Welcome

Pierre Pradervand Welcome, dear friend, to a practice which since time immemorial has been uplifting people of all races, beliefs, occupation, age … a non denominational practice which even agnostics can practice. However, there are many ways of practicing it and the one described here is the result of a very powerful spiritual experience I underwent many years ago.

At the time (1986) I was working in the humanitarian field for a group of Swiss NGOs active in the field of international development. My job was to formulate educational programs on Third World issues for the school system. I loved my job and was very committed to it – I even had a camp bed in the office so as to rest when I missed the last train home ! At one moment I very much wanted to create a roving exhibition on hunger for schools to sensitize school children to one of the main world challenges. As there was no money in the budget for the project, I invested a very large chunk of my personal economies into the project. This had never ever happened in the history of these organizations. It was a frank success, toured many schools and was even written up in the press.

A thought to ponder

Adyashanti en

More thoughts to ponder...

Healing testimonies

This section constitutes the heart of the site, because it shows that blessing changes lives, sometimes very deeply, including in immensely challenging situations.

Anyone having had a meaningful experience with blessing is invited to share it with visitors to this website. Kindly do not write more than 2/3 of a page, unless the testimony is quite exceptional. The editors may occasionally edit a text for clarity or length. Please sign at least with your first name and the city, place or country where you live.

Read the testimonies...

Blessing messages read by Pierre Pradervand

These 35 audio blessings, half of which have been composed by Pierre for his forthcoming book, 365 Blessings to Heal Myself and the World, have been recorded by Beyond Words, the publisher of The Gentle Art of Blessing.

Why the only future worth building includes everyone

Our guest blogger for the month of June is Pope Francis, with a powerful message for humanity. We have reprinted it from the blog on http://gratefulness.org/blog/the-future-you-pope-francis-ted-talk/

EDITOR’S NOTE: Below is the complete transcript (translated into English by Elena Montrasio) of Pope Francis’s recent TED Talk delivered directly from Vatican City. We offer our warm thanks to the good folks at TED for so generously sharing “Ideas worth spreading.” We found this talk timely and powerful and hope you are as moved and inspired as we are…

Good evening – or, good morning, I am not sure what time it is there. Regardless of the hour, I am thrilled to be participating in your conference. I very much like its title – “The Future You” –because, while looking at tomorrow, it invites us to open a dialogue today, to look at the future through a “you.” “The Future You:” the future is made of “yous,” it is made of encounters, because life flows through our relations with others. Quite a few years of life have strengthened my conviction that each and everyone’s existence is deeply tied to that of others: life is not time merely passing by, life is about interactions.

A Truly Friendly Universe

A Truly Friendly Universe It has been said that Albert Einstein once asked the question: « Is the universe friendly? » Although this quote may well be erroneously attributed to him, the question is possibly the most fundamental one any thinking person can ask.

Personally, not only do I believe we live in a very friendly – even exceptionally loving – universe, I believe this universe is moment by moment conspiring for our good. It is so incredibly restful to become aware of this and literally feel it in our bones.

Somehow, this conviction rests upon what one could call a primeval trust, a deep feeling born not of some logical reasoning but on what I believe are profound experiences from our very earliest childhood days that our surroundings and family were a safe place for us to be in. However; I also believe that someone who has not had such trustful experiences can reach this state of trust by constant work on themselves, be it of a spiritual or psychological nature.