Most things are awkward at the start.  Prayer is no different.  You were made for prayer, for your life to become prayer, but in almost all of us, those muscle are atrophied. Prayer is not any sort of practice of thinking – positive or negative.  Prayer is relating.  Relating to

“Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong. Do not be quick with your mouth, do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God.