Don't feel like a bad person...
Prayer is a complicated thing, though albeit, essential to the fruitful spiritual life. It isn't about manipulating God into doing your will, but it is about nurturing a spirit of openess to God's will.
Prayer does not only involve our petitions to God, but it is "the raising of one's mind and heart to God... when we pray, do we speak from the height of our pride and will, or "out of the depths" of a humble and contrite heart? Humility is the foundation of prayer, Only when we humbly acknowledge that "we do not know how to pray as we ought," are we ready to receive freely the gift of prayer. "Man is a beggar before God."
The supreme model of prayer was given to us by Christ himself as the "Our Father". This prayer involves all types of prayer. It directs us as a community united and upwards (Our Father who art in Heaven) It anticipates the coming of God's Kingdom (Thy Kingdom Come), it invokes a spirit of openness to the Father's will (thy will be done) it seeks to bring Heaven to earth (the Incarnation principle, may it be on earth as it is in Heaven, may God rule supremely on earth as he does in Heaven). It petitions God for our basic needs (Give us our daily bread) but it also recalls the supreme sacrifice of Christ himself who has given himself so fully to us that he is our daily bread and spiritual food. It is a prayer of contrition, (Forgive us our trespasses) Man is humbled before God, acknowleding his sinfullness and asking for forgiveness. Yet it unites man to his brothers and sisters (as we forgive those who have trespassed against us) The mercy of God is to pass through us and shape our spirit in the image of his mercy. Our forgiveness is tied up with how we treat others. Lastly this prayer asks for God's guidance and light (lead us not in temptation) and it cries out to God like the Israelites in bondage, (but deliver us from evil!) recalling the salvation cycle of Israelite sacred history perfected in Christ's Cross.
As you can see, prayer is not just about petitions to God to heal people, but it involves and synthesisizes the whole of the Christian life. At the same time, it is the foundation of it.
"prayer is a surge of the heart; it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and love, embracing both trial and joy" -St. Therese of Lisieux
I would suggest starting your prayers with the Our Father, echoing the very words of Jesus to our Father in Heaven. Remember that prayer is a participation in the Trinitarian life of God. When we pray, we do so through Christ, using the words he gave us, to the Father he has reconciled us with. When we pray, we are doing so in the power of the Holy Spirit who is "the master of the interior life" and who is poured out upon us like oil as the sign of the Father and the Son's beloved unity.
2563 The heart is the dwelling-place where I am, where I live; according to the Semitic or Biblical expression, the heart is the place "to which I withdraw." The heart is our hidden center, beyond the grasp of our reason and of others; only the Spirit of God can fathom the human heart and know it fully. The heart is the place of decision, deeper than our psychic drives. It is the place of truth, where we choose life or death. It is the place of encounter, because as image of God we live in relation: it is the place of covenant.
2564 Christian prayer is a covenant relationship between God and man in Christ. It is the action of God and of man, springing forth from both the Holy Spirit and ourselves, wholly directed to the Father, in union with the human will of the Son of God made man. [/i]
Prayer as communion
2565 In the New Covenant, prayer is the living relationship of the children of God with their Father who is good beyond measure, with his Son Jesus Christ and with the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Kingdom is "the union of the entire holy and royal Trinity . . . with the whole human spirit."12 Thus, the life of prayer is the habit of being in the presence of the thrice-holy God and in communion with him. This communion of life is always possible because, through Baptism, we have already been united with Christ.13 Prayer is Christian insofar as it is communion with Christ and extends throughout the Church, which is his Body. Its dimensions are those of Christ's love.14