Randy Hain's Blog

Every action we take with regards to relationships in the business world is intentional. On some level, we likely know what we are doing, but may not always consider the impact of our actions or the repercussions. The challenge is people on the receiving end of our actions notice…and they are not likely to forget. We may be perceived as a “giver” or a “taker.” Maybe they see us as either “fake” or “authentic.” Regardless, it is important to know how we come across to others and make corrections if necessary.

Most of my relationship observations have been experienced through watching the actions of job seekers and people doing business development. Both categories of professionals rely on networks of people to achieve their goals. What has been obvious to me over the years is the clear demarcation between Best and Worst relationship practices.

WORST Business Relationship Practices

Only reach out when you need something.
Only talk about yourself.
Mistake connections through social media as substitutes for real relationships.
Avoid being personal.
Fail to be transparent about what you want.
Go from “hello” with a new contact to “I want…” without building a trusting and open relationship first.
Keep score.
Abuse your network with frequent requests.
Don’t follow up appropriately.
Fail to show gratitude.

BEST Business Relationship Practices

Be authentic.
Get personal. Your transparency will invite them to be transparent in return.
Be candid.
Always try to “pay it forward” and offer to help the other person first.
Be insatiably curious about others. Learn and remember personal things about others like spouse and kid names, hobbies, interests and birthdays.
Find meaningful ways to touch base with your network consistently throughout the year.
Freely share ideas, connections and content. Always add value to the relationship.
Do what you say you will do.
Meet people in person whenever it is convenient and appropriate.
Always be grateful.

I have certainly struggled with following the Best Practices list over the years, but each interaction with another professional has been a lesson-filled experience which has helped me improve in this area so critical to achieving professional and personal success. Why did I feel compelled to write this post? Unfortunately, I have observed countless business relationships get off to the wrong start or end in frustration and failure because of a stubborn pursuit of the actions on the Worst Practices list.

I would suggest a pervasive lack of self-awareness and an unbalanced focus on our own needs are the biggest contributors to poorly done business relationships. If you feel convicted about your own relationship practices and sincerely desire to change, I encourage you to do these three things:

Reflect on your last five encounters with people in your business network. What were the results? Be honest. What can you improve? How many of your actions were on the Worst list versus the Best list?
Ask the most honest and candid person you know to give you feedback on how you conduct relationships. Do not seek encouragement or validation. This exercise requires brutal honesty.
Ask for feedback from one of the “failed” business encounters mentioned in bullet number one. Ask how they perceived you. Ask how you might have approached them differently. You may not always get feedback (or like what you hear), but if they respond, the lesson is invaluable.

If you are a job seeker, looking to develop new business or are another professional dependent on strong relationships, consider how intentional you have been in your past actions. Are you satisfied with your efforts and results to date? Think about times you have been on the receiving end of the Worst Relationship Practices. How did these encounters make you feel?

I encourage you to dare to be different. Build a strong network of like-minded professionals and nurture these valuable relationships with a new mindset and approach. Be the opposite of every bad encounter you have ever had in business. As for me, I have always found that being friendly, curious, authentic and sincerely saying “What can I do to help you?” has been the best way to get business relationships off to a great start.

Please join me for a moment of honest self-reflection.

Do you ever feel numb or helpless in the face of all the problems the world faces each day?

One only has to watch the news or follow the events of the day online to feel completely overwhelmed. Some of the challenges facing the world include ever-increasing threats to our Catholic faith. The Church is being accosted on all sides and the culture wars are raging. We are locked in an ongoing series of battles over the HHS Mandate, abortion, euthanasia, same-sex marriage and immigration. Voters recently re-elected the most pro-abortion President in history whose policies are often in direct conflict with the teachings of the Church and polls show that he enjoyed the support of 50% of America’s Catholics. There is a crisis in vocations to the priesthood and in some areas of our country, parishes are nearly empty. These are real issues which demand a response.

What can we do? How do we engage?

Unfortunately, many of us succumb to feelings of indifference and apathy rather than get involved. We may think to ourselves that somebody else will take care of these problems as we have enough to handle already or believe the issues don’t really affect us. At times, it feels to me like we are living in an isolated little town of our own making called Apathy-ville.

