Most of us are inspired to pray only at moments of emotional upheaval or when failure, success, or deep fears overwhelm us. At those times in our lives, says Swami Swahananda, "something is stirred up in man's heart; faith in a greater being or power is born, and prayer follows. Prayer is thus the deepest impulse of the soul of man.
Many know prayer only as a form of petition, a plea for a desired object or state, either for oneself or for someone else. But prayer can also take other forms, says Aldous Huxley, among others:
Prayer as adoration: an expression of love for God: Prayer as contemplation: union with the Divine.
It is these higher forms of prayer that chasten us and mark a passage into higher states of consciousness. This kind of prayer brought to its culmination is a silent "standing before God," an unbroken state of union with the Higher. Prayer then is no longer the activity of the supplicant relative to a greater power, but is, instead, a state of being, one of total identification with the higher Reality.