written by Laurel Clark and reported by Diana Kenney
Balbir Mathur said he always felt like a foreigner in life, even as a child living in his native India. This all changed when a mysterious two-year illness that left him unable to walk ended as suddenly as it appeared. The instantaneous healing happened when a vision inspired him to promise to fight world hunger.
Mathur was born in India and received his Masters degree there in Political Science from the University of Allahabad. He came to the United States in 1958 and studied business management at Wichita University in Kansas. In the early 1970’s he formed an international consulting firm that required extensive worldwide travel. Although he developed a good reputation and financial prosperity, he was unfulfilled.
While flying overseas on one of his business trips, Mathur looked below to see the Island of Cypress. Suddenly he saw the world from a different perspective; it was as if he was viewing the earth from “God’s eyes.” The earth became smaller and smaller until it was a speck of dust. He saw light and dark and good and bad.
After the vision, he noticed a pain in his hand. There was a lump at the base of his fingers. The lump grew larger and larger and the condition spread down his body until he could no longer work or even walk. No one knew what was wrong or how to cure the strange condition. After being bed-ridden for two years, his sister suggested he try fasting. Mathur was resistant at first, saying that eating was the one thing he had left since he could no longer walk or work, and she wanted to take that away from him! However, he surrendered and fasted for four days. On the fifth day, he had a vision, which brought him to his knees promising to work to fight world hunger.
Immediately upon making the promise, he was spontaneously healed. He was able to get up and walk. Mathur was so grateful for having his mobility restored he walked for several miles, afraid that the healing might not last and that he could find himself again unable to walk.
The healing became permanent when Mathur remembered another promise he had made as a child in India. There was a lemon tree in his yard. As a young boy, he picked the lemons and made lemonade for his family. The promise he made to the tree was that he would plant 100 lemon trees for others. Now, as an adult, Mathur committed to fulfilling this promise.
It turned out to be more difficult than he had imagined. Mathur could not find other people willing to plant the trees, not even his mother or friends. Finally he met a holy man with a reputation for healing. It was said that if the man touched glass of water, the one holding the glass would be healed. Mathur stood in line all day with his glass of water. The holy man touched his mother’s glass, but when it was Mathur’s turn, he was asked to return the next day.
When Mathur returned, he asked the healer to bless 2,500 trees, thinking that people would plant the trees blessed by this holy man. The healer taught Mathur some lessons about giving. Mathur tried to persuade him to bless the trees because it would be for the good of others. The healer said one cannot do anything for the good of others; it is always for one’s own good. Then Mathur suggested he bless the trees because he would become known. The healer said that that was little better than a dog who wags his tail when someone pets him. Did Mathur really think he was like a dog?
The healer taught Mathur that if he really wanted to plant the trees, he must do it as an expression of his soul, an expression of his being. It could not be done for the purpose of doing good for others, nor for glory or anything else. The act must be complete in itself. The healer told him that if he could grasp that then everyone, the entire universe, would support him. Then he blessed the 2,500 trees and Mathur’s work began. From that action, the organization known as Trees for Life was born.
Mathur left his successful career as a business management consultant to empower community leaders worldwide. Today Trees for Life is more than an organization that plants trees. It teaches people how to use resources, how to work together, and how to gather knowledge. He believes that people have unlimited potential.
"We are a movement of people gathered together in the spirit of service, not to change the world or not to force our will on Earth, but to simply serve, just like a lover gives his beloved a flower in loving service," Mathur said. He asserts that “people come to understand that their basic hindrance is not the lack of resources, but the lack of knowledge. People don’t need giveaways; people need hope, people need knowledge.”
Mathur gathers the staff of Trees for Life together every morning for silent meditation. Out of stillness they listen with an open heart. Part of the philosophy of Trees for Life is to leave no imprint of their presence. They do not disturb the culture of the people and they leave the community they serve intact, empowering them to be self-sustaining.
Trees for Life is a teaching organization. It embodies the truth, “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach him how to fish and he eats for a lifetime.” The organization thinks about 1000 years in the future. They ask that the people they teach agree to teach two others what they learn, and that they ask those people to each teach two others. In this way, the work of the foundation has a ripple effect. More and more people are served after the foundation leaves an area. If all make good on their promise to teach others what they learn, the ripple goes on without end.
Mathur describes his life as being like a boat called Surrender. He steers the boat with two oars: gratitude and forgiveness. His soft-spoken gentle spirit is an expression of a natural humbleness. When Mathur spoke at the College of Metaphysics pre-Parliament of the World’s Religions event called “Living Peaceably,” he began his talk with a disclaimer, saying that he was going to talk about his own experience. He did not claim to be an authority on universal truth.
Mathur’s commitment is to be himself, to do his best, and be an example for others. In an educational DVD called “One Heart at a Time,” he says of his life and his work, “It’s like a beautiful symphony going on and I don’t know the entire music and I can’t see the entire cast. I just have to play my small instrument and do the very best that I possibly can.”
Balbir Mathur was a speaker at the College of Metaphysics “Living Peaceably begins by Thinking Peacefully” pre-Parliament of the World’s Religions event held in September 2009. The College of Metaphysics is the headquarters of the School of Metaphysics, a 501(c)(3) organization in Windyville, Missouri. Two dozen SOM teachers wrote a document called The Universal Peace Covenant which resonates with Balbir Mathur’s work. He believes that he is a conduit for something greater than himself and agrees that the peace covenant describes the essence of Trees for Life, particularly these two lines:
“Enlightened service to our fellow man brings peace to the one serving and to the one receiving,” and “Peace and security are attained by those societies where the individuals work closely to serve the common good of the whole.”
To learn more about the School of metaphysics and the Universal Peace Covenant, please visit www.som.org and www.peacedome.org. To learn more about Balbir Mathur, visit www.treesforlife.org.##