How did we get here?

If we take a candid look around us, it is obvious that we live in a consumer-driven, materialistic society. Advertisers bombard us with messages about how our lives can be so much better if we only had the latest gadget or toy. Additionally, over the last few years, we have seen unparalleled growth in the federal government and its subtle, but ever-growing influence over the economy, healthcare and education as well as moral issues such as abortion and marriage. It seems that so many of us have wrongly placed our faith in material things, the government and ourselves, instead of in Christ and His Church. Political correctness has seeped into our collective consciousness like a disease and made us fearful of saying and doing what is necessary to defend our faith and stand up for what is right and true. If we tolerate everything, it leads one to think that we likely stand for nothing. “I don’t want to offend” often translates into “I am not willing to defend.” As G.K. Chesterton once said, “Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.”

They said it best

To stimulate more self-awareness and reflection on how we may have arrived in Apathy-ville, I have listed below some quotes which I hope will challenge all of us, make us question our actions and serve as a catalyst for different behaviors. Let’s be honest as we ask ourselves if any of these quotes apply to us.

“Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.” (Matt 10:32-33)
“So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.” (Rev 3:16)
“For the time will come when people will not tolerate sound doctrine but, following their own desires and insatiable curiosity, will accumulate teachers and will stop listening to the truth and will be diverted to myths.” (2 Tim 4:3-4)
“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” (Blessed John Paul II)
“You cannot please both God and the world at the same time. They are utterly opposed to each other in their thoughts, their desires, and their actions.” (St. John Vianney)
“Faced with today’s problems and disappointments, many people will try to escape from their responsibility. Escape in selfishness, escape in sexual pleasure, escape in drugs, escape in violence, escape in indifference and cynical attitudes. I propose to you the option of love, which is the opposite of escape.” (Blessed John Paul II)
“Really, most of us live below the level of our energy. And in order to be happy, we have to do more. Now, we can do more, spiritually and every other way. . . so you see how important it is to have in the mind to do all that you can. To work to the limit of your ability. Our world is really suffering from indifference. Indifference is apathy, not caring. I wonder maybe if our Lord does not suffer more from our indifference, than he did from the Crucifixion.” (Archbishop Fulton Sheen)

How do we respond? What can we do?

First of all, we can’t stand on the sidelines and watch. We also must believe that one person can make a difference! At times it seems we have lost our way and forgotten or ignored the teachings of the Church. Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadephia offers this insight which cuts to the heart of the matter in his excellent book, Render Unto Caesar (p.197): “What needs to be done by Catholics today for their country? The answer is: Don’t lie. If we say we’re Catholic, we need to prove it. America’s public life needs people willing to stand alone, without apologies, for the truth of the Catholic faith and the common human values it defends. One person can make a difference – if that individual has a faith he or she is willing to suffer for.” Are we willing to suffer for our faith? What sacrifices are we willing to make to follow the teachings of the Church?

Are there good examples for us to follow?

The good news is we have many examples to emulate, ranging from the numerous Pro-Life groups who pray outside abortion clinics to the Bishops who are challenging government leaders over the HHS Mandate, same-sex marriage and reforming our immigration laws. Some of the greatest examples may be our friends and neighbors who pray constantly for the Church in the quiet of their homes, who write letters to their government representatives and devote time before the Blessed Sacrament in prayer for the blessing of the Church and Pope Benedict. There are also those who offer financial and personal support to those in critical need. Also, remember our Priests and the incredible job they do in serving their parishes. We clearly have examples to follow, but far too many of us have only been watching, tolerating and…turning away.

