Editor’s note: We continue our series exploring each of the steps of the Examen. We’re using the Examen version from Jim Manney’s book, A Simple, Life-Changing Prayer. We’ll look at a different step each week.
3. Review the day.
In all my years of Catholic education, no one ever told me prayer could be getting a bowl of popcorn and watching a film in which I am the main character. That is often what the third step of the Examen feels like to me. But while I am the main character, I am not the director.
Reviewing my day in prayer requires me to take out my calendar from the previous day. Without doing so, I have already forgotten much of what was so important yesterday that had to be written down in advance. How quickly priorities and desires change. Sitting in a sacred space (the theater of prayer), my Walking Partner (my image of Christ) and I sit back to enjoy the show and a colloquy.
The film begins with the opening scene of my earliest hours. From this perspective, I am not the one under panic from missing an alarm. I am the observer, watching the scene from a place of calm, knowing full well, in retrospect, that panic could have been avoided and did not serve me well going into the next scene. Without judgment, God doesn’t even have to ask what is revealed. I see it for myself.
Hour by hour, the calendar reminds me what I did (or meant to do): the mundane tasks, the boxes checked, the unexpected reunion. But the emotions within tell the real story. In this theater of prayer, I feel the day. I cringe noticing how I responded to others when my patience was low. I smile at moments of connection with others, now wanting to hold them forever in my heart when, at the time, I brushed past them too quickly to the next to-do on my list.
The Director slows the frames and sometimes zooms in to focus on other characters that I completely missed at the time. I see my husband making dinner for me and hear the angst in another’s voice begging me to return a phone call. I don’t always know why a person or interaction comes to the screen in my mind. Perhaps in time I will.
Rather than “Cut!” the Director yells, “Notice!” It is not judgment of me but validation of the reality of my life. “Notice how kind that person was.” “Notice what that felt like.” “Notice your energy.”
The Director adds the soundtrack. The symphony plays “Flight of the Bumblebee” as I dash from one scene to the next. I listen to the peaceful piano while walking with my husband hand-in-hand, and I hear the vaudeville follies when my schemes don’t pan out.
But while I notice new insights as I watch this movie of my day, I also notice what is being elicited in the act of recalling itself. Sometimes, it feels awkward, like hearing my own voice on a recording. Do I sound like that? Did I treat others like that? What more do I want? What do I wish I could do differently? In that honest, sacred theater, sitting with my Walking Partner, I am the most fulfilled. There I am the person my heart longs to be.
And the credits roll. I imagine the names and faces of all those who played starring roles in my day. Special effects, lighting, props, cinematography, and narration are all by God. Although I have sat in this sacred-space theater thousands of times, the show never gets old. Every day is a new blockbuster. My gratitude is palpable. How beautifully that story was told. A typical day becomes a timeless tale.
