PREVIOUS FESTIVALS
GALLERY, PAST PRESENTERS & TESTIMONIALS – IMPRESSIONS

You want to gain an impression of how the festivals used to look like before?
Take a look at our picture gallery, past presenters and read and watch testimonials. Then read on why the culture of giving back is so central for us.

GALLERY

TESTIMONIALS

TESTIMONIALS

Please hover over a picture to read.

Scilla Elworthy
“Coming to Celebrate Life Festival is like being given a helicopter view of your life. You are enabled to rise above the daily preoccupations and see everything with a much broader perspective. The effect of this is reassuring, and strangely gentle.It also provides a glimpse into the future. This is because 70 people are giving their skills and their care as volunteers, and their spirit of service is contagious – it spreads to all of us and we find ourselves doing things for others and taking care of the environment. Imagine that 1,000 people can camp together for more than a week, and I never saw one piece of litter. By contrast, others were constantly helping me. This is a body-felt experience of how we could live co-operatively, and how connected life could be – and can be – if we intend it so.” Scilla Elworthy

PAST PRESENTERS

William Ury
William Ury is a co-founder of the Harvard University negotiation model and is the co-author of the best-selling book “Getting to Yes”. The book has sold over 13 million copies and translated into 35 languages. Ury’s latest, award-winning book “Getting to Yes with Yourself” has just been published in German by Campus Verlag.Over the past 35 years, Ury has worked as a Negotiation Consultant and Mediator on many conflicts worldwide. He is currently working as a consultant to the president of Colombia on the goal of ending a fifty-year civil war.Ury is the founder of the initiative “Abraham Path” and co-founder of the Climate Parliament, which brings together parliamentarians from all over the world with civil society to make the transition to renewable energy.
www.williamury.com

Bart Weetjens
Bart Weetjens is a Buddhist priest and social entrepreneur. Bart had the idea of training rats to develop a suitable method for detecting landmines and tuberculosis.With many years of experience as a product designer and development engineer, Bart founded the landmine detection project APOPO with the support of Professor Mic Billet and his colleagues at the University of Antwerp. Bart is a Fellow at both ASHOKA and SCHWAB.
www.apopo.org
www.wellbeing-project.org

Dr. Gordon Neufeld
Dr. Gordon Neufeld is a Canadian developmental psychologist with over 40 years of experience with children and youth and those responsible for them. A foremost authority on child development, Dr. Neufeld is an international speaker, a bestselling author (Hold On To Your Kids) and a leading interpreter of the developmental paradigm.Dr. Neufeld has a widespread reputation for making sense of complex problems and for opening doors for change.While formerly involved in university teaching and private practice, he now devotes his time to teaching and training others, including educators and helping professionals. His Neufeld Institute is now a world-wide charitable organization devoted to applying developmental science to the task of raising children. Dr. Neufeld appears regularly on radio and television. He is a father of five and a grandfather to six.
www.neufeldinstitute.org