Two Important Things to Remember

Is simply being Catholic enough to motivate everyone to authentically embrace the responsibilities of our faith? One would hope so, but perhaps we need these additional reminders:

1. We all received the call to holiness at our Baptism.

“The call to holiness is rooted in Baptism and proposed anew in the other Sacraments, principally in the Eucharist. Since Christians are reclothed in Christ Jesus and refreshed by his Spirit, they are ‘holy’. They therefore have the ability to manifest this holiness and the responsibility to bear witness to it in all that they do. The apostle Paul never tires of admonishing all Christians to live ‘as is fitting among saints’ (Eph 5:3). (Blessed John Paul II, Christifideles Laici 16)

2. We are made for Heaven, not this place.

‎”The big, blazing truth about man is that he has a heaven-sized hole in his heart, and nothing else can fill it. We pass our lives trying to fill the Grand Canyon with marbles. As St. Augustine said: ‘Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.” (Peter Kreeft)

“We must always remind ourselves that we are pilgrims until we arrive at our heavenly homeland, and we must not let our affections delay us in the roadside inns and lands through which we pass, otherwise we will forget our destination and lose interest in our final goal.” (St. Ignatius of Loyola)

‎”I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others to do the same.” (C.S. Lewis)

Please reflect carefully on these two points as we can clearly see how to conduct ourselves on our faith journeys (the call to holiness) and our final destination (Heaven). As Catholics, we are set apart and therefore not to allow ourselves to be assimilated into the surrounding culture. It requires courage, trials and often loneliness to walk this path, but we know what our final reward will be if we embrace our calling.

5 Keys to Escaping Apathy-ville

How do we escape Apathy-ville? First, we need to acknowledge that perhaps our personal response (and indifference) to the challenges the Church faces is woefully inadequate. Second, we must truly desire to do something about it. I have quoted the teaching of Our Lord and the wisdom of Blessed John Paul II, Saints and others in an effort to illuminate the right path. I have reminded us of the call to holiness which we received at our Baptism and that we are all made for Heaven, and not this place. What else do we require to leave Apathy-ville? Here are five tips:

Stop practicing “Cafeteria Catholicism.” We can’t pick and choose what we believe and still be authentically Catholic. Follow the Magisterium and authentically practice our faith, trusting that two millennia of Church history and teaching are far superior to what we may come up with on our own. ‎”Be Catholic, really, faithfully, unapologetically Catholic, and the future will have the kind of articulate and morally mature leaders it needs.” (Archbishop Charles Chaput)
We can’t explain or defend what we don’t know. We may be indifferent to challenges the Church faces because we don’t understand them. We may believe the lies and half-truths being said about Catholicism because we have forgotten or never bothered to learn the truth of what the Church teaches. Poor faith formation for a generation of Catholics is one of the biggest problems the Church faces today. We have to study our faith-the Bible, the Catechism, parish adult education and a number of online resources are readily available.
Prayer is the key. We can’t remain apathetic about Christ and His Church if we are conversing with Him in prayer each day. Most indifferent Catholics I have encountered are struggling in their prayer lives and yet, turning our thoughts to Him in prayer, thanking Him and asking for His help can be so easy if we will only surrender and acknowledge that we can’t do it alone.
Put our Pride aside. Peter Kreeft wrote: ‎”The national anthem of Hell is ‘I did it my way.” It must take a pretty big ego to show indifference to Christ and His Church! What we need is more humility and a sincere commitment to put Christ’s will before our own. I know from personal experience that doing it my way has never really worked out well!
Know the enemy. We rarely hear this in homilies these days and little is written about it in contemporary books or articles, but who stands to gain the most by our apathy towards defending the Church? The Devil is the clear winner. Read the Book of Revelation to see the similarities between modern times and the prophetic visions of Saint John, or heed the words of Saint (Padre) Pio of Pietrelcina: “Temptations, discouragement and unrest are the wares offered by the enemy. Remember this: if the devil makes noise, it is a sign that he is still outside and not yet within. That which must terrify us is his peace and concord with the human soul. That which comes from Satan begins with calmness and ends in storm, indifference and apathy.”

What could be said about resisting an indifferent attitude towards our Catholic faith would fill several volumes and much more needs to be written and discussed on this subject. My goal is simply to grab your attention, if only for a few minutes, and tell you we are in trouble if we don’t step up in defense of Mother Church. You may ask yourself what gives me the right to challenge you and everyone else about being apathetic.

To put it simply, I am just like many of you. I am human…and I have my struggles with this problem as well. But, I also know full well we can’t continue looking to others to fight issues counter to the teachings of the Church. What is going on matters to us, our children, our friends, neighbors… the entire world.

