I wonder how differently we'd tread this sacred earth today if our praying taught us to do this:

"Not to run from one thought to the next, says Theophane the Recluse, but to give each one time to settle in the heart."

From Thomas Merton's journals

How would you treat the clerk at the grocery store?  Your child at the dinner table?  Your spouse?  Balancing the check book, paying bills online? Driving?  Talking with a friend?  Arguing with a foe?

Our distraction, the scatter of our thoughts, our inability to concentrate, our hurry and worry . . . all this is a great enemy of good living, of spiritual awareness, of holiness.