The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times(63)

For more on the Davos World Economic Tree Planting Initiative, see “A Platform for the Trillion Tree Community,” www.1t.org/. The research that demonstrated “The Global Tree Restoration Potential” that led to the initiative was published in Science by Thomas Crowther et al. (365, no. 6448 [July 5, 2019]: 76–79, https://science.sciencemag.org/content/365/6448/76).

Reason 3: The Power of Young People

For more on Roots & Shoots programs, see http://rootsandshoots.org/.

Chan Hellman’s story was relayed to me in a phone interview, but an account can be found in his book Hope Rising (Morgan James, 2019).

Reason 4: The Indomitable Human Spirit

For a wonderful video on Jia Haixia and Jia Wenqi and their tree-planting friendship, see GoPro: A Blind Man and His Armless Friend Plant a Forest in China (www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mx6hBgNNacE&t=2s) and learn more at https://gopro.com/en/us/goproforacause/brothers.

Becoming a Messenger of Hope

For more on near-death experiences and what they may say about life after death, see Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s classic On Life After Death (Celestial Arts, 2008) or Bruce Greyson’s more recent book, After: A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal About Life and Beyond (St. Martin’s Essentials, 2021). Greyson, who is the leader of the field of near-death studies, has been examining these experiences for over forty years. He studied many people who, while near death, had seen and learned things that should not have been possible, like meeting relatives that they did not know they had. He said that after people have near-death experiences they almost universally believed that death is not something to fear and that life or consciousness continues in some form beyond the grave. Near-death experiences also transform how people live their lives and inspire a belief that there is meaning and purpose in the universe. Some of the most fascinating stories relate to what Jane said about this life possibly being a test. According to Greyson’s research, many people experience an end-of-life review where they literally do see their whole life flash before them and understand why certain events in their lives happened.

For more on Francis Collins’s views, see his book, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief (Free Press, 2006).

For other books in the Global Icons Series, go to www.ideaarchitects.com/global-icons-series/.

For further information about Jane Goodall’s work, see www .janegoodall.global and www.rootsandshoots.global.





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