The last train is ready to leave Apathy-ville… will we be on board?

Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel

St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle.
Be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray, and do thou,
O Prince of the heavenly hosts, by the power of God,
thrust into hell Satan, and all the evil spirits,
who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.

My father came to our house for a visit a few weekends ago, which he typically does two or three times a year. He loves to see his grandsons and we talk to him every week by phone, but it is sometimes difficult for him to travel from his Florida home to Atlanta. I have occasionally written about my dad over the years and the wise counsel and good example I have always received from him. This particular weekend visit was different because of a powerful lesson he helped me teach my 11 year old son.

On the Saturday afternoon of my dad’s visit, my younger son and I were throwing the baseball outside while my father was taking a short nap in his room. I can always tell when one of my boys has something on his mind so I probed and asked him if everything was alright. He responded with, “Dad, remember when we talked about what it means to be successful a few weeks ago? Is Papa successful?”

Wow! That was an interesting question and a mature one from my youngest child. He was referring to a conversation we had a few months ago about being successful in business and what kind of career he wanted to have after college. I gave him a thoroughly modern version of what I thought success looked like in business and made sure we talked about having strong faith and the importance of starting and caring for a family some day as well. I kept it at a high level for him at that time, but his question about my father deserved a deeper answer.

I explained that my father came from a different generation. He was in the army for six years after high school and then he completed two years of college before going to work full time. He met and married my mother who also worked for his company in 1965 and I came along in 1966. We didn’t have a lot of extras when I was growing up, but we had what we needed. Both my parents worked when I was growing up, but we always had dinner together and my father frequently coached my sports teams. They were both active volunteers at church. Even though my parents did not finish college, they both instilled in me a passion for learning when I was young and there was no question in their minds that I would be continuing my education after high school. The same was true for my younger sister.

Our father and mother taught us about faith and the value of hard work. We knew how to be self-sufficient at a young age. As I shared in last week’s blog, strong values and great life-lessons were instilled in us from my earliest childhood memories. So, is my father successful? By modern standards, a quick glance at his meager savings and lack of material possessions would merit a resounding “no.” But, in the areas that mattered most to him and also to my mother while she was alive, they were incredibly blessed all their lives with everything they could ever desire.

You see, my parents never tried to keep up with the Joneses. Acquiring toys and wealth never mattered. They were focused on raising faith-filled children, helping us as much as possible with furthering our education and teaching us how to be responsible. My father always wants to talk about the kid’s school and athletic achievements when I call him or find out how my book is selling. He rarely talks about himself and certainly never complains.

He comes from a generation that has much to teach us today. We can deceive ourselves all we want that today’s world holds us to a different standard, but as I get older I recognize that we also have the ability to choose the lives we want to lead. The more I detach myself from modern society’s view of success, the happier and more fulfilled I feel. This detachment allows me to put the appropriate focus on serving Christ and His Church, raising my children, loving my wife and giving back to others instead of accumulating toys that become false idols. I learned these invaluable lessons from my parents, especially my father.

So, back to that question from my youngest child: Is Papa successful? “You know, I think my father is the most successful man I know. I hope I am half the man he is when I am his age.”

“Thanks Dad. I think you and Mom are doing a pretty good job.”

How often does it occur to us to make our prayer lives a priority? Do we even know how to get started? How about if we stop making prayer conform to our day and instead make the day conform to our prayer lives. Not that this is easily done all the time, but it will help to start us off on the right path toward becoming more faithful Christians at work.

When I think of people who excel at integrating prayer with the busy workday, one of the best examples I can think of is Jennifer Baugh. Jennifer impressed me the first time she contacted me more than a year ago via a business networking Web site. She was start­ing a Dallas-based networking group for Catholics in their 20s and 30s called Young Catholic Professionals and wanted to discuss my experiences with similar groups I have started in Atlanta.

Jennifer has an impressive background, and I love her passion for encour­aging a culture of Catholic community in all aspects of our lives, especially in the workplace.

