by Nada-Yolanda
In all of my channelings since 1958 and, in fact, in all truth teachings and scriptures, there are certain basic principles given about proper prayer techniques and correct requests for material manifestations. In summary, they say that sincere and fruitful prayer requires the following steps and realizations:
1. Eliminate all negativity. You must 
have no resentments and no thoughts of malice, injustice, confusion, criticism or any negative quality. Unless you can remove all negativity, you do not allow the other person to change and it boomerangs back to your own affairs.
2. No one can do the work for you. No teacher, master or guru can do the cleansing and speak your prayers for you. You have to learn to do the work yourself, painful step by painful step, until you are cleansed and purified.
3. No condition is unchangeable. Everything that exists is in a state of change, on its way to becoming something else. This is the fluidity of free will. Allow the freedom for Spirit’s will to be done through you and through those for whom you pray.
4. Spirit’s will be done. No matter what the condition, no matter how ugly or perverse or evil, ask first that good be done in God’s name, for God’s glory, according to God’s divine plan in all beings. Nothing can be accomplished if God does not accomplish it. He is in you, you are in Him. That which you do is done with His aid. The evil that you do — the wrong thinking and the unrighteous acts — is because you have distorted what He intends, what He wills.
5. Timing of a demonstration is Spirit’s only. You cannot ask for a specific time or way for a demonstration to manifest. That prerogative belongs to God alone, who is in all things equally. You from the mortal, or even from the highest spiritual or total cosmic consciousness, cannot know all things that God alone knows. Therefore, release the methods and the time by which proper manifestation is to be.
6. Pray as an instrument of the Divine. Prayer is the essence of all knowledge and humility that we are only instruments of God. Be humble agents of the greater power. Recognize each of us receives but a part of the total power and knowledge. But it is essential to realize we are a focus through which God’s energy and power can be channeled toward error situations and relationships. Step aside from any personal desire, no matter how justified, and let the power of God flow unimpeded through your hearts and minds.
7. Where two are gathered in Spirit’s name, there I Am. Essentially this means where you are one in conscious and subconscious aspects of yourself when you pray and decree, there is the I Am Self, that part of you connected with the divine in all creations.
8. Do not waver. You cannot visualize, pray, decree for a thing and then reexamine all the errors of the condition, condemn the pain or the distortion, feel pity for yourself and others. Once you have asked, know you have received the answer even though you do not know the way it will be done or the time it will take to complete.
9. Demonstrate yourself whatever you pray for in others or in the world. Don’t expect others, no matter who they are or how evolved they claim to be, to express certain qualities of mind, body or soul that you are not willing to work toward and to envision for yourself and your affairs. Don’t be a hypocrite. Do and be what you expect others to do and to be. That is the I am that I Am.
ASK & RECEIVE
In a private conclave at Mark-Age headquarters on January 30, 1974, Sananda channeled these thoughts through me as Nada for the forthcoming I Am Nation. Here is the essence of his guidance:
“Ask and you shall receive. This means all things that are needed for the externalization of the Hierarchal Board on Earth must be asked for by the staff representing the spiritual 
government of our solar system.
“Do not be ashamed to ask for anything. That is your privilege. It is your absolute right and obligation to the Hierarchy to ask Spirit for everything that is needed at this particular point in order to do the job as you see it needs to be done.
“However, this is our caution to you and the qualification of this instruction. Recognize that asking for foolish things, or asking for things that are not absolutely required, will not be advantageous. For Spirit knows what you need before you ask for it. However, it still is required that you ask consciously for everything necessary to fulfill your functions as Hierarchal Board representatives on Earth.
“Proceed with great discernment and discrimination. Do not be afraid to ask specifically for each physical, mental or emotional quality required to perform your specific roles and missions, as well as for the unit’s functioning in the New Age.
“Do not ask for things you cannot use immediately or if you do not know what you will do with them, just for the sake of having them or the glory of showing them off to others. This immediately would disqualify you from the privilege that now has been given to you through hard lessons, great deprivations, spiritual cleansings of the soul.
“Understand this also. According to the highest cosmic principles you should ask only for that which you can utilize properly for the greatest good, for the greatest number of individuals, and for your own abilities to carry out your functions in the best and highest manner possible on Earth at this time.
“Modesty is foolish when it comes to this level of development. Use this as a parable or a symbol. If you recognize that you need a high-powered engine, such as a tractor, in order to complete a certain physical function, but you try to be overly modest and humble and ask for a tiny automobile to do that difficult task, feeling Spirit would honor you more by your humility and self-sacrifice, this is stupid because it is impossible to do a tractor’s job with a tiny auto engine.
“Ask bravely, firmly, strongly for what is needed; not what you think in your mortal mind is a nice, left-handed way to reach God, our Father. In dealing with God or Divine Energy, you are not dealing with another human being whom you can cajole, flatter, outwit. Spirit or God knows you beyond your own realization of the mortal self and knows what you really need to fulfill Its desires for your existence. Spirit or God has the power to give and to serve each of Its parts fully — without depriving any other part of Itself in any conceivable way — and according to that individual’s proper place in the whole kingdom of God’s creation.”
Excerpted from University of Life course Teacher-Student Relationships, published in 1980 (out of print, but available in audio recording as a 2-CD set; please click here for information to send for our catalog).
Photos: (1) Nada-Yolanda, 1997, Mark-Age Archives. (2) Christ at Prayer by Carlo Parisi.