There’s no magic formula to prayer. Its just a conversation between you and God. He wants your openness, your vulnerability, your mess and your fears.
Why do we feel we have to fix ourselves or have just the right words to talk to him. He loves us and he wants to talk to us and to help us.
If we have to be all cleaned up just to talk to him. Then why did Jesus sacrifice himself for us? If we could achieve perfection then his sacrifice was in vain. So why do we keep thinking we have to achieve it before we can talk to him.
God is our heavenly father and like any good father, he wants to be there for us even when we are at our worst, in fact especially then. That’s when we should depend on him the most, when we are at our worst. Because he is the one that can make it better, he can heal the hurts and the pain, and he has already forgiven us.
We need stop trying to be perfect first and let him perfect us instead.