THE UNIVERSAL AGREEMENT - THE UNIVERSAL GREETING
🌍 The Universal Agreement / Universal Greeting
🌍 The Universal Agreement / Universal Greeting also known now as The Universal Agreement is A Social Tool for Functional Harmony, for Peace and Global Citizenship.
📖 ORIGIN STORY
In 1963, during Don Conreaux’s time directing an event for the CCCUN (Communication Coordinating Committee for the United Nations) in Los Angeles, a mysterious act of service unfolded:
- A group of five anonymous individuals in Japan, working under a veil of service and anonymity, sent the greeting to Don via a friend.
- One of them, whose pseudonym was Steven Beltz, handed Don a piece of paper at the end of the conference.
- This paper contained the original nine-sentence Universal Agreement, accompanied by nine gestures.
Don recognized the synchronistic symbolism — especially the esoteric power of the number 9, sacred in many traditions and resonant with the gong’s vibrational numerology. 🌍 The
#9: The Peacemaker, Bliss, Samadhi
Don was asked and accepted the mission to share this as a divine tool for Functional Harmony and the promotion Peace to spread around the world.
Thus began the life of the Universal Agreement as a ritual, a greeting, and a spiritual contract between all people — no matter their language, faith, or background.
✨ PURPOSE
- To establish peace, respect, and deep listening
- To transcend language barriers through gesture and sound
- To reflect the spirit of caregiving, unity, and cooperation
- To prepare the field before a gong bath, healing session, or ceremony
- To be a universal ritual of human acknowledgment and mutual respect
🕊️ WHO WE BECOME IN THIS PRACTICE
- Servant Leaders: Living by giving, acting for others’ well-being.
- Universal Caregivers: Each of us, regardless of age or role, participates in caregiving — for ourselves, each other, and future generations.
- Peace Makers and Sound Ambassadors
👐 THE UNIVERSAL AGREEMENT (with Gestures)
These 9 original lines and gestures form the foundation:
- I/We offer you Peace
→ Face palms forward, elbows bent - I/We offer you Friendship
→ Cup hands palm to palm, elbows bent - I/We offer you Love
→ Draw hands forward from heart to form a cup - I/We hear your Needs
→ Cup hands behind ears - I/We see your Beauty
→ Cover eyes, then open hands wide - I/We feel your Feelings
→ Self-hug: arms cross chest, fingertips to shoulders - All Wisdom flows from the Highest Source
→ Right hand arcs from above head, down past face to chest
(like a swimming stroke) - I/We honor that Source in You
→ Prayer hands at heart - Let us work together
→ Hands clasped, fingers intertwined
EXPANDED GESTURES (Added Later by Don Conreaux and The Global Gong Family students)
- I am another Yourself
→ Two Gyana Mudras with fingers interlaced - You are another Myself
→ Disconnect and reconnect the Gyana mudras in reverse - We Are One
→ Namaste; fingertips meet, holding a sphere above the head or at the brow - Blessings
→ Sphere descends, hands shift to heart mudra - So Be It! or Let it Be So!
→ One fist enclosed in the opposite hand
(A peaceful martial arts gesture, stopping the fist’s aggression) - So Much Love! (French Gong Master Philippe Garnier and Student of Don)
🧬 ESOTERIC INFLUENCES & SYMBOLISM
- Number 9: Reflects completion, the spiral of evolution, and sacred geometry. Also associated with the gong's vibrational field.
- Movement as Language: The gestures transcend spoken word, allowing for telepathic communion, nonverbal empathy, and a heart-led experience.
- Mayan Influence: The phrases In Lak’ech Ala K’in ("I am another you") inspire gestures 10 & 11.
🌐 GLOBAL LEGACY
- Officially adopted by The Children of the United Nations
- Spoken and performed at gong baths, global peace meditations, healing circles, and sound therapy events
- Translated into multiple languages and adapted across cultures
- Still free to use, perform, and teach — as a public service for world peace
🔊 How to Use It
- As a call and response between teacher and students
- Spoken aloud, slowly and clearly, with eye contact and a smile
- Can be sung, chanted, or performed silently using only the gestures
- As a group practice to open or close events
- As a personal daily ritual for centering and compassion
What is a Servant Leader?
