Romans 8:25-26–But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought,but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.I’ve come to appreciate praying for other people because they have given me details for what to pray for.  So its something I don’t have to figure out, it is “ready-made” to deal with.  But I find that my own prayer life sometimes is more difficult.  Not the things that are more obvious, like repenting, but things that involve direction and purpose…
There have been numerous times where I thought I had prayed about a situation, invested, and acted upon it, yet it wasn’t God’s will for it to happen.  To have that happen numerous times made me pause and ask myself, “what is it that is causing me to pray, and go after something God obviously is not permitting?”  
But I think that was the point God wanted me to come to in my prayer life, that I don’t know what to pray for in such instances.  Because I had been “praying” and acting impatiently on what I wanted God to do for me, instead of patiently enduring what He wanted me to continue doing for Him…
Like a GPS, which maybe a poor analogy for how God speaks to us about direction.  But the GPS only says something when we need to make a turn, otherwise it is quiet regarding any direction we are to go, so we just keep going straight ahead.  Much like the children of Israel in the wilderness, they stayed there until God said, “that’s enough.”  (Deuteronomy 1:1-6)
Many times prayer for an answer on anything from God, takes a patience we generally run out of, and begin to do things in our own mind and strength.  In the times we don’t know what to pray for regarding a situation, find time to be “still” and seek God for what He may be revealing.  If He doesn’t reveal anything different, than keep doing what He has called you to do.  You come to realize that the Spirit is working God’s will out, even though we don’t know how He is doing it.

In His Love, Ld