Reflection & Prayer Prompts

Addressing Your Spiritual Needs

These prompts are designed for personal processing — during a session, after a session, or on your own. Take your time. There's no need to rush through them. Let yourself sit with what emerges.

Personal Reflection Questions

Looking Inward

1. When you think about the "treasures of your heart" — your feelings, attitudes, desires, talents, limits, choices — which ones feel the most neglected right now? What would it mean to pay attention to them?

2. If someone asked you, "What do you really want?" — would you be able to answer? Have your desires been buried, suppressed, or forgotten? What might it take to rediscover them?

3. Where in your life have you been running on empty while telling yourself you're fine? What would it look like to admit that your soul needs care?

4. Which of your three key relationships — with God, with others, or with yourself — has received the least attention lately? What has that cost you?

5. Think about the people who have access to your heart. Are any of them consistently trampling what matters to you? What has kept you from creating boundaries there?

Looking Back

6. Was there a time when your spiritual life felt more alive, more integrated? What was different then? What protected it?

7. Think of someone who has been a "gardener" in your life — someone who nourished your soul. What did they do that made a difference?

8. Is there a dream, desire, or calling that you stopped protecting somewhere along the way? What happened? Is it still there underneath?

Looking Forward

9. If you truly guarded your heart "with all diligence," what would change in how you spend your time? Your energy? Your relationships?

10. What is one specific structure you could add to your life that would create space for your spiritual needs? A time? A place? A relationship? A practice?

Guided Prayer Language

These are offered as starting points — ways to begin a conversation with God. Adapt them or let them spark your own words.

Prayer 1: Acknowledging Neglect

God, I confess that I haven't been paying attention to my own soul. I've treated my spiritual needs like an afterthought — a slice of the pie I get to when there's time. But there's never time, and I've been running on empty.

Help me see that caring for my heart isn't optional. It's not selfish. It's stewardship. You made me with these feelings, these desires, these limits — and I haven't honored them.

I don't know how to start, but I'm willing. Show me what guarding my heart looks like in real life — today, this week, in the relationships and responsibilities that fill my time.

Prayer 2: Naming the Wounds

God, there are places in my heart that have been trampled. Relationships that drained me. Voices that silenced my dreams. Moments when I let people too close who shouldn't have had that access.

I've carried the effects of that wounding into every area of my life — my relationships, my work, my sense of who I am. I haven't known how to protect myself, and I've paid the price.

Meet me in those wounded places. Bring your healing to what's been hurt. Give me the wisdom to build better fences — not out of fear, but out of love for what you've entrusted to me.

Prayer 3: Asking for Integration

God, I don't want my faith to be a compartment. I don't want Sunday to be disconnected from Monday. I want all of my life to be spiritual — my work, my relationships, my rest, my creativity, my decisions.

Teach me to be aware of my heart throughout the day. Show me how to practice what I know in real time, not just when I'm in a religious setting. Build structures into my life that make this sustainable — rhythms that protect and nourish my soul.

You said to guard my heart because from it flow the issues of life. Help me take that seriously. Help me live like I believe it.

Optional Journaling Prompts

Use these for written reflection — in a journal, on a phone, or just as thinking prompts if you prefer not to write.

1. Write a letter to your heart. What would you say? What have you been ignoring? What do you need to acknowledge?

2. Describe your "concentric circles" of relationships. Who is in the innermost circle? Who is in the outer rings? As you look at them, what do you notice? What might need to change?

3. Finish this sentence: "If I truly believed my spiritual needs mattered as much as everyone else's needs, I would..." Write for 5 minutes without stopping to edit.

4. Think of a dream or desire you've stopped protecting. Write about what happened. When did you stop guarding it? Who or what trampled it? Is there anything left to nurture?

5. Describe the version of you who has integrated spiritual care into daily life. What does that person's week look like? How do they protect their time? Their relationships? Their heart? What would it take to become that person?

6. Write about a "gardener" — someone who has nourished your spiritual life. What did they do? What did they see in you? What did being known by them give you permission to become?

7. Complete this prayer in your own words: "God, the treasure of my heart that most needs your attention right now is _______________. What I need from you is _______________. What I'm afraid of is _______________. Help me _______________."

A Final Word

Your spiritual needs are real. They're not a religious luxury or a sign of weakness. They're the care of your actual soul — the immaterial part of you that thinks, feels, desires, and connects.

God isn't waiting for you to get your act together before he meets you. He's already present. The invitation is to turn toward him, toward others, and toward yourself with honesty and intentionality.

Guard your heart. Not because you're fragile, but because what's inside matters. From it flow the issues of your life.