Why Everyone Should Pray

Why Everyone Should Pray

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-white-sweater-and-blue-denim-jeans-sitting-on-bed-5199759/

 In this blog I argue why everyone should pray, even if you are an atheist. Pulling from scientific papers, I will run through the major benefits of prayer. As well, I will propose with philosophical rationing why we may be experiencing these benefits. So if you are looking for ways to live a longer, better life, you have found the right blog.

Discussion:

 There is a large body of research showing the benefits of prayer. Harvard produced a study (by VanderWeele et al) showing that regular service attendance and private prayer were associated with greater life satisfaction and emotional well-being. This also showed those same people had a 25-35% lower mortality over 10-15 years. On top of that, rates of depression and substance abuse were lower. Another study published in the International Journal of Science and Research Archive (Ueda) provides a potential mechanism. They state prayer combined with breath control activates brain regions tied to emotional regulation and serotonin release. By engaging the parasympathetic nervous system, we can reduce stress and enhance mood.

 Now that we know the benefits of prayer and the potential system of said benefit, I think we should reduce prayer into its base components. If we understand how people pray, we may be able to pull learnings from this for our atheist friends as well. So, what is prayer? To start, you are orienting your thoughts towards the greatest conceivable good. God being all that is good. This sets prayer aside from meditation, which may be muddled in less than good thoughts. On top of that, during prayer your thoughts are filtered as if your divine creator is listening to you. This makes you carefully select words, and aim upwards in your message. Anyone who has been told to be “careful how you speak to yourself” knows the importance this brings. If you are praying over a situation/feeling, you will be careful to talk to yourself/God using only positive language so as to not sound ungrateful.

 Prayer is a ritual. Many people work this into their lives multiple times per day. This strong routine reinforces its benefits and perpetuates the good it can accomplish. Many people also set aside a quiet moment for prayer which can help avoid distractions (before bed, in the car, at church ect). This is like sending constant positive messaging from your conscious thought stream into your subconscious. We can see this in what people often pray for: “God give me strength”, “God give me patience”, “God let me see what I should be grateful for today”. If you remove “God”, this is a direct message from your thoughtful frontal lobe to the rest of your subconscious and nervous system. This may be why many people feel as though these types of prayer work, as there is a different system being activated outside of divine intervention.

 Lastly, prayer requires humility. The act of asking someone for help is like taking a weight off your shoulders. This can promote many positive mental health outcomes, especially when that someone is believed to be all powerful. It's like reaching out to that friend who always knows exactly how to cheer you up. Knowing that you do not need to face hard situations by yourself can be incredibly comforting. So it's no wonder those who pray for help, and attend services in their community feel better emotional well-being. In a study titled Perceived Family Support and Psychological Well-Being, it was found that there may be a compounding factor to social support. Greater social well-being directly improves psychological well-being, and the inverse was also found to be true. This means when you are doing better, you are more willing to connect with people. And when you connect with people, you are going to be doing better. This positive interaction can scale and compound to create greater benefits. So praying in church, combined with social cohesion from the service, both add together to improve mental health outcomes.

Conclusion:

 I promised to bring this back to my atheist friends so here is my best shot. If you refuse to try prayer, I suggest you try this to gain some of the above benefits. 1) Regularly get out and see people. You can volunteer, join a club, or visit friends/family. This will kick off the start of a positive reaction. And has the benefit of being scalable. Replace that time that you would otherwise spend feeling miserable to do some good/have some fun. 2) Careful meditation. This should be framed as discussed above. Aim towards the greatest good you can conceive. Wish for the best for everyone and yourself. And act as though you are proclaiming these thoughts to everyone you love. This will help prevent you from leading your subconscious down a darker rabbit hole. 3) Don’t be afraid to ask for help. This can be a close friend, family member, or a therapist. Working towards fixing your problems is a good thing, and asking for help does not take away from all the great work you are already doing. 4) Set aside quiet time for your meditation. Treat this as a crucial step in your routine. How long does it really take to quietly close your eyes and give it a try? Probably about as quick as taking your vitamins.

I also suggest keeping these meditations aligned with nature and reason (think Marcus Aurelius). You do not want to pray/meditate on thoughts that are not productive. Keep these thoughts on what you can control. When people pray they don’t often say “God remove this negative thing”. They usually frame it “God give me the strength to face it”.

I hope you enjoyed the read! If you are curious about other religious thoughts I have explored I would suggest my dissection of the Tolstoy novel What Men Live By. It is called What Do Men Live By and can be found on my blog.