In one of our discussions, I asked Jennifer how she makes time for prayer during her hectic days. She told me she has long been inspired by one of her favorite verses in Scripture, “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:11)! It is how Jennifer makes prayer the backbone of her day. She says: “As a young professional, there are constant pressures to perform and exceed expectations in a new working environment. I often felt that as a recent MBA graduate working for a high-intensity consulting firm that I had a great responsibility to react to every challenge with complete calm and confidence. The temptation to lose my spiritual center amidst the demands of the corporate world was real. My BlackBerry never left my side as I awaited each email with anxiety and disquiet.

“By the grace of God, my office building was located right next to the downtown Cathedral where daily Mass was celebrated at noon. Each day I would look forward to leaving the office for this time of prayer and reflection. Seeing the other men and women who were taking time out of their busy schedules to participate in the Mass was a powerful and humbling experience. Together we listened to the eucharistic prayer that says, ‘In your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety.’

“Making time for prayer has helped me find balance to my work and reminded me not to be so inwardly focused on my trials. As Saint Paul tells us, ‘Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God’ (Philippians 4:6). Prayer is our great weapon and will help us weather any storm in our professional and personal lives. Mak­ing time for prayer will also enable us to act in a Christian manner in business decision-making rather than react emotionally to new situations.”

Jennifer is eminently practical and very disciplined. She sets aside time for prayer when she wakes up and before she goes to bed, but finds that going to daily Mass as often as possible provides the best opportunity for prayer. She is also fond of prayer in the car and leaves her rosary beads hanging from her mirror to remind her to use the time for thanksgiving and reflection. Jennifer finds that using her daily routines to help her stay close to Christ is rewarding and helpful. Lest you think her prayer is always scheduled, Jennifer is working on being more spontaneous in her prayer life. She shared with me that, “Life is full of contradictions. I am working on pray­ing throughout the day as the Spirit moves me. There are so many opportunities to thank God or to offer up a struggle. My favorite prayer is the Memorare, which I tend to pray when I am worried about something. I also have started to pray the Jesus prayer when I am pressed for time.”

Thinking about Jennifer, what can you learn from her and perhaps integrate into your own daily prayers? Knowing that we are all different in our spiritual and prayer lives, I encourage you to take from Jennifer’s experience the value that it might have in your own workplace. It is a challenge, but it will also strengthen your workplace faith.

In past blogs, I explored the difficulties that we often have in finding quiet time for prayer, reflection, and thinking. That, in addition to finding time to prayer, are the biggest challenges I most frequently hear from business and professional people. In today’s world, the trend is toward squeezing the air out of our schedules and being more productive. We rarely stop to consider the harm we are doing ourselves by ignoring our need for peace and quiet. By just taking the time to think and pray each day, it will become easier and easier to work and to share our faith in the workplace.

For me, the difficulty in finding the time to think and pray came in those moments when my faith was new; when I still relied on books to find faith, not prayer. Before I began my RCIA classes in the summer of 2006, I studied the Catholic faith in earnest. I tend to intellectualize everything, and my first thoughts were to learn everything I could about our faith. I quickly realized there was more to Catholicism than knowledge, history, and tradition. I then began to focus on being the best Catholic I could be, and started on my true faith journey, versus simply immersing myself in books. One of the biggest obstacles for me in those days was my lack of prayer life. I knew I needed to pray, but I couldn’t ever remember sincerely praying about anything. I was struggling with the typical male challenge of asking for help, especially asking God for help. Who was I to bother him with my petty problems?

I finally sought guidance. I shared my prayer challenges with one of our deacons and asked for advice. He looked at me with some amusement and said I was approaching prayer the wrong way. “Don’t worry about asking for help just yet,” he said. He ad­vised me to simply praise God for who he is, and then thank him for what he has done…praise first, then thanksgiving. Eventually, I learned to ask God for help and guidance, but my real prayer life started by praising and then offering thanks to him. I finally got it! I understood that my faith would never grow unless I had an active prayer life. This was the beginning of my prayer journey that has continued to unfold and grow with each passing day. I would like to share with you the stages of my prayer journey as a Catholic, lessons I have learned and insights into how I pray in hopes you will find my experiences helpful.

