Thanksgiving Letter

Written December 5, 2008

It was September 21, 1958 when I first stepped onto United States soil.

Even after 50 years, I can vividly recall every detail. I can still feel my excitement at first sighting the American coastline and my tears upon landing at LaGuardia airport in New York.

I can picture being ushered through the immigration line by an impatient airline employee and a very patient immigration officer. I recall the jovial customs agent who taught me how to pronounce my destination: Wichita, Kansas. I remember my first New York taxi ride, my first hotdog, and my very first stay in a hotel.

It was one of those rare experiences in life when a dream comes true.

That dream first emerged when, at the age of eight, I had an unpleasant encounter with an occupying British soldier in India. The encounter shook me to my core and left me rebelliously wondering, “What gives that soldier power over me?”

Over the years, my anger was transformed into deeper philosophical questions: “Why are some people more powerful than others? Why are some communities or nations more powerful than others? What is the source of that power?”

My quest for answers to these questions brought me to America – the most powerful nation on the planet. In this new land I became an avid student. I sought out “movers and shakers” and asked them the secret of their success. They were delighted to oblige.

A twist of fate put me in the right place at the right time. In the ‘70s and ‘80s, international business was expanding by leaps and bounds. My knowledge and skills were highly sought after, and I was able to catch the rising tide. Soon I was traveling the world, arranging international business deals as a management consultant.

Along the way, I found a shining soul mate. The arrival of two beautiful children completed our family. The avid student in me had discovered the “formula for power” and made it my own. I was on top of the world.

But then, something happened.

I was on a business flight over the Mediterranean. I looked out my airplane window and was struck by a stray thought: If the Earth looks so small from a few miles up, how must it appear from a divine point of view?

Suddenly, I felt myself floating upward out of my seat – and out of the plane. As if in a dream, I traveled farther and farther away from the Earth, until it became a mere speck of dust floating In space.

From out of nowhere, I heard a voice. It asked me the question: “What do you see?”

Images flooded my mind in rapid succession. Experiences from my world travels fell into sharp contrast. I saw opulent riches and crushing poverty, wasteful gluttony and deadly hunger, extravagant revelry and hopeless despair.

Then, just as suddenly, I was back in my seat, as if nothing had happened. But I noticed an unfamiliar pain in one of my fingers.

Over the following weeks, the pain spread throughout my body. I became disabled, unable to walk. I felt as if my body were ninety years old. Internally, I felt deeply torn – as if my world had been fractured in two. I was trying desperately to reconcile the painful dichotomy I had been shown. But I could not.

Doctors could find no cure for my physical ills. I eventually tried fasting, on the suggestion of my sister. After five days with no food and very little water, something happened for which I have no explanation, no words. Perhaps it was what some call a vision. But at that moment there was a knowing. I knew why I was here on Earth.

At that moment, I knelt and dedicated the rest of my life to fighting world hunger. And, at that very moment, I was suddenly able to walk again.

The rest is history. It’s the story of a movement called Trees for Life.

Outwardly, I am still the same person, traveling around the world – more than 130,000 air miles last year alone. But internally, everything has changed

Now I am no longer seeking the source of power. I feel plugged into it. Each step I take is not taken to get somewhere, but as an act of prayer and worship. They are like steps in a dance.

I am still a kind of management consultant, but now my clients do not pay me handsomely. They have a hard enough time just trying to feed their own children. The young man who came here seeking power has ended up as a servant of the powerless.

So, as I celebrate the holidays for the fiftieth time in America, I shall bow my head in gratitude. Mine will be gratitude for the Mystery that transformed my dance, for the platform that has allowed it, and for all those who have made it possible.

Thank you for the dance.

Love, Balbir