a friend asked

"But to whom do you pray?"

that's not an easy question for me to answer successfully.

it requires careful use of language from me to avoid being misunderstood.

I could just say "God" but what I mean when I say "God" seems to be very different from what many people who use that word mean.

part of why it's difficult is that God is not a "whom" in my experience, not a person.

(so the question feels like it may carry implicit assumptions which I do not share)

there are gods, angels, spirits I pray with or perhaps through and as a shorthand it might seem as if I am praying to these beings, but they are present as masks of God. (or perhaps of me? epiphenomena of my presence in the world? of perception? emergent interfaces?)

I think there can be danger of becoming confused about this, forgetting that the messenger is not the correspondent, of becoming mistakenly certain of a concrete god.

but I am not confused.

an important thing about prayer to me is that it is as much about the effects on me as it is about any content of the message or its effects on the World.

I have the sense that prayer is like an asana -- the changes necessary to assume the physical, mental, and spiritual posture for prayer have already accomplished much of what prayer is for, before I speak.