Gaia's Own: Every Child's Guide To Living In Harmony With Nature - Softcover

Bajaj, Dharshana

Softcover

ISBN 10: 9356594821 ISBN 13: 9789356594821

Publisher: Dharshana Bajaj, 2022

Synopsis

Empowering the Caretakers of Tomorrow

Gaia’s Own: Every Child's Guide to Living in Harmony with Nature is a warm, thought-provoking guide for children aged 9 and above, offering gentle but urgent insights into the environmental challenges facing our planet.

Told through a series of emails in an epistolary style, the book invites young readers to join Grandpa Yogesh—a wise and caring mentor—and his 12-year-old granddaughter Satvika as they explore how we can live in deeper harmony with the Earth.

Combining creative nonfiction with facts, solutions, and soul-stirring reflection, Gaia’s Own:

• Helps children understand climate and environmental issues in an accessible way
• Inspires connection with Nature through empathy, mindfulness, and curiosity
• Encourages individual and collective action—with hope, not fear
• Offers a fresh, intergenerational perspective on sustainability and oneness

Whether you're a student, homeschooler, parent, teacher, or young changemaker, you'll find Gaia’s Own is a timely, empowering read that reconnects children with what truly matters. The book has 10 chapters, each approaching the issue of climate change from a different perspective and presenting related examples and real-life scenarios. At the end of each chapter, action steps and points to ponder are provided as "Gateways to Gaia," to help develop a deeper connection with Nature. These include the following:

• spend more time outdoors
• hug a tree
• keep screentime to a minimum
• pay attention to the food as you eat
• love animals
• eat healthy foods
• write often in a journal
• plant more trees
• visit parks and beaches often
• and feel gratitude

The book also shares the words of wisdom spoken across ages and from all over the world, introducing young minds to new concepts. Such as

Your diet is a bank account. Good food choices are good investments. ~ Bethenny Frankel

Man belongs to Earth, Earth does not belong to man. ~ Native American Proverb.

Climate change is the single biggest thing that humans have ever done on this planet. The one thing that needs to be bigger is our movement to stop it. ~ Bill McKibben

Gaia’s Own: Every Child’s Guide to Living in Harmony with Nature is contemporary artist Dharshana Bajaj’s first book. This is a creative nonfiction that, via an exchange of emails between a young girl and her itinerant grandfather, introduces various concepts on the theme of Nature and climate change. While the tweenager Satvika, or Satvi, presents the questions and concerns, the older and wiser character in the book, Grandpa Yogesh, reminds readers of things long forgotten, and offers solutions that could yet save the day.

This book is for everyone but is primarily written for preteens and older children. It aims to share insights, both old and new, about the interdependence between mankind and the natural world. The Foreword has been written by Mr. Pushpanath Krishnamurthy, a climate change/environment activist.

What the readers say:
"A model of the kind of optimistic and caring conversations we need more of!" Bill McKibben, environmentalist and author, We Are Better Together.

"We appreciate it very much ... It conveys the kind of spirit shared by many Greenpeace supporters." Greenpeace International

"Dharshana has created a sensitive and timely book that not only introduces young people to the urgent environmental questions of the day but also opens up the conversation in a way that allows them to make their own decisions and discoveries. Beautifully put together.” Parvathi Nayar, artist and writer who works with Water, space and urban memory

Edition details

• Publisher: Dharshana Bajaj
• Publication date: 2022
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9356594821
• ISBN 13: 9789356594821
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 120