I invite you to try offering blessings. You may already do this in the form of sending cards or notes. In our detached, digital age, a handwritten note expressing wishes for speedy recovery, condolences, or just warm greetings is a precious communication. Perhaps thinking of those interactions as blessings will shift in some way how you go about them or simply help you value them all the more.

You can offer blessings in person in the context of conversations with friends, neighbors, or family members. You can do it when someone you care about is in distress or overflowing with joy. You can bless as part of saying good-bye.

Here are a few suggestions for words you might use to offer blessings:

* May you . . .
* I wish you . . .
* I hope that . . .
* May God bless you with . . .

Be creative; don't worry about the words, but focus on your hopes for the person you are blessing or on his or her hopes for him- or herself. You may feel shy at first about giving blessings. It's always fine to ask permission. It's also great to start with someone you feel very comfortable with. A blessing habit is a beautiful thing. When you offer blessings, you become a conduit for connection -- to hopes, to Power in the universe you hope will act/respond on behalf of the other, to eternity, and to the heart of the person before you.

— Dayle A. Friedman in Jewish Wisdom for Growing Older