Lessons from St. Ignatius of Loyola

July 31: The Feast Day of St. Ignatius of Loyola - Introducing The Five-Step Ignatian Examen: Part 1

Jul 30, 2026

St. Ignatius of Loyola, by Peter Paul Rubens

By: Fr. Henk Van Meijel, SJ ©

The Examen: Part 1

The Examen is a spiritual practice developed by Saint Ignatius of Loyola to help us become more aware of God’s presence in our daily lives. It is not just a method, but an attitude, a way of reviewing our day with gratitude, insight and hope.

The five steps are:

Ask God for light. Invite God to be with you and to help you see the day through his eyes.
Give thanks. Express gratitude for the gifts and blessings of the day.
Review the day. Reflect on your interactions and emotions throughout the day.
Face your shortcomings. Acknowledge where you fell short and seek growth.
Look toward the day to come. Consider how you will respond to God’s love tomorrow.

Ask God for Light

Actually, I don’t like the word spiritual direction at all, because it spiritual guidance might be better.

Spiritual direction indicates that I’m going to tell you what you should do and how you should pray, but spiritual guidance is that the director listens to the “directee” and listens to where the Holy Spirit is moving, and out of that, the spiritual director can ask questions but never suggest what the directee should do.

In step one: Ask God for light.

It is very important to to relax, to place ourselves before God, and to put all worldly thoughts aside and to stay calm - to find maybe a spot in our homes, in a place where we can feel calm and quiet.

We need to shut off the cell phone or a TV or radio, and just be silent, where we can sit in the presence of God. You might want to imagine God sitting right beside you, or God looking at you with loving eyes.

Or, you might imagine that Jesus is sitting beside you or looking at you - He is a God who loves you for who you are, and a God who wants to just love you.

And this is very important: to just take a few moments to sit back and feel the quiet in our hearts, for there to be no distractions, to feel comfortable.

I know of someone who was abused by her father and abused by her mother, and the only comfort she could get, was something pink and fluffy. And that’s quite right with God.

So we have to choose an image of God which is loving, and one we feel comfortable with it - one that speaks to the heart.

Give Thanks

In step two: we give thanks to God

Maybe we have an image we saw before, perhaps one of those images that give us comfort. We also need to just be grateful that:

We woke up this morning,
We were able to get dressed,
We have enough food to eat,
If we live in a nursing or retirement home and need help, that it has people to assist us and to give thanks for them.
We have family members or friends, people like you and me, who are doing our best.

And it might be very helpful to do some “journaling”. We could write down possibly three things, only three things. Specifically, what we can give thanks for.

Of course, I invite you to do a whole lot more to maybe even make a list of all the things we are thankful for.

But there’s so much to be thankful for in our lives, and as we live in gratitude and thanksgiving for all we have received, we prepare ourselves for steps, three, four and five!