Guest post by Kelly O'Dell Stanley

Praying Upside Down: A Creative Prayer Experience to Transform Your Time with God was inspired by the concept of an artist turning an image upside down to copy it and having better results because of the left brain/right brain thing—when an image is upside down, our mind stops trying to define and prejudge it and we see what's really there. 

When my husband and I owned two houses for two years and couldn't find a buyer for the old house, I started praying for the woman (who was then unknown) who would eventually buy my house. Praying "upside down" changed everything for me. It allowed me to hold on and stop focusing on myself, realizing that selling my house was just one part of a bigger plan. 


Before long, I realized that nearly everything I knew about art also applied to prayer—and those ideas eventually became this book. Each chapter tells stories connected to different artistic concepts (like perspective, contour drawing, minimalism, realism, sketching, and white space) and relates them to prayer. At its simplest level, it's about opening your eyes to notice God where you might have missed Him before because you didn't know to look. Like art, faith is all about learning to see. 

Won’t you join me as we explore prayer together? Because there’s always something more to learn. If we’ll just open our eyes to see. 

BIO: Kelly O’Dell Stanley is a graphic designer, writer, and author of the new book, Praying Upside Down, which releases today. With more than two decades of experience in advertising, three kids ranging from 21 to 14, and a husband of 24 years, she’s learned to look at life in unconventional ways—sometimes even upside down. Full of doubt and full of faith, she constantly seeks new ways to see what’s happening all around her. Subscribe to her blog (www.prayingupsidedown.com) to download her free ebook, Praying in Full Color, along with this month’s prayer prompt calendar to jump-start your prayer life. 

Purchase links: 
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