It isn't as much as a conflict as at first comparison that it has seemed. When we pray we are to believe it has already been received. This is holding the vision of the desire, then being grateful for it. This being grateful is hence followed by a feeling and sense of being at ease and comfort because you know that as it is written that even before you pray your prayer is already heard and being addressed.

That is the faith part that comes next, that relaxed feeling that everything is cool, you have prayed and God is handling it now.

Once given to God it is his and no longer your worry. So this is holding the vision, focusing on it then letting it go and being grateful and finally relaxing and knowing it is coming and you don't need to think about it anymore.

That is very similar to LOA modus operandi.

When you go into details, it sounds like different directions to focus upon. The more general you go, the more it is one direction: to feel better.

Look at this Focus delight: it is quite general, and you can work in it with your whole life, as well as with some particular issue.

It can look to him as if his question at hand is to improve his life conditions. It's okay, we all went into this trap with Law of Attraction. It doesn't really work this way.

The real task at hand is to find a better feeling perception for his life conditions right now (change in the conditions will then be a nice bonus, and it will actually work, but it cannot be a goal), and Cristianity could be of help here, too.

how to focus? put you attention on the point in front of you that is not there. observe and keep watch. desire should fall away since they will not make you happy.

in your example of the man in prison and people in power making a living hell for the prisoner they act out of their desire and darkness it does not serve them it does not serve the prisoner also. you see what they do to other to get their desire will eventually be done to them also. also the prisoner stuck between 4 wall in is cell alone should use that time to meditate once he know himself he will know other also. it takes more then 40 days. born of water and spirit he will become like the wind.

The wind blows wherever it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbBmpaDBizA

Buddha also talked about the five hindrance.

In order to overcome the hindrance of sensory desire (kamacchanda), the meditator must first apply mindfulness and recognize that the hindrance is present.[4][web 8] Then one must look at the hindrance, analyze it, make it the object of our meditation, experience it fully. The meditator can then apply specific techniques such as contemplating the impermanence of the pleasant desire.[web 8]

Ajahn Brahmavamso emphasizes the technique of letting go of concern for the body and the five senses completely; he states:web 2] In meditation, one transcends sensory desire for the period by letting go of concern for this body and its five sense activity. Some imagine that the five senses are there to serve and protect the body, but the truth is that the body is there to serve the five senses as they play in the world ever seeking delight. Indeed, the Lord Buddha once said, "The five senses ARE the world" and to leave the world, to enjoy the other worldly bliss of Jhana, one must give up for a time ALL concern for the body and its five senses

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_hindrances

many religion are made after men that told the truth using different word or analogy all referring to similar experience.

in this world of division because of darkness(ignorance, desire ,ego, fear, unbalance) that cause division in the heart and the mind always going in to extreme to the left or to the right, above or below.

Jesus saw some children who were taking the breast: he said to his disciples: "These little ones who suck are like those who enter the Kingdom." They said to him: "If we are little, shall we enter the Kingdom?" Jesus says to them: "When you make the two <become> one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the upper like the lower! And if you make the male and female one, so that the male is no longer male and the female no longer female, and when you put eyes in the place of an eye, and a hand in the place of a hand, and a foot in the place of a foot, and an image in the place of an image, then you will enter [the Kingdom!"

http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/gthlamb.html

According to you what is the difference between a prisoner in a cell and a prisoner in the world? you will first say the prisoner in a cell is not free and is trap by limit. what about a prisoner in the world do you think that he does not have limit because he is in the world and the cage is bigger? Does materiel thing create stuff? or is it the water and the spirit that create stuff in this world? remove man from the world and the world would be in its natural state, man would not be there to create in it and experience and enjoy this world. seek the truth and the truth will set you free.

Let there be light, be the light that you can be , experience and enjoy.