STAGE ONE of my prayer life was learning to thank God and be grateful. Going to him in prayer every day and reflecting on the blessings and burdens in my life are how I learned to appreciate and acknowledge the Lord’s role in my life. I never start a prayer without thanking him. I have also learned to recognize his role in my work life, and I frequently go to him in prayer before major decisions and when I need support.

STAGE TWO for me was learning to ask for forgiveness. I go to reconciliation frequently, but it is still important for me to ask the Lord for his pardon and forgiveness when I commit a sin, which is more frequently than I care to admit. It has become a daily examina­tion of conscience for me to reflect on where I have failed him and ask for forgiveness and the grace to not commit that sin again. This reflection time is easily incorporated into the Daily Examen that I have mentioned in previous blogs. I often take moments out of my day to think back on where I may have wronged him, or perhaps acted in self-interest. Doing this daily, I am able to move forward in forgiveness.

STAGE THREE was asking for his help and guidance. This stage of prayer is also when I learned to pray for others and their needs. Help is the key here. I think men in general struggle with asking for help, and I am no exception. My growing prayer life and deepening faith journey have given me the humility to realize I don’t have all the answers and that Jesus absolutely wants to help me. Early on I would tentatively ask for help with the big stuff such as getting my family into heaven, blessing our priests and deacons, blessing my business, and so on. Now, I am very comfortable asking for his help and guidance in every facet of my life. But first I had to gain the humility to recognize that without our Lord, I am nothing, and I need his strength. Asking for help in my work life was once a major struggle for me, but as I shed my old compartmentalized existence for an integrated life, I recognized where I needed perhaps the most help was at work.

STAGE FOUR in my prayer journey has been learning to completely unburden myself to the Lord. This has occurred only in the past few years. I have always been inclined to carry my stress, frustrations, worries and fears like a secret weight around my neck. As I got bet­ter at asking the Lord for help, I began asking him to help lighten these mental and emotional burdens. I am so grateful that I now can go to him and absolutely give up to him whatever is weighing me down, from work stress to concern about my children’s futures. Whatever it is, I share it with Jesus as he asked us to: “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your selves. For my yoke is easy and my burden light” (Matthew 11:28–30).

I am confident there will be more and evolving stages of prayer growth for me if I am humble and focused on deepening my rela­tionship with Christ. Saint Teresa of Avila wrote frequently on the stages of prayer, especially in her book The Interior Castle. I hope to reach the contemplative and mystical prayer life she describes in her works, and pray that Jesus will lead me there. But I have a lot yet to learn.

I’d like to share some important, big-picture lessons I have learned in my prayer life:

1. Make time for prayer; just do it!

As I stated earlier, if you don’t schedule prayer time and stick to it, it will not happen. And again, I encourage you to include prayer time on your calendar. You should start your day with prayer and continue to pray throughout the day. Set aside short blocks of time. Making time for prayer is like making time for your family. How much time are you willing to spend a day with your loved ones? It should not be a struggle to commit a small amount of time each day to pray. How you do it, or for how long, is not nearly as important as the act of doing it.

2. Block out the noise.

Turn off the car radio, watch less or no TV, reduce unnecessary computer time, and seek out more quiet moments during the day. Take a walk by yourself at lunch to clear the cobwebs. Turn off your cell phone on the way home and use that time for quiet reflection. Because our jobs typically demand it, it is difficult to pray and hear God when we are distracted by the noise of the world. It is easy to schedule around it, if you must, but remember: It’s not another “to-do” list item.

3. Have the proper disposition.

It is important to have the right attitude of humility and trust that God can and will help us before we start praying. Reading Scrip­ture or a book of meditations such as In Conversation With God or Imitation of Christ every day before prayer will help prepare our minds and hearts to approach the Lord in a deeper and more meaningful way. We should always end our prayers feeling grateful for the blessings God has given us in our lives.

4. Work through the “dry patches.”

We all experience dryness in our prayers or have trouble focusing. We may feel that God is not listening. We may fall into the trap of asking God to validate what we want, instead of submitting to his will. I am certain that we will all likely experience this, but keep at it. We may realize that our dry patches come as a result of rush­ing prayer or going through the motions, which we should always avoid. In those cases, we have to revert back to taking the time to think and be alone with God; that will lead back to a prayerful life.

