Summary

In the prelude to the Penguin edition of the guidebook and memoir, author Anne Lamott introduces her idea that prayer should be kept simple. Three main types of prayers, she writes, are simply “help,” “thanks,” and “wow.” Lamott spends the rest of this prelude discussing what she believes prayer is. She says that prayer is private communication from the heart to a higher force. While she refers to this higher power as God, she argues the supplicant should not get caught up in what they call this higher power or what they think this higher power is. She describes how many were taught to pray by their parents at bedtime by reciting the traditional “Now I lay me down to sleep.” She remembers being scared when she first heard this prayer because of the reference to taking her soul.

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