How to Find True Peace Through Prayer When Life Feels Overwhelming

There is something therapeutic about sitting in silence, letting the noise of life fade away until all that remains is your breath and the gentle awareness of God’s presence. Prayer grounds us in ways nothing else can.

I’ve spent much of my life learning this lesson, sometimes the hard way. When my daughter was diagnosed with cancer as a baby, during military deployments, when grief threatened to swallow me whole—these were the moments when prayer became not just a spiritual practice but a lifeline.

Why Does Prayer Sometimes Feel Like Wishful Thinking?

We often approach prayer with our own agenda, a list of wishes we hope God will fulfill. I remember my childhood prayer journal, where I’d record requests for things like a piano or bunk beds, and then note when those prayers were answered.

That prayer journal didn’t just have a list of children’s wishes. There were three columns beside each prayer—yes, maybe, and no. Dates were written down when the answers were given. We learned that God doesn’t always say yes, and often the answer is not yet. We learned contentment in those answers as we prayed together as a family.

But it was the prayer requests that weren’t written in that journal that stuck with me the most. We didn’t have much. My dad was in graduate school in Dallas, I was the oldest of four very young children and my mom stayed home to care for us. I remember the Sundays we would walk out to the car to be surprised by bags of food or clothes sitting in the backseat after church, or the day we’d open our front door and groceries were sitting there, or the Christmas that someone adopted us and our tree had so many presents underneath. What I remember was feeling loved and taken care of by people who loved God.

Prayer wasn’t a Santa Clause list. It was a slow building of trust between myself and God as He used the actions of believing adults to meet real needs. It was the beginning steps of my faith.

Psalm 37:4 says that he will give you the desires of your heart, but it comes after the phrase “take delight in the Lord.” When we truly delight in God, our desires change. Our prayers move from childish wishes for material things to deeper longings for peace and love that only God can bring.

When life feels chaotic and our minds race with worry, prayer calls us back to the present moment. It reminds us that while we cannot control tomorrow, we can experience God’s presence today.

What Is the Examen and How Can It Help With Daily Prayer?

One contemplative prayer practice that has helped me find this kind of grounding presence is the Examen. St. Ignatius of Loyola developed this spiritual practice in the 16th century. It helps us detect God’s presence in our daily lives and discern His direction.

How do you pray the Examen? The practice invites us to pause at the end of the day and prayerfully reflect on where God has been present—even in moments we might have missed. Unlike our tendency to either dwell in the past or anxiously anticipate the future, this daily prayer routine grounds us in what’s real: today’s lived experience with God.

I practice it simply:

Take a deep breath and remember that you are in God’s presence. “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).

Notice the gifts the day has brought—the sunrise, a kind word, a moment of laughter. When I was navigating the complexities of divorce, finding these moments of gratitude became my anchor.

Pay attention to what stirred within you today. Joy? Anxiety? Peace? Anger? Our emotions often signal where God is moving in our lives.

Choose something from the day that stands out. A conversation, an encounter, a decision. Bring it before God.

Ask for God’s light on tomorrow without falling into the trap of worry.

This spiritual practice doesn’t ask us to avoid difficult emotions or pretend everything is fine. It invites us to bring our whole selves—the messy, complicated reality of our lives—before God.

What Do You Do When God Doesn’t Answer Prayer the Way You Want?

When Jesus first heard that His friend Lazarus was sick, Scripture tells us He loved them and He waited. In Martha’s world—and in mine—”He waited” does not communicate love.

I remember sitting in a cold waiting room at St. Jude Children’s Hospital, wrapped in a blanket with my knees pulled to my chest, crying as my six-month-old daughter underwent tests for her rare cancer. A stranger approached me and asked if she could pray for me. Her simple prayer included asking for healing “if it was in God’s will.”

For a long time afterward, I resented those words. The idea that God’s will might not include healing my baby angered me because my vision was so limited. But through that dark season, I eventually discovered that God hadn’t abandoned me. He was sitting with me in my pain, weeping alongside me, just as Jesus wept at Lazarus’s tomb—even though He knew resurrection was coming.

How can prayer help with grief and disappointment? Prayer doesn’t always change our circumstances, but it always changes us. When we pray honestly, we open ourselves to transformation.

How Do You Pray When You’re Angry at God?

Prayer connects us to God and to one another. It’s the one place in life where we can be completely authentic. We cannot hide who we are with God. Prayer is where we can bring our anger, our doubts, our fear, and our joy.

Through the practice of the Examen, I’ve learned to be more honest with God and with myself. Instead of offering up polite prayers I think God wants to hear, I bring my whole heart—messy emotions and all.

When life presses in and anxiety threatens to overwhelm, I return to Psalm 46: “God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea.”

Can prayer really help with anxiety? True peace doesn’t come from avoiding our troubles or pretending they don’t exist. It comes from bringing them into God’s presence and discovering that He is there in the midst of them.

How Does Prayer Help You Stay Present Instead of Worrying?

Weekends and evenings used to fill up quickly during military deployments. My children and I would try to hide the ache of missing their father with gymnastics, martial arts, drama practices, church meetings, and countless playdates. It was easier to hide our pain than to rest in the promises of God’s comfort.

But when I’m honest, I know that the lonely empty nights still wait for me. Filling the emptiness only postpones the pain.

Truth is more powerful than denial.

God gives us the beautiful comfort of presence. We are never abandoned.

Prayer offers us not an escape from reality, but a way to fully experience our reality in God’s presence. Prayer helps us notice God’s presence even on our hardest days. It trains us to see with new eyes the countless ways God has been with us—in a stranger’s kindness, in a moment of unexpected beauty, in the strength to take the next breath when we thought we couldn’t.

How Can You Start a Daily Prayer Practice?

Whatever you’re facing today—whether it’s a mountain of joy or a valley of shadow—I invite you to pause and pray. Not as one more task on your to-do list, but as a gift to yourself, a moment to remember that you are not alone.

God is our refuge and strength, not because He removes all our troubles, but because He walks through them with us. When we pray, we acknowledge this reality and open ourselves to both giving and receiving grace.

Prayer is not a wish list or a magical formula, but a genuine connection with the Creator of the universe who knows us better than we know ourselves. And in that connection, we find not just comfort, but true and lasting peace.

So pray. Pray when you’re certain and when you doubt. Pray when you’re grateful and when you’re angry. Pray when you have the words and when you don’t. Prayer is the language of relationship with God, and like any relationship, it grows deeper with practice, honesty, and time.

A Prayer for Peace:

In those moments when my troubled heart seeks God’s peace, I’ve learned to pray simply: “Dear God, I bring my anxious thoughts to You, trusting that Christ Jesus offers a kind of peace the world cannot give. When difficult times threaten to overwhelm me, remind me that You are the Prince of Peace who brings perfect peace even in times of uncertainty. Holy Spirit, help me find inner peace not through my own strength, but through the power of prayer and the promise of eternal life in Jesus’ name. Make me an instrument of your peace in my daily life, that others might see Your light of God shining through even my past hurts and chronic difficulties. Almighty God, I trust that Your supernatural peace will guard my heart and mind, for You are my Lord of Peace in every time of need.”