Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers

Summary: The author’s account of what it is for her to pray and three types of prayer that, for her, describe what it means to pray.

Anne Lamott hit bottom in her own life, struggling with alcoholism and drug abuse, and out of this came to faith as a Christian. And she began writing about it in her unpretentious, “this is who I am and my best shot at explaining what I’ve come to understand and what God still hasn’t made sense out of.” In this book, she does that with prayer and, along the way, narrating her own experiences in prayer. All of it is free of spiritual jargon, evident in her title summarizing what she thinks are three essential prayers in three words. Help. Thanks. Wow.

Help. Help is the prayer when you hit rock show more bottom and know that all your efforts to run life or fix someone else’s just aren’t working. It is the prayer when we are mired in broken relationships, debt, or a scary medical diagnosis. It is praying that God will help others facing the same kinds of stuff, or just trying to make it through life. It is the prayer of her grandfather, a missionary. She writes, “if one person is praying for you, buckle up. Things can happen.” (I know this. I had a grandmother who prayed like that for me.). She writes that the beginning place for this kind of prayer is “admitting the three most terrible truths of our existence: that we are so ruined, and so loved, and in charge of so little.” She shares her own “help” prayers and talks about the miracle of when we reach the place where our hearts shift and we surrender, which leads to…

Thanks. For Lamott, this is short form for “thankyouthankyouthankyou.” It can be everything from ten minutes free of obsessive thoughts to a good day of work to a season of good health. Sometimes it is a glimpse of “the beautiful skies, above all the crap we’re wallowing in, and we whisper, ‘Thank you.’ ” Thanks, Lamott proposes flows into our behavior–serving or at least not “being such a jerk.” Serving others is where joy comes, an awareness that God is having a good time watching us do this. Sin in this regard is the hard, ungrateful heart. We can’t change it–we can only give it to God to change. And those moments when grace leads to gratitude reveal the changes God is working. Thanks.

Wow. It’s the gasping response to something of incredible wonder or terror. Sometimes it is the response to climbing between clean sheets that feel so good on us. There are so many wonders for her from dinosaurs to the cosmos to boys to Monopoly and Sylvia Plath. She believes “spring is the main reason for Wow.” It is the extravagance of a God who “keeps giving, forgiving, and inviting us back. And it is blackberries eaten slowly.

Amen. This chapter sums up her thoughts on prayer and discusses the place of “Amen” in her prayers. She concludes:

“Let it happen! Yes! I could not agree more.Huzzah. It is a good response to making contact with God through prayer, and to praying with people who share the journey, and to most things that are good, which much of life can be. So it is, when we do the best we can, and we leave the results in God’s good hands. Amen.”

There is so much good in this account of prayer, a life of prayer woven into all of life, into all the moments of help, thanks, and wow, in which we become aware of both our desperate need of God and God’s utterly extravagant care. All of this comes in Anne’s self-deprecating demeanor (she suggests that “Help me not to be such an ass!” might be a fourth great prayer). She likes a version of the Serenity Prayer that prays, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the weaponry to make the difference.” As with so much of Lamott, you laugh at one moment and catch your breath at a bracing insight the next. If you want to learn to pray but have been put off with books that just seem more spiritual than you ever hope you can be, Lamott may be the place to start. “Help, Thanks, and Wow. Amen” seems a pretty good place to begin. show less

I'm so glad a writing professor fifteen years ago made me read "Bird by Bird," because from the first page, I became a Lamott fangirl. Her writing alone is so clear, but as an added bonus, the content is inspiring and instructive. No matter where you fall on any faith spectrum, her approach to faith is accessible and non-confrontational. Love her. Loved this book. Some great insights--I know that when I read Lamott I need a pencil in hand, because I'm going to be underlining and writing notes in the margins. This was no different.

Although it was a little bit rambly (but isn't that part of Anne Lamott's charm?), I thought this was a good book. Lamott delves into a proposition from an earlier book that the only two prayers you really need are "Help me help me help me" and "Thank you thank you thank you." She expands on those two and adds a third essential prayer: "Wow."

One of my favorite things about Lamott's writing is that she engages heavy topics with a sort of fizzy spunk and wit, allowing her to land her colloquially-phrased insights right in your lap without you feeling like you just sat through a sermon or a philosophy class. It's like enjoying a cup of hot chocolate with a hilarious and worldly-wise aunt.

