confident that it was good, simply because you did it.

Second, pay attention to your thoughts, feelings, and desires. Our thoughts, feelings, and desires are deeply connected to our experience, and thus are very important. However, they can be an emotional rollercoaster with its ups and downs. These ups and downs can threaten the peace and happiness that Jesus wants to give to us.

Additionally, our thoughts, feelings, and desires are not always truthful. Let me give you a mundane example from my time in seminary. One day I was irritable. It was the beginning of a new semester, and I had just returned from studying abroad in Europe. I was getting upset at the people around me, and I thought they were the cause of my anger. But then, in a lightbulb movement, I realized that I had been sick on my return flight, and I had crossed seven time zones without sleep. I wasn’t angry; I was jetlagged! My feelings were lying to me.

How can we understand our thoughts, feelings, and desires? For this, I recommend doing a daily Examen prayer. St. Ignatius of Loyola gave his spiritual students the Examen prayer as part of his spiritual exercises. You can research St. Ignatius’ Examen in more depth if you wish. But allow me to give you a basic version.

The Examen prayer is essentially a review of your day. In it, you can bring your thoughts, feelings, and desires before God. If you’re feeling good, ask God why you feel good. This will increase your thanksgiving before God. If you’re feeling down, ask God why you feel down. Sometimes the answers might surprise you. You might think this, that, or such and such has upset you, but in your Examen, you discover it is something you did in the morning, and the guilt has been silently haunting you all day. When God reveals to you something like this, you can allow Jesus to enter into it, so that you may endure the negative worldly circumstances with the happiness found only in Jesus.

Jesus offers us a peace and happiness that is not dependent on worldly circumstances. Two steps we can take to find that happiness are developing a consistent habit of prayer and routinely praying an Examen to bring our thoughts, feelings, and desires to God.