I am reading a book by Kate Braestrup called Beginner's Grace.  

It is about prayer.  A little bit about how to compose a prayer, and a little bit about the situations where prayer might fit in to daily life, and a little bit about a bunch of different types of prayer.  It is filled with stories from her own life as a chaplain to game wardens and as a mother and widow and daughter and friend.

Inspired by this book, I am going to try to commit to a couple practices regularly for the month of March.

One practice is to pray out loud more - to form the words and create whole sentences or at least whole phrases and to hear the prayers in my own voice.  Many of the prayers that I just mouth silently or form in my head aren't really whole thoughts, they are just half-formed thought bubbles about a general topic.   A lot of times,  I just stop and breathe and try to connect to gratitude and the feeling of being loved.  Which is fine but let's say I wanted to pray with somebody else, or I wanted to lead a prayer, or I wanted to be absolutely sure what I'm praying for/about.  It'd be better if I became more skilled at vocalizing my prayers.  For this next month, I want to stop and say things out loud, things that would make complete sense to other people if they heard me speak it.

The other practice I want to commit to is to stop and pray at the markers that Kate Braestrup calls "bells of mindfulness," which is a term she got from Thich Nat Hahn.  She describes them as "phenomena that you are likely to encounter that can trigger a moment of conscious attention."  Three examples that she gives is meals, bedtime, and parting from loved ones.  I am going to try to catch these moments and speak prayers.  I don't expect to be perfect at it, but I'm going to commit to try.