I've loved all Anne Lamott's non-fiction that I've show more read, and this is no exception. It may not take its place on my shelf next to Bird by Bird or Traveling Mercies, but I'll probably end up buying a copy to keep. show less

Finished Anne Lamott’s “Help Thanks Wow: The Three Essential Prayers” today. A small yet powerful book, may well be the best book on prayer that I’ve ever read. Just open oneself up to the great mystery, she says, unclench, loosen the death-grip the fingers have and let light in, let air and space in, let joy in. At a not so small least – just get through what you have to get through with some chance at hope, some chance at kindness. I’m all for people being kind to me; I have a much harder time being kind to others. Something always goes wrong, somehow it always leads to aggravation and frustration. Reading Anne Lamott is joy,because as much as I know, I am quite absolutely sure she is a nicer person than me or at least show more able to make conversation with people which I just completely fail at, as much as I know that is true, she doesn’t write as if that were true. She writes as if she’s just a normal sort of selfish person with flashes of light, flashes of hope, little moments. It gives me tremendous hope. Thank you God for Anne Lamott and her deep rich luminous writing. show less

An excellent little book on why people should personally approach prayer even if they don't know how to, or even if they aren't sure about what God is like. This book is 102 pages long which is manageable. It could read in an hour which is perfect in terms of time commitment for anyone averse to spending any time on a topic they are trying to avoid anyway. Lamott is a clever writer and sprinkles lots of Northern California observations throughout the pages. Lamott is a writer by trade but this subject is one she has spent lots of time thinking and writing about. She is not a syncretist but she has no qualms about taking the words of Rumi or Jesuit Fr Greg Boyle or Judge Judy and using them to help the reader to pray better or to try at show more all. The writing style is elevated however the matter a hand is kept to basic levels. The book requires some life experience because Lamott assumes you know what human tragedy looks like in hindsight. Lamott says her form of prayer takes three shapes. Help, Thanks, and Wow. She ends with Amen but that just shows she is now ready for a new round of asking God for help. She says prayer must be simple and so she has come up with this easy way to direct our minds and hearts to God. I'm very happy I read this book. Lamott is Presbyterian. She says she grew up not believing anything at home stemming from her parents absence of religious practice. show less

I read [b:Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith|10890|Traveling Mercies Some Thoughts on Faith|Anne Lamott|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320444231s/10890.jpg|14837] about ten years ago and decided that while Anne Lamott may be a very high-maintenance person in the flesh, she writes so well it really doesn't matter. Many of her nonfiction works have taken turns on my nightstand. Reading this slim volume feels like picking up the conversation with an old acquaintance. Anne doesn't pose as an expert on prayer but opens her own sweet, paranoid heart and spills out what she's learned and witnessed. While this is vintage Anne, by page 49 I wondered if this personal approach (and slightly gloomy tone) could work. After all, I think of show more prayer as akin to making love -- so mystical, intimate, and individual that I don't say a lot about it in casual conversation. My attention flagged a bit, wondering if Anne had anything to say to me regarding how each person communicates with the divine.

Then i turned the page and read, "But if you've been around for a while, you know that much of the time, if you are patient and paying attention, you will see that God will restore what the locust have taken away." boom. "restore what the locust have taken away." I roll this notion over and over in my heart like a spiritual talisman; I have for the past few years. Perhaps because I've "been around for a while" now, and realize that only God can make all of this come out right and I really really really want, need, trust-because-there's-no-other-option God will. With this sense of connection, I'll keep reading.

By a Saturday evening fire I finished reading Anne's thoughts on prayer. I still love her curmudgeonly self-deprecating voice and found comfort in this as well as her continuing faith journey when most established writers steer clear of the topic in personal terms. (Albiet, "spirituality" is fast rising as the hip subject for more emerging writers and media gurus than you could swing a cat at.) show less

Many thanks to Terri (Tymos) for pointing me toward this book. Small in pages, large in content, Lamott finally is off her political high horse. I gave up on reading her books primarily because I didn't want to have her political views be thrown surprisingly in my face when the titles did not indicate that political content would be smattered throughout.

This is a lovely book about prayer. She lists three primary reasons, or times when we seek prayer. Help -- when we are at our wits end and simply literally need help, either for ourselves or others. Thanks -- when we thank God for blessings, or maybe simply to say, thank you I am alive and my life is good today. Wow -- reserved for times when we are overwhelmed with the sheer beauty of show more nature, a person, a situation and or life.

I enjoyed this book tremendously. It wasn't preachy. It was well written, chocked full of wisdom and resonated with me at the current time in my life. show less