The "Prayer of Examen" has always been somewhat of an enigma to me. I had done a modified version of it last fall when I read Beyond Loneliness by Trevor Hudson, and I posted a lot of my "Prayerful Reviews," and have done it sporadically, but after reading this book and also talking to my new spiritual director (who is the BOMB), Fran, I thought I would be more consistent with it, and it has been wonderful. I like to know the "why" behind all of this, and this book helps me understand it according to how St. Ignatius understood it. Manney gave me the freedom to do it the next morning rather than at the end of the day because I just don't have the energy, but I am an energizer bunny in the mornings! The EXAMEN is a great way to look at your day and bring God into every nook and cranny.
All that to say, the EXAMEN is NOT for everyone, and I have had a quite vibrant prayer life without it! (My favorite prayer book is Kenneth Boa's masterful guided Scripture praying called Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Intimate Worship.) So do not feel like you will be GOOD if you do it. Some Intuitive people on the Myers-Briggs can find it difficult "recalling sins from the day." I guess that is why I like Trevor's take: "What was 'life-deadening' today?" Some of that might or might not be sin, but it gets you to think what might have been life-deadening first.
Here is my adaptation of this book and Trevor's questions in a nifty two page handout:
A Prayerful Review and Examen
I quit posting my Prayerful Reviews here and started doing them at EXAMEN.me. (I am so open. I don't mind sharing them here (my sins for all the world to see), but I have the questions posed to me as I go through it instead of having to repost the questions here every time I do it.) I really like this site because it also has some nifty reading plans. I am doing 30 Days with Jesus right now, and it has been so GOOD!
Here is the button:
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