5. Practice more listening and less talking.

As our work schedules continuously fill up, we often become so busy talking and working that we don’t hear him. That detracts from our quality prayer time. I have a tendency to ask God to grant my requests when I should be focused on asking him what he requires of me. It is easy to fall into cycles of “I’m too busy” or to simply forget to take prayer time. Don’t let your work become so busy that you forget your role in God’s plan.

6. Realize we can’t grow in our faith journeys without growing our prayer lives.

We simply will not grow our relationship with Christ unless we do so through prayer. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (2744): “Prayer is a vital necessity. Proof from the contrary is no less convincing: if we do not allow the Spirit to lead us, we fall back into the slavery of sin.”8 Make time for prayer throughout the workday, and you will find a more peaceful and enjoyable work environment.

Finally, I would like to share insights on how I pray and what led me to where I am now, in hopes that they will inspire and help you deepen your own prayer life:

I get up early each morning and start every day by reading Scripture in the quiet of my home. I then read and reflect on vari­ous meditations and how they apply to my life. I follow with the Morning Offering, praying for the special intentions of friends and loved ones, and then finish with the Angelus, which is traditionally prayed three times a day (at 6 a.m., noon, and 6 p.m.)

I started praying the rosary a few years ago and typically pray it on my way to work or during a run. I put off praying the rosary for a long time, but it has become a critical part of my prayer life and is a true blessing. This goes hand-in-hand with my ever-deepening love and appreciation for our Blessed Mother and asking for her intercession and help.

The Daily Examen, developed by the Jesuits, is a critical part of my daily routine. Basically we are asked to stop five times throughout the day for a few minutes of reflection and prayer. Each stopping point has a specific purpose, such as the prayer of thanksgiving, prayer for insight, prayer to find God in all things that day, prayer for your desires and what you seek from God, and finally a prayer about the future and what you will resolve to do tomorrow. It is best to put these five-minute blocks on your calendar throughout the day so you will be reminded.

If it is not on my calendar, it rarely happens. I schedule different prayers at various times in the day on my iPhone. This helps me remember to pray, forces me to make time for it and allows me to read the prayer if I have not yet memorized it. This is a good way to integrate our faith with technology.

In a nod to the incredible advances in technology, I will share that I find a number of Catholic apps for my iPhone to be very helpful for integrating my faith into my busy world. A few suggestions are iRosary, The Divine Office, Confession and RC Calendar. BlackBerry, Android and other smartphones may have similar products worth investigating.

Pray at every meal, public and private, regardless of your com­panions. It is important for us be thankful, acknowledge Christ, and ask for his blessing.

My wife and I pray with our children every night. It is important for them to develop their own prayer lives, but they need to see our example, and we also grow by sharing our prayer lives with them.

I have been a eucharistic adoration guardian since January 2007, and this is the best hour of my week. No matter what is happening in my life, I can come into the Real Presence of Christ and open up to him in prayer. It is uplifting, energizing, and a great way to start my day. I also stop by our parish chapel to pray before or after work as often as I can.

I certainly don’t have all the answers on prayer. I simply want to share with you as someone who struggles with the same issues and obstacles as you that my prayer life and my faith journey have grown together. I presented you with many ideas and suggestions, but remember that they are yours to accommodate into your own life. Start at a comfortable place and work until you reach your level of comfort. The important thing is that you just do it. The most significant changes in my prayer life occurred when I made the commitment to “just do it” and started scheduling my prayer time on my computer and iPhone.

I didn’t have any kind of prayer life before converting to the Catholic Church, and now I couldn’t imagine life without it. To me, prayer is any time that I turn my attention to God and away from myself alone. It can be accomplished in a variety of ways. Feeling worthy or inspired is not a great barometer for measuring our prayer lives. Praying for the desire for prayer is worthwhile and a good start. My life, especially my work life, is richer and more fulfilling because my days are now built on a foundation of prayer.

This post was adapted from The Catholic Briefcase: Tools for Integrating Faith and Work with the permission of Randy Hain and Liguori Publications.