Guidelines for Centering Prayer

• Basil Pennington, one of the best known proponents of the centering prayer technique, has delineated the guidelines for centering prayer:
• Sit comfortably with your eyes closed, relax, and quiet yourself. Be in love and faith to God.
• Choose a sacred word that best supports your sincere intention to be in the Lord's presence and open to His divine action within you (i.e. "Jesus", "Lord," "God," "Savior," "Abba," "Divine," "Shalom," "Spirit," "Love," etc.).
• Let that word be gently present as your symbol of your sincere intention to be in the Lord's presence and open to His divine action within you. (Thomas Keating advises that the word remain unspoken....)
• Whenever you become aware of anything (thoughts, feelings, perceptions, images, associations, etc.), simply return to your sacred word, your anchor.
Ideally, the prayer will reach the point where the person is not engaged in their thoughts as they arrive on their stream of consciousness. This is the "unknowing" referenced in the 14th century book....Centering prayer (Wikipedia)
• The Method of Centering Prayer...by Thomas Keating

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