Meditation Makes Better Mormons

We often try to spiritually ground ourselves with daily prayer and scripture study. However, our commitment to these practices is sometimes irregular at best. During prayer, it’s natural for our minds to wander; when reading the scriptures, our attention often drifts to what we’re going to do next. Not surprisingly, it’s easy to feel spiritually empty and apathetic.

Faced with these problems, an important breakthrough for me came as I began practicing the art of meditation. Latter-day Saints often use the word “meditate” to mean something like “ponder.” But the type of meditation I discovered indicates a more intentional approach to bringing stillness and focus to our distracted minds. It is this purposeful cultivation of inner peace and quietude that, I believe, President McKay referred to when he said, “Meditation is the language of the soul. . . . [It] is one of the most secret, most sacred doors through which we pass into the presence of the Lord.”