Examen of Consciousness

This practice was developed by Ignatius of Loyola and is often called The Daily Examen,  Examen, or Prayer of Examen. It can be applied in many situations, but most commonly, it is used in the evening to review one’s day. 

It is important to note that this is an Examen of Consciousness rather than an Examen of Conscience. An Examen of Conscience carries a moral overtone of looking for good or bad, right and wrong. The Examen of Consciousness is more related to discernment where it is an invitation to look over one’s day in the Presence of God in order to discern how God was involved. It can be a powerful way to bring your day to a close as you highlight your experience of God .

There are several forms of this practice from very simple and brief to more elaborate. One of my favorites follows:

At the end of the day, we often find ourselves mulling over events and experiences. This short prayer exercise builds on that natural tendency to play back the day. But most importantly, instead of making our own analysis and judgments, we ask GOD to SHOW US how God has been at work in the details, the moods and the feelings of the day. It need only take ten to fifteen minutes.

1.  Pray for Light. Since we are not simply day-dreaming or reminiscing, but rather looking for some sense of how the Spirit of God is leading us, it only makes sense to pray for some illumination. The goal is not simply memory, but graced understanding.

2.  Review the day in thanksgiving. Note how different this is from looking immediately for your sins. Nobody likes to poke around in their memory to uncover their smallness, their weakness, their lack of generosity. But everybody likes to fondle beautiful gifts. And that is precisely what the past twenty-four hours contains,gifts: existence, work, relationships, food, challenges. And gratitude is the foundation of our whole relationship with God. So use whatever cues help you o walk through the past twenty-four hours, from hour to hour, place to place, task to task, person to person, thanking the Lord for every gift you encounter.

3.  Review the feelings that surface in the replay of the day. Our feelings, positive and negative, the painful and the pleasing, are clear signals of where the action was during the day. Simply pay attention to any and all of those feelings as they surface — the whole range: delight, boredom, fear, anticipation, resentment, anger, peace, contentment, impatience, desire, hope, regret, shame, uncertainty, compassion, disgust, gratitude, pride, rage, doubt, confidence, admiration, shyness — whatever was there. Some of us may be hesitant to focus on our feelings in this over-psychological age, but these feelings are the liveliest index to what is happening in our lives, which leads to the fourth movement…

4.  Choose one of those feelings (positive or negative) and pray from it. That is, choose the remembered feeling that most caught your attention. The feeling is a sign that something important was going on. Now simply express spontaneously the prayer that surfaces as you attend to the source of the feeling — praise, petition, contrition, cry for help or healing, whatever.

5.  Look toward tomorrow. Using your appointment calendar, if that helps, face your immediate future. What feelings surface as you look at the tasks, meetings and appointments that face you? Fear? Delighted anticipation? Self-doubt? Temptation to procrastinate?Zestful planning? Regret? weakness?> Whatever it ism turn it into prayer — for help, for healing, whatever comes spontaneously. To round off the Examen, pray the Lord’s Prayer.

–Dennis Hamm, S.J.