Br. David loves to tell the story of marching in New York City on June 17, 1982 during an anti-nuclear demonstration. He walked side-by-side with Thich Nhat Hanh alongside other monks and clergy people. As these slow-moving and unhurried monks walked peacefully and meditatively, those behind them became agitated. People huffed and passed them. Thich Nhat Hanh responded, I’m told, by saying, “It is not by going out for a demonstration against nuclear missiles that we can bring about peace. It is with our capacity of smiling, breathing, and being peace that we can make peace.”

Since 1968, when Br. David first founded Grateful Living as the Center for Spiritual Studies, Br. David has shared a similar message: happiness, joy, hope, and meaning are all reliant on being grateful. We can say thank you and tell people that we are grateful. Easy. But the gratefulness Br. David speaks of is not a gesture. It is the embodiment of our gratefulness in our actions, the choices we make, and how we care for others and the Earth. The grateful stance is revelatory and changes our perspective. With it, we learn that our life is a gift that should be cherished and not taken for granted. We learn that greed is deadly and destructive and prevents us from tending to the societal and environmental maladies that plague the planet. Our grateful gaze on life awakens us from the heartlessness that indifference and despair propagate. It saves us from the delusion that violence cures violence. And it teaches us — with reflection and attunement to the present moment — how to trust and have hope by building and becoming the future every being deserves. 

That is why in July 2008, Br. David invited a gathering of people at Thanksgiving Square to make a gratitude pledge. He put to words the essence of living gratefully, the closest one might come to a creed in a spiritual practice that is free of a prescribed path.  

On the occasion of his 100th birthday, we invite you to recommit to the grateful life today and to consider how this pledge and your practice can transform your life, your community, and who we are becoming as a people.

  • In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
    to overcome the illusion of ENTITLEMENT
    by reminding myself that everything is gift
    and, thus, to live GRATEFULLY.
  • In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
    to overcome my GREED,
    that confuses wants with needs,
    by trusting that enough for all our needs is given to us
    and to share GENEROUSLY
    what I so generously receive.
  • In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
    to overcome APATHY
    by waking up to the opportunities
    that a given moment offers me
    and so to respond CREATIVELY to every situation.
  • In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
    to overcome VIOLENCE, all of which is rooted in fear,
    by observing that fighting violence by violence
    leads to more violence and death
    and, thus, to foster life by acting NON-VIOLENTLY.
  • In thanksgiving to life, I pledge
    to overcome FEAR
    by seeing in what I might otherwise fear,
    the opportunity to cultivate courageous TRUST IN LIFE
    and so to lay the foundation for a peaceful future.

Sign the Gratitude Pledge

In honor of Br. David’s 100th Birthday, we invite you to sign the gratitude pledge and (re)commit to the grateful life.

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Photo: Br. David (right) with Thich Nhat Hanh and others at a peace protest


The Anatomy of Gratefulness: Say Yes to Life

Wondering what it truly means to live a grateful life and how to do it? In this on-demand course, learn guiding principles for living gratefully every day, try daily practices that can guide you in challenging and joyful times, explore what scientific research and spiritual wisdom have to say about the benefits of living gratefully, and more.

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Joe Primo - CEO, Grateful Living
Joe Primo, Grateful Living

Joe Primo is the CEO of Grateful Living. He is a passionate speaker and community-builder whose accomplishments made him a leading voice on resilience and adversity. Gratefulness for life, he believes, is foundational to discovering meaning and the only response that is big enough and appropriate for the plot twists, delights, surprises, and devastation we encounter along the way. A student of our founder since his studies at Yale Divinity School, Joe is committed to advancing our global movement and making the transformational practice of grateful living both accessible to all and integral to communities and places of belonging. His TED talk, “Grief is Good,” reframed the grief paradigm as a responsive resource. He is the author of “What Do We Tell the Children? Talking to Kids About Death and Dying” and numerous articles.

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