“I believe that as gong players everywhere being to perceive their roles as Servant Leaders, the policy of gift giving will also gain the momentum needed for transforming our relationships away from greed and fear and towards seeing the other persona as our own true self.” - Don Conreaux
Who is a caregiver?
We begin our lives being cared for and we grow into adults with a mission of caring: for ourselves, for each other, for our community, and for the coming generations.
So, in essence, we are all Universal Care Givers. May we all take on the Universal Agreement as our Life Mission. Sharing it as a greeting and agreement before and/or after we meet.
THE HISTORY
In 1963 I was directing a CCCUN event in Los Angeles, and I received a phone call from a good friend. He said that he received a call from an anonymous person in Japan who wanted to be of service. There were 5 of them working under the veil of anonymity. so their names were withheld.
Near the end of the conference, the leader of the group - whose undisclosed name was Steven Beltz gave me a piece of paper with the 9-sentence agreement on it with 9 gestures. He said it came to him in Japan and he shared it with the other four at breakfast time. I have used it ever since because Steven asked me to spread it around the world. It was partly because the esoteric number of the gong is also N0. 9 that I took it as a divine public service. May this spirit continue through you. - DJC.
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The Universal Greeting is a standard in the Gong Community and performed at every Gong bath to inspire a creed to live by.
Gongmaster Don Conreaux made The Universal Greeting available, free to all, as a social tool to establish harmony amongst individuals and groups, regardless of culture, religion, or political conscience. Adopted as the official greeting of The Children of the United Nations, it has been around the world multiple times and has been translated into many languages.
The Universal Greeting is usually spoken along with the universally recognized signing gestures, hand mudras to aid in its expression, with the understanding that movement is the ultimate universal language and so if one encounters a being who does not speak your given language, they would respond to your smile, hand and arm gestures.
It may be chanted, sung, performed silently with gestures alone, or as a call and response.
The Universal Greeting (known as the "Universal Agreement").
Best Practices are: to speak slowly and enunciate, making eye contact with the recipient/s, or audience. And Smile!
THE UNIVERSAL GREETING/AGREEMENT:
1. I/We offer you Peace
Face palms forward, elbows bent
2. I/We offer you friendship
Cup hands palm to palm, elbows bent
3. I/We offer you love
Draw hands forward, from the heart to form a cup
4. I/We hear your needs
Cup hands behind ears
5. I/We see your beauty
Cover eye with hands….. then open
6. I/We feel your feelings
"Self hug" - Arm close chest, fingertips to shoulders
7. All wisdom flows from the highest source.
A. Move right-hand palm down from overhead
(Like an overhead crawl stroke in swimming)
B. pass the face, then palms at the chest, fingertips pointing to the front
8. I/We honor that source in you
Palm together in prayer position
9. Let us work together
Two hands clasped, fingers intertwined
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Later on, I have added these following gestures, and have also encouraged people to add their own when appropriate.
Added gestures by Don Conreaux:
10*I. I am another yourself two gyana mudras with fingers interlaced together
11*. You are another my self disconnect and reconnect the Gyana mudras in reverse.
12. We Are One - Namaste Fingertips meet holding a sphere above the head or at the forehead
13. Blessings Sphere comes down turning into a heart mudras in front of the heart.
14. So Be It!** One fist is enclosed in the second hand , as in a gesture to stop aggression of the fist) - martial arts close
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*10 & 11 was inspired by the Mayan saying: In Lakesh Alak Kin... I am another yourself......you are another myself! (Thank you, Randee Ragin, for that gesture.) also popular: You Are My Own True Self, And I Am Another Your Self
14a**optional vocal variation: “Let it be so!"
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THE UNIVERSAL GREETING/AGREEMENT Pamphlet was first published by Don Conreaux in 1983 for the CCCUN: Communication Coordinating Committee of the People's United Nations.
VIDEO OF DON DOING THE UNIVERSAL GREETING: