Harmony and the Bhagavad-gita: Lessons from a Life-Changing Move to the Wilderness  by Visakha

Henry David Thoreau, who read and admired Bhagavad-gita, stimulated the American imagination with Walden. In Harmony and the Bhagavad-gita, Visakha and her family follow Thoreau’s path, stepping out of the daily grind into a simple, introspective life in the woods, with Bhagavad-gita lighting their way.

Harmony is a contemplative memoir accompanied by sixty-two lyrical, black-and-white photographs. Weaving the Bhagavad-gita’s age-old wisdom with contemporary concerns, this book explores an enduring basis for personal, ecological, and social harmony. And the book serves as a spiritual compass for those who dare to look afresh at the attitudes and goals we sometimes blindly accept.

Visakha, her husband, and daughter lived ordinary lives in an ordinary home on an ordinary street in Los Angeles. Longing for something more, they gathered their savings and gumption and, in the summer of 1999, made a leap to Sharanagati, a rustic homestead in a raw, enchanting 1,600-acre valley in British Columbia.

There they shared the open air and changing seasons with loons, black bears, aphids, ants, forest fires and rugged, spiritually-inclined individualists who were inspired by a culture as old as history. There they took in soul-stirring, sweeping life lessons that are suited for any time, place and circumstance.

Focusing on internal development along with a simple lifestyle, Harmony gives readers a chance to find genuine meaning in the entertainment of a good story well told.

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