Make Your Personality Work for You in Prayer--The Free Spirit — Erica Barthalow

Today’s post is all about the Free Spirit Prayer Personality. If you’re new here and wondering what in the world a prayer personality is, check out this post for a quick rundown that will get you up to speed on how to make your unique personality work for you instead of against you in prayer. And if you haven’t taken the Prayer Personality Quiz yet you can find that right here (and also at the end of this post).

So let’s talk about the Free Spirit, shall we? Let’s begin by looking at some of the highlights and unique traits that make up the Free Spirit.

If you’re a Free Spirit, variety is the spice of life. You prefer spontaneity to structure, and restrictions and routines are a real bummer. You’re creative, inventive, and adaptive. Easily going with the flow, you enjoy trying new things and you’re always up for adventure. For a Free Spirit, boredom is public enemy number one. You’re always chasing that next fun or thrilling experience. For you, life is what you make it, and you aim to make it vibrant and rich.

Because you dislike routines it can be easy for prayer to slide right off of your radar and forgotten for long periods of time. And if your prayer life has become boring, you may abandon the practice altogether which then leaves you feeling guilty and defeated. But it doesn’t have to be this way!

One of your issues with prayer could be that it easily slips into a rote routine which then causes you to lose interest. The best way to avoid this is to create a way for you to approach prayer in a new way each day. But how, exactly, do you do that?

I’m glad you asked.

First, you’ll need to set aside time to pray, because if we don’t make space for it it will never happen. But let that be the only thing that remains constant and unchanging. The method is up for grabs.

Prayer is simply about connecting with God, and for too long I think we’ve defined it too narrowly. In the Old Testament we see examples of people building things as an act of worship and connection with God (i.e. the Tabernacle, Temple, and altars to name a few). I’m sure as these people did these things their minds were focused on and praising God with each movement and task.

“Prayer is simply about connecting with God, and for too long we’ve defined it too narrowly.”

I love this quote from the old movie Chariots of Fire where the main character Eric Liddell says, “I believe God made me for a purpose…and he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure.”

As a Free Spirit, where do you feel God’s pleasure resting on you? Is it running, like Liddell? Or perhaps it’s music, like Bach? Can you imagine telling Bach that music was not an acceptable way to connect with God?

The key to using these things that God has gifted and created you to do is to focus your mind as you do them. If it’s running, perhaps you can use your breathing or your footfalls to bring your heart and attention to God, or the things you see in nature as a means to praise Him.

You get the idea. Whether it’s journaling, writing or playing a song, writing a poem, dancing, painting, or reading the Bible or a book of prayers, or building something, the key is being intentional and looking for ways to bring your focus on God as you keep your body active and engaged.

“Where do you feel God’s pleasure resting on you?”

You can keep things fresh and engaging by switching things up. Don’t do the same thing two days in a row. Consider this your permission to get creative and use your God-given personality to express your love and devotion to God in ways that you find engaging and exciting.

Be sure to come back and let me know how it goes! I love hearing from you!

Next up on the Prayer Personality breakdown is The Planner (coming the week of 8/8/22). If you want to make sure you get every post in this series all you have to do is take the quiz below and you’ll get each post delivered straight to your inbox! Hooray! So far, we’ve already covered The Contemplative check out this post to learn all about that prayer type.