Ed Mitchell
(* 17.09.1930 in Hereford, Texas; † 04.02.2016)Traveling back to Earth, having just walked on the moon, Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell had an experience for which nothing in his life had prepared him. As he approached the planet we know as home, he was filled with an inner conviction as certain as any mathematical equation he’d ever solved.
He knew that the beautiful blue world to which he was returning is part of a living system, harmonious and whole—and that we all participate, as he expressed it later, “in a universe of consciousness.”
Trained as an engineer and scientist, Ed Mitchell was most comfortable in the world of rationality and physical precision. Yet the understanding that came to him as he journeyed back from space felt just as trustworthy—it represented another way of knowing. This experience radically altered his worldview: Despite science’s superb technological achievements, he realized that we had barely begun to probe the deepest mystery of the universe—the fact of consciousness itself. He became convinced that the uncharted territory of the human mind was the next frontier to explore, and that it contained possibilities we had hardly begun to imagine. Within two years of his expedition, Edgar Mitchell founded the Institute of Noetic Sciences in 1973.
Today, Dr. Mitchell is member of the Board of Directors of the Institute. He continues to be active at events at the Institute, e.g.with lectures and conferences.
Dr. Deepak Chopra
The medical doctor, university teacher and bestselling author Dr. Deepak Chopra is regarded as one of the most brilliant philosophers of our time. For a long time, the native Indian worked successfully as an internist and endocrinologist at a hospital. Seeking an animated form of western medicine, he has been dedicating his life to the boundary between science and spirituality since the 1980s.As the founder of the Chopra Foundation and co-founder and chairman of the Chopra Center for Wellbeing in Carlsbad, California, he combines the knowledge of the West with the wisdom of the East in a unique way. He is a pioneer of holistic alternative medicine and has published 80 books about healing, transformation and higher consciousness, which have been translated into 43 languages and sold over 20 million copies. He is a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and Washington Post and a regular contributor to Oprah.com, Intent.com and the Huffington Post. Time Magazine counts Chopra among the 100 most outstanding minds of the 20th century.
www.deepakchopra.com
Tami Simon
Tami  Simon is Publisher, CEO, and Founder of Sounds True. In 1985, at the age of 22, Tami Simon founded Sounds True, a multimedia publishing company dedicated to disseminating spiritual wisdom. Based in Boulder, Colorado, Sounds True has published more than 800 audio, video, music, and book titles along with online courses and events. A two-time winner of the Inc 500 award as one of the fastest growing privately held companies in America, Sounds True is widely recognized as a pioneer in providing life-changing, practical tools that accelerate spiritual awakening and personal transformation. In addition to being the publisher and CEO of Sounds True,  Tami  hosts a free weekly podcast series called Insights at the Edge, in which she interviews Sounds True authors about the growing edge of their life and work. Additionally,Tami  is a senior meditation instructor under the guidance of Reggie Ray, who teaches in the practicing lineage of the great siddha and Tibetan Buddhist meditation teacher Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche.
www.soundstrue.com
Scilla Elworthy
Dr. Scilla Elworthy holds a PhD in political science and is the former director of the Oxford Research Group (ORG), which she founded in 1982 to analyze how and by whom nuclear weapons decisions are made worldwide. It is for this work that she was awarded the Niwano Peace Prize in 2003 and nominated three times for the Nobel Peace Prize. She then founded Peace Direct, which grew out of ORG’s conflict prevention work. She has been a consultant to UNESCO as well as research director for Minority Rights Group, before she managed a self-help organization in Africa. She is the author of many books and reports on defense and security issues and a gifted public lecturer in Europe, the United States, Russia, China and Japan.
www.worldfuturecouncil.org/scilla_elworthy.html
www.preparingforpeace.org/elworthy_biog.htm
Eckhart Tolle
Spiritual teacher and author, born in Germany and educated at the Universities of London and Cambridge. At the age of twenty-nine a profound inner transformation radically changed the course of his life. The next few years were devoted to understanding, integrating and deepening that transformation, which marked the beginning of an intense inward journey. Later, he began to work with individuals and small groups as a counselor and spiritual teacher in London. Since 1995 he lives in Vancouver, Canada.
www.eckharttolle.com
www.eckharttolle.de
Jean Houston
Dr. Jean Houston is one of the principal founders of the Human Potential Movement and is one of the foremost visionary thinkers and doers of our times. In her inter-disciplinary approach, Dr. Houston combines a deep knowledge of history, culture, new scientific results, spirituality and human development. She is the author of 26 books and is also known as a dynamic and powerful speaker and leader of large seminars and conferences, who can inspire, inform and activate her audience in an entertaining way. Her passionate interest is always focused on supporting the inner visions, abilities and possibilities of each person or group and translating them into action.Jean Houston earned a Ph.D. in Psychology and a PhD in Religion. She founded institutions such as The Foundation for Mind Research (1965); the Mystery School (1983) – now called Renaissance of Spirit; the Possible Society (1984); as well as the Jean Houston Foundation (2008), which offers “Social Artistry”, a training program for executives at the international level. She is a consultant to international organizations, to UNICEF in human and cultural development and to the United Nations, as well as to leading figures such as the Dalai Lama, President Clinton and his wife Hillary, and President Carter.She has taught at various universities and colleges as a professor and guest professor.
Ken Wilber
Born in 1949 in Oklahoma City, Ken Wilber lived in many places during his school years, due to his father being in the Air Force. With 22 books on spirituality and science, and translations in more than 25 countries, Wilber is now the most translated writer on consciousness studies in the United States. He is seen as an important representative of transpersonal psychology, which emerged in the sixties from humanistic psychology, and which concerns itself explicitly with spirituality. For the fundamental and pioneering nature of his insights, he has been called “the Einstein of consciousness research”. In 2000 he founded the Integral Institute, a think-tank for studying issues of science and society in an integral way.
www.kenwilber.com
Thomas Hübl
Thomas Hübl is a modern mystic, spiritual teacher, author and systems-thinker. His work integrates the essence of the great wisdom traditions, scientific knowledge and his own personal experience. For almost 15 years, Thomas has been leading international workshops, multi-year training programs and online courses. He is the initiator of the ‘Celebrate Life Festival’ as well as founder of the ‘Academy of Inner Science’ and of the ‘Pocket Project’. Thomas was born in Austria in 1971 and now lives in Tel Aviv, Israel, with his wife, the Israeli artist Yehudit Sasportas and their daughter Eliya.
www.thomashuebl.com
Gerald Hüther
Prof. Dr. Gerald Hüther is one of the most famous brain researchers in Germany. He heads the Center for Neurobiological Prevention Research at the Psychiatric University Clinic of Göttingen, writes non-fiction books, organizes congresses, and works as a consultant for politicians and entrepreneurs. As co-publisher of scientific journals, co-founder of the Network for Education and Training and frequent guest in the media, he is committed to the distribution and implementation of the insights from modern brain research. He sees himself as a “bridge builder” between scientific insights and social or individual life practice, with the aim of creating favorable conditions for the development of potential, especially in the area of education and training, as well as at the level of political and economic leadership.
Byron Katie
Founder of The Work, has one job: to teach people how to end their own suffering. When Katie appears, lives change. As she guides people through her simple and powerful process of inquiry, called The Work, they find again and again that their stressful beliefs – about life, other people, or themselves – radically and positively shift.Katie, who recently did The Work with Oprah, has worked with millions of people all over the world who report profound experiences and lasting transformations.Time Magazine names Katie “a spiritual innovator for the new millennium”. Eckhart Tolle calls The Work “a blessing for our planet.”
www.thework.com
Michael Laitman
Michael Laitman is a Professor of Ontology and the Theory of Knowledge, Doctor of Philosophy and Kabbalah, and has a Master of Science of Biocybernetics. He gives lessons for 30 years and founded the public education and research center Bnei Baruch, which has more than 2.5 million students and holds the world’s most comprehensive educational materials about the Kabbalah. He has written more than 30 books, translated into 27 languages. His lessons to his students can attend free of charge every day live on the Internet.As a scientist and global thinker, Laitman is a sought-after lecturer on the topic of authentic Kabbalah. He is frequently invited to participate in prestigious international meetings such as the World Wisdom Council and the Club of Budapest, and in the last two years he has been in numerous meetings in the United States, Canada, Europe , Russia, and Latin America. Most recently, as the founder and president of the Ashlag Research Institute (ARI), he has established ties with UNESCO on the subject of global education.
www.laitman.de
www.kabbalah.info

Further Presenters:

Lawrence Bloom, Stephan Breidenbach, Pia Gyger & Niklaus Brantschen, Günter Faltin, Diane Hamilton, Thomas Harms, Johannes Heimrath, Barbara Marx Hubbard, Gary Joplin, Kosha Joubert, Kira Kay, Christina Kessler, Ervin László, David Less, Lindsay Levin, Auke van Nimwegen, Aftab Omer, Terry Patten, Margret Rasfeld, Miles Kessler Sensei, Tom Steininger, Elaine Valdov

Our History

The Celebrate Life Festival has been taking place annually since 2004 and has become one of the largest consciousness events in Germany and Europe. It combines deep spiritual practice with mature contributions and participation in the evolving cultural and societal landscape and challenges of our time.

Every summer, from all over the world, more than 1,200 culturally creative people gather and explore a deep interest in human development. The Festival is renowned for its inspiring and healing atmosphere and is an international melting pot for socially innovative individuals and an incubator for new ways of forming our contemporary cultural fabric – enabling participants to better meet the inner and outer challenges of their lives.

All year round, a team works to create a profoundly human framework that nourishes deep exchange and sharing between participants, as well as a seedbed for new ideas and projects. The outcome is a container that revitalizes and strengthens the spiritual impulse that so many people come to experience for and in themselves. International experts from many fields come to contribute – in spirituality, science, psychology and trauma work, peace work and mediation, social projects, etc. They share their insight, expertise and leading-edge developments. The Festival is run on a non-profit basis. A team of more than a hundred volunteers, speakers and artists co-creates a place for inquiry into compelling global issues and for friendship and networking. Every year, funds raised are distributed to other non-profit projects that the Festival chooses to support in the world, often in places and fields of great need.
READ MORE About OUR History

The Celebrate Life Festival began in Germany in 2004, and has since grown to become one of the largest consciousness events throughout Europe. Founded by spiritual teacher and modern mystic Thomas Hübl, this annual festival is renowned for its inspiring and healing atmosphere. Every year, thousands of creative thinkers and innovators from around the globe come together to participate in personal spiritual practice, create a strong sense of group coherence, and incubate new ways of forming our cultural fabric. International experts, speakers, and artists across multiple disciplines have taken the stage to contribute their work at Celebrate Life. Guest speakers for past events include Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle, Byron Katie, Michael Laitman, Gerald Hüther, Ken Wilber, Scilla Elworthy, Jean Houston, Tami Simon, Peter Levine, and William Ury. Through experiential workshops and facilitator-led practices, Celebrate Life fosters a nurturing and enriching environment for a deeper sense of connection with the inner and outer world.

The Celebrate Life Festival arose from an impulse to utilize spiritual practice as means of initiating a cultural shift towards restoration and global health.

Nourished by a strong desire to give back to the greater community and an authentic assumption of responsibility for global care, this Festival is dedicated to creating new frameworks for social and cultural connection. Donations raised by the Celebrate Life Festival will support the Pocket Project. You can learn more about this invaluable program here.

The initiator and host of the Celebrate Life Festival is Thomas Hübl. Special thanks go to Sheila Deutinger, the co-initiator and long-time organizer of the festival (2004 to 2009) as well as Ute Kostanjevec for her tireless commitment to the overall coordination and direction of the festival teams from 2010 to 2016. The event is suitable for families on vacation with children – there are strongly evolved childcare facilities, groups for young people, and a youth group that has formed its own organisation for creative social participation (www.youngvision.info).
The festival contributions that are received are used to cover the entire costs for organizing the Festival. Should there be a surplus after all the costs are deducted, it will be partly put aside to pre-finance next year’s Celebrate Life Festival, just as this year’s Festival was pre-financed with the surplus from last year. Any further surplus will be made available to non-profit projects. This year they will be used for the Pocket Project.

The Festival team 2017

Giving Back and Donating

The Celebrate Life Festival arose out of an impulse from spiritual practice, and it is made possible through the commitment of many volunteers. It is nourished by the deep need to “give back”, and by an authentic assumption of responsibility that goes beyond our personal issues and expands into a global care. Participating in the realization of the Festival is an important matter of the heart on the spiritual journey of all those involved. Read more:
TRADITION: giving back and donations