Do we pray less than we think?

How many times have you said to someone, with the best of intentions, "I will pray for you", and never got around to doing it?
How many times have you even said "I am praying for you", genuinely believing that you've been praying for them, and then found yourself wondering afterwards whether you have in fact prayed for them at all?
How many times have you set aside a time to pray, and having reached the end of that time, realised that you spent only a very small portion of the time actually praying.
If you're anything like me, it happens too often. If we were to examine ourselves honestly, most of us would probably find that we pray a lot less than we think we do. We might not deliberately fool people about the extent of our prayer life, but we can all too easily fool ourselves.
The Apostle Paul starts his letter to the Philippians with a pretty big claim about his prayers for them: "I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy". (Phil 1:3,4)
But how do we know Paul really does pray like he says? The answer to that question comes in verses 9, 10 and 11, where Paul tells them what he is praying for them, and actually writes out for them the words of his prayer. And so they can be in no doubt that Paul really, truly has prayed for them.
At a church I used to go to, there was an older lady – a wonderful saint – who sometimes, while we were discussing something over a cuppa after church, would stop and say, "why don't we pray about that right now, because if I don't, I'll forget."
I must admit to my shame that there were times when I felt a bit awkward doing that – standing there praying while surrounded by people chatting over morning tea. But at least I had absolutely no doubt that she was praying. And also, it gave her a lot of credibility when she would ask me from time to time how something was going, and would say to me, "I've been praying for you."
Maybe we can all learn from Paul's example – telling someone you're praying for them is good. Actually spelling out for them the content of your prayer, either in the text of a letter or verbally as you pray with them, is even better.