The tree speaks to us in silence but those who have the capacity to understand hear its message loud and clear. It speaks of giving shade to the weary and a nesting place to the needy. It speaks of delicious fruit, nuts and nectar, and useful resin and oilseed. It silently offers its green leaves for fodder and dried leaves, full of nourishment fed by its roots, for fertiliser. It changes our carbon dioxide into oxygen. It holds the lose earth together and prevents flatlands from becoming deserts and hillsides sliding down in the rains. And when it dies, it burns for us as firewood.
The tree does not keep repeating 'I love you' every time someone passes by. It quietly shows that it does, in a way true lovers would do well to emulate. And, after this, it does not ask anything in return. It does its part without expectation of a reward, as if it had truly internalized one of the core teachings of our spiritual heritage.
Apart from the above, we can learn things from what the tree says when adverse weather threatens. When a tree breaks in a storm, it mostly does so because of overwhelming force, advanced age, disease or human intervention.Usually it wisely bends and becomes its normal self again, once the storm has passed. Compare this to how most of us behave during and after the real and imagined storms in our lives
Despite the above, we, who cannot do the smallest thing for others without asking “what is in it for us?” and who usually tend to become demoralized in adversity, say that the tree has no mind and no heart.
Indeed, the heart of the tree is larger than we can imagine and it has a consciousness which is wise enough to do the bidding of this heart. And, in its own way, it constantly speaks to us of both. Listening to it, we have to ask ourselves - is it better to have a mind and a heart like that of the tree or like that of the tree-choppers? Is it better to speak like the tree or like our verbose leaders? Is it better to act like the tree or like our normal selfish selves?
Let us try to listen to the speaking tree. The very effort to understand it will make us better human beings.
Kishore Asthana
asthana1@yahoo.com
