Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults Quotes

“A species and a culture that treat the natural world with respect and reciprocity will surely pass on genes to ensuing generations with a higher frequency than the people who destroy it.”
― Monique Gray Smith, Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants

“What would it be like to be raised on gratitude, to speak to the natural world as a member of the democracy of species, to raise a pledge of interdependence? What happens to nationalism, to political boundaries, that cannot be bought or sold?”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants

“down payment on a debt of gratitude.”
― Monique Gray Smith, Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants

“The forest is ragged and uneven from centuries of windthrow,”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants

“I’ve heard it said that sometimes, in return for the gifts of the earth, gratitude is enough. It is our uniquely human gift to express thanks because we have the awareness and the collective memory to remember that the world could be less generous than it is. I think we are called to go beyond cultures of gratitude, to once again become cultures of reciprocity.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants