“Why should I pray? Basically it is for the sake of praying. There is much else we might claim about prayer–it is for the sake of the world, it is for those in need, for the Church, for individual souls–all of which is true. But unless it is rooted in the boundless freedom of love and confidence in God, it is void and crippled. It has some effect perhaps, but lacks the current of grace and graciousness that flows from God.”

Quenon, Paul. In Praise of the Useless Life: a Monk’s Memoir. Notre Dame, IN: Ave Maria Press, 2018, p. 5.

My note when I read this in Quenon’s book: We pray well when we are simply praying. It’s one of the things believers do. We don’t do it to get stuff (although that may be the result, or a result). We don’t do it because we are forced to, required to. We pray in order to be praying.