Friends Like No Other Species

 

10.07.2022 FRIENDS LIKE NO OTHER SPECIES Two weeks ago, a hurricane made its way through the city where I live, bringing with it a fury of wind, rain, and destruction. Many lost power, fences, roof shingles, and patio furniture. Perhaps the most visible loss was the abundance of fallen trees, torn from their roots and toppled by nature’s wrath. Several towering trees in my own neighborhood succumbed to the storm, blocking roads and walkways in the days following. The autumn air was charged with the scent of wood and evergreen as neighbors worked together to haul, chip, and corral tumbled fragments of brush and branch. I encountered a number of bewildered faces surveying the damage while out for a walk the day after the storm. The change in landscape was clear, though I doubt many of us had ever truly seen what once stood where woody stumps now sit. I can’t tell you what kind of trees had grown from the now barren bases, but I can tell that something is missing — that something great was lost. “Trees are our closest neighbors,” writes Zen teacher Henry Shukman in his piece “Tree of Wisdom,” “There are dogs, cats, cows, and other domestic animals with whom some of us live, and there are our cousins like the chimpanzee with whom we don’t usually live. On the other hand, pretty much all people live with trees.” “Trees are our natural environment,” he continues. “They are our friends like no other species.” If you’ve ever heard the story of how the historical Buddha attained enlightenment, you’ll know he awakened while sitting in meditation beneath a ficus tree, henceforth known as the “bodhi tree.” It’s told that he was inspired to sit under the bodhi tree after recalling a childhood memory of experiencing a peaceful state of being beneath the shade of a rose-apple tree. If a tree can help spur the Buddha’s awakening, can they help us on our path, too? In the new November 2022 issue of Lion’s Roar, Lin Wang Gorden shares a healing tree meditation to help attune to the natural world and work through difficult emotions. It’s a beautiful practice that brings forth a sense of curiosity, gratitude, and connection. Though I can’t bring the fallen trees in my neighborhood back, I can appreciate the ones that remain and vow not to take their shelter and friendship for granted again. The great storms of life will come and go, giving and taking a myriad of things along the way — be it trees, relationships, joys, or sorrows. We can use these changes to awaken us to the present moment and learn to appreciate what we find there: the cool shade of an old oak, the sharp smell of pine, the sweet taste of maple syrup. The three pieces in this Weekend Reader all take a similar inspiration from the wisdom of trees. May they help you find a friend in some of your closest neighbors, too. —Lilly Greenblatt, Digital Editor, Lion’s Roar

Tree of Wisdom Oak and maple, palm and pine — trees are our closest neighbors and most patient teachers. Henry Shukman on the common roots of people and trees. We may not live in them anymore, as our ancestors once did, but we remain a tree-dwelling species. In the deserts, they are the oases that provide homes for humanity, with their sheltering palms. In the grasslands, every village and farmstead nestles in its cluster of shivering trees; in the hills of Europe, the stone villages huddle amid pine, oak, and beech. Nor, without trees, would we have had the industrial revolution: coal and oil are the ancient remains of giant trees, and through the release of their vast power, we have paradoxically been able to denude great areas of our planet of its forests. Trees are our natural environment. They are our friends like no other species. Warmth in winter, shade in summer, said the poet Alexander Pope, of trees’ gifts to humanity. Where people are, trees are. Many cities are filled with trees. Some even look like woodland from the air. For thousands of generations, trees have provided people with windbreaks, shade, shelter, fire, and one of the primary fabrics of our dwellings.

Need to Heal? Find a Tree Tree meditation, says Lin Wang Gordon, is a way to strengthen our connection with nature and deepen our understanding of difficult emotions like grief. On the eve of New York City’s lockdown for the pandemic, I felt the fear of the unknown that was in the air. So I meditated with a crooked tree with branches snaking out sideways, and insights from that tree meditation helped me weather the pandemic over the next year. The next Saturday, I took my father to the ER for Covid, and I never held him again till I held his ashes. Throughout those days when grief and helplessness enveloped me, I leaned deep into my nature-meditation experiences. I remembered how trees survive storms. I remembered the groundedness of the earth holding me. I remembered the loving nature of the universe. When my family asked how I was holding up, I answered, thinking about trees, “Roots go deeper; feet stand firmer.”

Imagine a Pine Tree Thich Nhat Hanh answers a retreatant’s question on what to do in the face of suffering. Imagine a pine tree standing in the yard. If that pine tree were to ask us what it should do, what the maximum is a pine tree can do to help the world, our answer would be very clear: “You should be a beautiful, healthy pine tree. You help the world by being your best.” That is true for humans also. The basic thing we can do to help the world is to be healthy, solid, loving, and gentle to ourselves. Then when people look at us, they will gain confidence. They will say, “If she can do that, I can do that too!”

SIGN UP TODAY!