What is the ultimate goal of prayer? Or does prayer have no purpose? Is it a ritual that has been passed down to us from our ancestors and just because our parents prayed and our grandparents went to the church, the temple or the mosque, we too continue to do so? Why do we pray? Stop and think about it for a moment. Doesn't prayer have a purpose? Isn't there a bigger meaning in our prayers? For a moment, one would instantly react and respond, 'Of course! I pray because I have problems.' 'I go to God to make my dreams come true.' 'I close my eyes and remember God in prayer because of my faith.'
There is no doubt that we don't pray unnecessarily. Prayer is both important and essential in our life. It is instrumental for our happiness and wellbeing. But what is the ultimate goal of prayer? Is God sitting on a throne in the kingdom of heaven, listening to each of our prayers and then answering them one by one? Is it remotely possible that the hundreds of prayers of billions of people are being individually answered by God? No! God lives within the temple of our heart and God has created Universal Laws that respond to each of our prayers. Every single appeal that we make to God is replied to, one by one. This is because each one of us has the presence of the Divine or rather, Divinity appears in billions of people uniquely, individually, and personally. But we don't realize this truth that the Divine is present within each one of us. We want to pray to our Heavenly Father. We want to reach out to the God who lives in the mountains. We raise our hands to the God that is up in the skies. These prayers become ineffective and have little meaning.
However, when we realize the truth that we are nothing but a manifestation of the Divine, when we realize that we are embodied Souls and the Divine is within, then our prayers become profound. There is great meaning and purpose in our prayer. Our prayers are meant to recognize the God within. Our prayers are meant to make us realize that which we are not, and realize who we truly are. Our actions in serving humanity are an indication that there is Divine meaning in our prayer. Unless we discover the true meaning of prayer, we can never achieve its ultimate purpose.
But how many people actually pray with purpose? The vast majority blissfully enjoys religious prayers without realizing whom we pray to, the true meaning of what we say and why we pray. Isn't there an ultimate purpose? Are prayers not meant to achieve a specific goal?
Yes, the first purpose of prayer is to believe in God. Then, to live with faith, hope and trust. Our enthusiasm must make us love God. Once we truly love God, then our prayers evolve into true prayer. We seek God and want God passionately. We become obsessed. Our prayers vibrate with energy as we go in quest of God. Our prayers seek the blessings and grace of the Divine to overcome ignorance. Our prayers seek a Spiritual Master or Guru. Our prayers appeal for strength to live with dispassion and detachment, to discriminate, to live with discipline. Now our prayer has real purpose and meaning. But is that all? It's still not the ultimate goal.
True prayer is yearning for the Divine. Yearning must appear in a triple formula. Our yearning must be like how a miser yearns for God; a lover yearns for his beloved and a young child who has just lost his mother, cries to find her. When our prayer has this triple yearning, we truly seek the Divine and we start on that quest, on that journey to so-called 'heaven'. Once we discover the meaning of true prayer, then we go towards achieving its ultimate purpose.
Through prayer, we live in Yoga or Divine union, always connected to God. It may be through our action or meditation or simply through our devotion. We keep educating ourselves about the truth as our Divine prayers achieve progress on the path to God. True prayer seeks purification. The prayer evolves into illumination, but the ultimate goal is unification with the Divine.
How can prayer create unification with God? True prayer does not continue without questioning. Not only do we ask questions about God, heaven, life and death, Karma and rebirth, we investigate every thought and contemplate possibilities. True prayer moves from the traditional noisy prayer to a prayer of complete silence. Then we discover God within. We can't explain that in words. It is not just about knowing God and feeling the Divine, but it is realizing the truth that we are manifestations of God. True prayer makes us see God in one and all. True prayer makes us experience all beauty as Divinity. True prayer liberates us from the petty annoyances of life. We transcend the triple suffering of the body, of the mind and the ego. Still, that is not the ultimate goal of prayer. Having reached this far, our prayer has become powerful. We live with everlasting joy and peace. We live without being affected by the trials and tribulations of the world. We live in a state of bliss, as we become conscious of the truth.
However, the ultimate goal of prayer is unification. Our ultimate goal is not just enlightenment and liberation. It is escaping from the cycle of death and rebirth. It is being blessed to drop all Karma or past actions as prayer makes us realize that we are not the body and mind that we seem to be. We are the Divine Soul.
The ultimate goal of prayer starts at the kindergarten of religion and makes us graduate in the university of spirituality, where we realize we are not the body that we wear, we are the ones that wear the body. While we are actors on this humongous stage called the Earth, true prayer makes us observers knowing that we come and we go. This is just a show and the ultimate purpose of prayer is to never return in another role through a rebirth. The ultimate goal is to be liberated and become one with the Divine.
Just like the wave becomes one with the ocean, we too must become one with God. It is true prayer that will stop us from continuing to splash as another wave, in another life, life after life. This is only possible if our prayers are genuine; if we realize the truth about the Divine Power and prayer; if we overcome our ignorance and live as a realized Soul.
There is a big challenge for those who realize the truth. They are a rare minority who have achieved this great feat, but it is still not over. The challenge is that there is a war within. The senses of the body and the wandering of the mind attack an embodied soul to fall to the temptations of this world. The constant onslaught of desires and cravings continue to pull a genuine believer who prays, but this does not affect a true yogi, one who lives and prays with a Divine connection. Our ultimate goal is to win this war within and to become one with God. This is not possible only by human efforts. It needs the Divine grace. It needs the guidance of a Guru. It needs us to be on the right path. But above all, it needs constant prayer. Prayer is instrumental in achieving our ultimate goal of liberation and unification with the Divine.
Therefore, let us learn to pray, not just bray. Let us know what we say in prayer and whom we pray to. It is time not to pray hard, but to pray smart so that we achieve the ultimate goal of prayer which is also the ultimate goal of our life.
Prayer leads us to the Ultimate Goal,
To realize that we are the Divine Soul.
It starts with Purification and then Illumination,
But our destination is Divine Unification.